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Ask HN: Six month sabbatical in Colombia. Any words of wisdom?

4 points by sdsfddeo ↗ HN
I'm a 20 something front end dev based in the US. Planning to head to Bogota, and/or Cali in Colombia for five to six months around August, or December of this year or January of next year. Budgeting around 8000 usd towards this. Planning to do some photography, and hobby dev. projects, and probably learn Salsa in Cali, and brush up on my Spanish/get fluent. And take stuff as it comes, meditate, contemplate on life and some other more lofty goals.

Does that seem too much, or too little to do. What other things should I do? Haven't done anything like this before so looking for some advice. If any of you have done something similar, or are from Colombia, and have some tips/advice, please let me know. Thanks. Also if you have traveled a lot in general, I would appreciate your recommendations and insights too!

Thanks.

8 comments

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Jun8
From what I've read: take care and be cautious! The situation is getting better (I recently read about the reviving Bogota party scene) and the violence is moving to other countries in Central America, but still.
drKarl
I'm from Barcelona, Spain, but I've been to Colombia some years ago for a project for an important spanish bank. I was there 5 times, and the total stay where 8 months. You should travel around the country, but while you should definitively visit Bogota, keep in mind that this city is in the middle of the Andes, and it is 2.600 meters above the sea level. That means that the weather can be colder than on the coast (nothing really cold, but more rainy sometimes) and the temperatures can be 15º-25ºC, while on the seaside the temperatures are more like 30º-40º. It is in the tropic, so there are no 4 seasons, just the wet season and the dry season.

You should go to San Andres Island, Santa Marta, Cartagena, Cali... it's a must to do scuba diving on all these places, don't miss Tayrona National Park!! I also enjoyed my trip to Leticia, in the middle of the Amazon Jungle, just where Colombia frontiers with Brazil and Peru.

Enjoy and take care!!

seven
Some recommendations for connectivity, that helped or would have helped me during my trips in Africa:

Setup some sort of vpn service that you can use in case of restricted internet access.

If you run your own mailserver, open up a port beside 25, since some provider will block this one.

An ip over dns setup is something you should consider as well.

Make backups and use encryption.

Have fun!

petervandijck
I live in Colombia, ask me anything.
whirlwind23
Thanks, I'll probably email you in a while when I have more specific questions.
bigohms
I've done this. 8K is a bit of money unless you're going for a relatively high end experience, especially in Cali. Keep it light, cheap and clean. Spend money on getting to places to meet people, a good internet connection/cell, and maybe a light mode of transport to move around (like a motorcycle or cheap small car). Definitely Cali is the place to start out, the people seem to be friendlier and more social. Go to the Termales, San Andres Island, Andre Carne De Res, Coffee Region (stay at a local hacienda/farm), etc.
whirlwind23
Thanks. Just curious, how long were you there/whereever, and what was the burn rate in terms of money? 8k is just an upper bound I had in mind for what I am willing to spend without breaking the bank.

In terms of staying, would you recommend against renting a place for like two-three months, given that I'd like to travel ? I was mostly going to pack a laptop / camera / some clothes / and buy other stuff locally.