hi folks - colombia is on my list of places to go, but I don't really want to stay in medellin, which is where i see most people are going to. I'd like to stay in a smaller town, kind of be away from noise and business, to be able to focus on my business and be surrounded by nature. any thoughts?

The nice thing about medellin is there are loads of small towns nearby that offer quiet places to get away from the city, all very accessible, though internet may be an issue depending on your needs. You'd be able to find 4g in a lot of places if that helps. Jardin is a lovely town, where they raise these famous horses. It's not too wild except when the locals bring out the horses to show off on the weekends, and there's nice mountains all around. Salento, also nearby, is quite famous for nearby valle del cocora, but also offers coffee plantations, eco lodges, and beautiful hikes. I've gone a few times and love it there. Both places will be quiet during the week, and busier on weekends. Guatape I think is becoming quite famous, but when I was there it was very quiet, though I'm guessing most people come up as day trips from medellin these days, so I can't be sure. One of the reasons I love medellin is that the mountains and nature are so accessible. Most people take advantage only on the weekends, but you can easily go for a week or more and find quiet places to work from. There are loads of more places, but these are the spots I know the best and have been multiple times

wow salento looks amazing but i can see the tourists coming in every weekend 😅 i'm just looking to not be in a big city anymore after years in NYC and now Berlin... i want to have good internet, live cheaply and be surrounded by nature basically

yeah there are loads of little towns like that in the region. the coffee region has a lot of little colonial towns to base out of, all of them in the mountains. good internet though will be a challenge unless you're comfortable using 4g

yeah good internet is pretty essential, i have to do calls a few times a day

I used to have a lot of calls when I lived there too, and unless I was on a fiber line in MDE, I needed to run the calls over data. Not sure of your setup, but 4g beats land connection for quality and latency most of the time

how's the transportation there like

in colombia? great. There were regular buses/vans to all these towns from medellin, and they were quite comfortable. new Mercedes sprinter and the like

Fantastic, thanks!

I'd highly recommend working from Salento for a few days. I stayed at the coffee tree hostel and they have great wifi, hammocks, and a bit away from the main plaza. I worked out of there for one day and it clears out during the day for people doing a lot of day excursions.

Would Salento be a place to stay longer term, for like a month or two? I'd really like to avoid Medellin or big cities for my 3-4 month stay

No, maybe a week, but it's worth checking out if you are in Medellin

Gotcha. Are there any smaller towns in Colombia nomads go to? So not Bogota, Medellin, Cali

I'm currently in Santa Marta>Minca>Tayrona. Internet is spotty out here. People go to Cartagena, but not sure the length of stay most nomads stay there. Usually if there is a Selina there are nomads which Cartagena has.

Salento is _WONDERFUL_, but I did not work at all during the long weekend I spent there. Same thing for Santa Marta - Parque Tayrona is also absolutely gorgeous. You might have to compromise a bit on either your desire to be in nature, or your need to have a fast, reliable internet connection zjxuawwhhtdbbn

phzeybkdanelhg what weather are you looking for? The coast will be quite toasty and humid. Check out Manizales (colder, beautiful mountains), Filandia (close to Salento, but more accessible). Barichara might be cool if you can get somewhere with solid internet. I'm currently full-time in the rural outskirts of Pereira and loving it, but took a lot of lifeops to get life going for me and my wife.

rlrszrnruzbycgyobtefnarmq just arrived in Minca, #colombia

bfcmxulm Not hot and humid, so we'll probably avoid the coast 😅 just looking for a relatively warm/mild temperature where we can work in. what do you mean by lifeops haha? how's the internet there?

shhgbqdsermngo yeah, then you want to just focus on the coasts when you want to go on a time-boxed adventure :) - that said, totally amazing and worth it. We chose to focus on the coffee region because of "eternal spring weather," proximity to international airports, ability to live more "rural" (we're done with cities - married, wanting to focus on regenerative lifestyle).

By lifeops I mean setting up a life - bank account, car, cell phones, insurance, etc :wink:. Took us a couple of months to get it all done, and that's with me being a citizen! However, we're now betting on making a headquarters here (family, the such), so it's a different case than most nomads that require less of a local footprint.

The internet… is a struggle as is in most of the developing world. We got internet at our apartment, and it's good enough (20Mb down/4-5Mb up). Also, I have an office where there's fiber. With Filandia & other places… you might want to have whoever you get in touch