We moved around a lot in August. We started out in Envigado in the southern part of Medellín but moved to the Manila neighborhood adjacent to the trendy and hip Poblado neighborhood when our friend Wayne came to visit us for 4 nights. We finished up school and spent our last weekend in Medellín enjoying the Festival de Flores with our friend. One day after Wayne left Medellín, we did too. Our 3 months in Colombia were about to come to an end, and we wanted to see more of the country. We traveled by bus to 5 different cities towards the border of Ecuador. Once we reached the border, we crossed into Ecuador and spent our last few days of August in our second South American country.
Expenses
* A few notes about these expenses. Because Spanish classes are not a “normal” travel expense, I am presenting this expense separately from the total of everything else. In the past, I report exactly what actually comes out of my bank account each month, but since we may book one or two months of accommodations, transportation, or Spanish classes ahead of time, I’m now reporting not when I spent the money but what month the money was spent on.
Spanish Classes: $517.39
Everything Else: $2,447.06
The Grand Total: $2,964.45
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Spanish Classes
On August 9, after 7 weeks of Spanish classes, we had our last day at Elefun, our school in Medellín. The teachers and support staff surprised us with balloons, certificates, and a pineapple. That pineapple would turn into a tropical-tasting cocktail when our friend Wayne bought a bottle of rum!
So, do we speak Spanish now? Not very well. Are we better than when we arrived in Colombia on June 1? Yes. Was our experience at Elefun beneficial? I think so. Was it worth the money? I’m not sure.
I hope to write more about our Spanish learning in a separate post soon.
We spent $517.39 for 7 days of Spanish class in August.
Communication
Our phone bill for August includes Greg’s Google Fi plan, $74.95, a plan recharge for my Colombia phone plan, $7.74, and $5.00 for an Ecuadorian sim card.
As I mentioned in July’s expense report, Google Fi sent a notice that they would cut off Greg’s data plan at the end of August. And they did. So we have changed his plan to a much cheaper call and text-only plan. Our phone bill will go down in the coming months and I will tell you about our new South American phone plan in future Expense Reports.
Consumables
We had a pretty low grocery bill ($235.56) due to eating out lots. We ate out for every meal besides breakfast when Wayne was visiting. As we Airbnb hopped our way to the Ecuador border, we were able to buy fresh fruit for breakfast and carry bread, cheese, and vegetables with us for our lunchtime sandwiches. But although we tried to book places with kitchens, carrying enough ingredients with us and having enough time to cook dinners was trickier – especially when we only stayed somewhere for 2 or 3 nights. And, of course, part of the fun of traveling to new places is eating out.
We are still mostly only drinking when we go out, so the booze bill was pretty low too, $18.11. We spent a little on toilet paper (which seems so much cheaper here than in the US) $3.63, and some ibuprofen, $0.76.
Except in Cali, grocery stores were pretty limited (which was another reason to dine out more). I was super surprised, though, in Salento to find a well-stocked Tiendas D1 that looked just like an American Aldi.
Entertainment
As I have already alluded to, our eating and drinking out expenses were a lot higher than usual, $711.61. But if you think about the total as eating out most dinners, some lunches, and quite a few beers, it really isn’t that bad. Eating out in Colombia is economical. And drinking out became even more economical once we left Medellín.
The $27.18 we spent on Museums, Attractions, Music, etc. includes money for street performer tips and bathroom visits (because I would rather not start a category just for pay bathrooms). We also spent $12.19 to visit the Medellín Botanical Gardens (usually free) during the Feria de Flores and $5.98 for a ride on a gondola to see a remarkable cathedral built in a canyon. The kind person who sold us the gondola tickets gave us the tecera edad price (senior discount).
Personal
Clothes
In Ecuador, Greg bought a Panama hat ($35) and a t-shirt ($7) at the Plaza de Ponchos, a huge artisanal indigenous market in Otavalo.
Gifts/Charity
On our last day of school, as a thank you to the staff of Elefun we brought them a variety of pastries from our favorite European bakery, $9.16.
Gear
Greg lost his reading glasses, so we bought a new pair for $8.54. We stayed at an Airbnb with few cooking utensils so we bought a set of 3, leaving 2 at the Airbnb and taking one with us, $4.90 (Having adequate equipment to cook is often a problem at some of the places we stay). And we bought a zipper pouch at the Plaza de Ponchos to replace a plastic pouch with a broken zipper for $7.00.
Subscriptions
We subscribe to Netflix, Abode Photoshop, The New York Times, and Michael Fox’s (A freelance filmmaker, journalist, podcaster, and musician reporting from the road in Latin America) Patreon account ($56.41).
Traveling Life
Storage
We pay $76 for a storage locker back in the US.
Accommodations
Once again we went a bit over ($72.80) our target budget of $900 for accommodations. This is partially because we broke a refrigerator bin. Although I heard a crack at the time, I didn’t realize we had actually broken anything until the Airbnb host asked for compensation. It was $14.74, and we didn’t argue.
We spent our first eight days of August in Envigado. You can read more about this accommodation in July’s expense report.
All of our accommodations in August were booked through Airbnb.
Manila, Medellín
August 8–13, $192 (We split the cost of 4 nights with our friend and paid full price for one night – another reason why we went over $900 for accommodations), two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment.
When our friend Wayne came to visit, we moved back to Manila, where we had first stayed when we came to Medellín. We really liked the area, which is closer to the city center than where we had been in Envigado. We rented a two-bedroom apartment just down the street from where we stayed back in June.
The bedrooms were nice and big and had plenty of storage. There were two full bathrooms. The living area was ok for 3 people who didn’t spend much time at the apartment. The kitchen was somewhat well-equipped and luckily there was a blender for us to make pineapple rum smoothies.
Jardin
August 13–16, $101.76 (3 nights), private room in a hostel with an en suite bathroom.
The first city we visited after we left Medellín was a little town about 3 hours away by bus called Jardín. I looked at lots of different Airbnbs in Jardín, including whole houses, but none of them looked as cozy and had as much character as the hostal, Hotel Plenitud.
Our room had a nice balcony view with big wooden doors and lots of natural light. There was a closet for our clothes. There were no pots and pans in the shared kitchen. When I brought this up to one of the hosts he told me that people didn’t do that kind of cooking there. I was very disappointed to not be able to make a grilled cheese sandwich and with his response.
But we enjoyed our stay there anyway. It was very close El Centro and the bus stop.
Salento
August 16–19 $66.13 (3 nights), shared apartment with a private bathroom outside the bedroom.
I was having a hard time finding places to stay in Salento. Salento is a tourist town, and everything I looked at was either pricey, didn’t have the right amenities (e.g., a kitchen), or had unfavorable reviews. I thought the place we finally chose was a homestay (staying with the owners). The stay came with a private bathroom but it was located outside the bedroom. This wasn’t ideal, but the bedroom and common spaces looked nice. It ended up being an apartment shared with another Airbnb guest (who we never saw) and a tenant who would pass through the apartment to get to her space upstairs. Since it wasn’t a homestay we ended up feeling totally comfortable using the common space.
When we arrived at the address I was given on Airbnb, there was a lot of confusion about where the apartment was actually located. Greg and I weren’t too concerned but our taxi driver was very concerned. He asked around and finally found a woman who knew exactly where we were going. She took us to the apartment and knocked on the door next door calling for the owner who eventually arrived and took us up to the apartment.
The place was comfortable but the king-sized bed in our room took up the whole space (there was any place to put our stuff) and the room didn’t have a window to the outside. Our bathroom had a sewage smell. The other room had a private bathroom and a balcony. It must not have been available when I booked. But the price was right on this place, it was conveniently located, had a nice view, and a well-equipped kitchen.
Cali
August 19–24, $156.69 (5 nights), one-bedroom, one-bathroom loft with an outdoor shower.
Cali was our rest stop. So we didn’t get out and do much, despite Cali being the third most populated city in Colombia. And because it was our rest stop we wanted a comfortable place to hang out in a good neighborhood. I loved the place we ended up at!
It was a two-story apartment with a loft. There were two small patios on each level and a big old wooden door that opened up to a shallow balcony and let in lots of light. The outdoor shower was quite unique. Because Cali has a warmer climate showering outside was great! We could walk anywhere we wanted to go (besides the bus terminal). And our host was great. He met us at the apartment, bringing us snacks and telling us about all the cool things the city had to offer.
Unfortunately, the outside of the building was being painted during our stay, so our view out the big door was of the workers.
Pasto
August 24–26, $52.65 (2 nights), one-bedroom, one-bathroom apartment.
I picked this apartment for the price, the big windows, the location, and the view of the church. Other than that it wasn’t one of my favorites. The electricity sparked when I plugged stuff in. I hated the cold-looking tile floors. The place looked like it was originally one big room that had been divided up to make an apartment. And although the location was great, it must have not been entirely safe as people kept telling us to be careful (including the host).
The host was super nice. We arrived late and after I texted her, she showed up with her boyfriend, son, and his girlfriend to let us in. It was Friday night and I suspected that they were out enjoying themselves somewhere when she got my message. The security in this place seemed a little overkill. We had 4 doors and gates to unlock to get in and out.
We mainly stopped here to break up our trip to the border and because one of our Spanish teachers told us how much he loved Pasto.
Ipiales
August 26–28, $59.76 (2 nights), two-bedroom, one bathroom apartment.
Ipiales was our last stop before crossing the border. It is a depressing town and there are only two reasons that I know to go here – to cross to or from Ecuador and to see the Santuario de Nuestra Señora del Rosario de Las Lajas, an amazing cathedral built in a canyon right outside of the city.
Once again I had a hard time finding a place I liked. The apartment we ended up at was nice enough but it didn’t have any windows to the outside – but rather windows to courtyards in the middle of the building. In the living room, light was borrowed from the apartment above through structural glass in the ceiling. The furniture wasn’t comfortable, and the tile floor wasn’t cozy. The kitchen wasn’t well-equipped (we had to go out a buy a wooden spatula) which was a problem because we couldn’t find any restaurants that might serve anything remotely vegetarian, so we cooked for all our meals.
Otavalo
August 28–31, $89.01 (3 nights), two-bedroom, 1 and 1/2 bathroom apartment.
This apartment wasn’t my style but it was big (two stories) and had a good view from the roof. It was conveniently located a couple of blocks from the bus station and walking distance from restaurants and the Plaza de los Panchos. The host was very nice.
Transportation
We spent $227.71 on transportation in August. $27.72 was for reloading our metro card in Medellín – we still had a balance on our last day so we left the card in our Airbnb. $18.04 was spent on taxis in Medellín. $131.19 was spent on 8 buses from Medellín to Quito. And $50.76 was spent on local taxis, buses, a tuk-tuk, and a Willie (Jeep) in the places we visited.
I estimate we traveled over 835 miles from Medellín to Quito (including some local excursions). If we had been traveling this distance in our van I estimate gas would have cost us about $222.00 (15 miles per gallon at $4 a gallon).
Hopefully, I will find some time to write a blog post just about our bus experiences. But what I’ve learned so far is that it is never the same. Sometimes you can buy tickets ahead of time online, sometimes not. You can flag a bus down from anywhere. A taxi driver flagged down a bus going in the opposite direction. The bus stopped. The taxi driver made a U-turn and we boarded. Sometimes there are big busy bus terminals, sometimes there is just a spot in the road where the buses stop. Sometimes you can buy your tickets ahead of time at the terminal, and sometimes the terminal has no ticket offices. Most companies don’t publish their schedules online so we have been relying on blog posts from people who have done the routes we want to take or just going to the terminal to hopefully find the information we need.
One of our most unusual bus trips was on an open-air Chiva from Jardín to Río Sucio over some pretty rugged road. Locally we took a tuk-tuk in Jardin to see some waterfalls and road on the back of a Jeep, called a Willie, in Salento to visit Valle de Cocora where giant Wax Palms grow. We had one super nice taxi driver coming back from Las Lajas Sanctuary outside of Ipiales who turned Google Translate on to chat with us and stopped at a mirador above the church so that we could take pictures.
Most of our transportation was reasonably priced, except for one Uber trip from our Airbnb in Salento to the bus station that cost $6.14 for less than a mile’s distance.
Most of the buses are big and comfortable. And if you get hungry or thirsty en route, there will almost be vendors that board the bus with snacks and drinks at many of the stops.
Right Now
We crossed the border to Ecuador on August 28. Right now, we are in Cuenca, Ecuador, at a house sit taking care of a cat. We love it here!
Obviously, I am very behind on these posts. I had a bit of a rough time in Quito (more on that in another blog post) and just didn’t have the energy or inspiration to write. I am trying to get back into the swing of things now. I don’t want to give up the blog. I have so many pictures and a few interesting stories. I promise to dedicate a little bit of my time to catching up every day.
Thanks, as always, for following along. It helps inspire me to know you are out there enjoying my stories.
To see all of our expense reports, click here.
If you are interested in reading other expense reports from nomads who really know how to live cheaply while still having a good time, check out the blog from our friends Mark, Liesbet, and Maya who are traveling in their truck camper in South America at Roaming About.
Thanks for all the pictures and commentary. Vicariously enjoying your travels!
Thank you, John!
I love reading about adventures with Greg and Duwan! So much fun, great pics! Wow!!!! Love y’all!
Thanks! Love you too!
I am enjoying your stories and reports! I have to say that you two stayed in much nicer accommodations than we ever did, the few times we stayed in Airbnbs, especially in Peru.
I’m surprised at the cost of your transportation, especially when compared to potentially driving in your van – or our camper. We paid $2 per gallon of gasoline in Colombia and Ecuador, not $4, so either the prices went up or you could have done that distance much cheaper in your own vehicle.
The food in your photos looks really good! I’m glad you enjoyed eating out in those two countries. It gets more expensive and less tasty further south! Yeah, we had the same experience in our Airbnbs – it was difficult to cook and have the right equipment for that.
I’m looking forward to reading about all the places you visited and explored!
Thanks! I’m going to get more posts out while we are here in Cuenca. Unfortunately, we have power cuts every day so working on the computer is limited.
I am basing gas prices on what we saw a few times in Colombia and Ecuador, but since we no longer have a vehicle we don’t pay much attention to them. I think part of the price difference in Colombia is that the exchange rate is not as good as it was when you were there. And now in Ecuador there is an energy crisis. There are daily blackouts up to ten hours a day. Businesses are running generators which is mostly likely running gas prices up. $4 a gallon is rounding up so it could be less.
The food has been for the most part good. We have had a few disappointing meals, but I love arepas and the hashbrown burrito was great!
Having nice accommodations where I feel comfortable is very important to me. I spend hours looking for places that have all the amenities we want and that look inviting. It quite a job. I’m sure if I was younger I wouldn’t care as much — and we could find cheaper places.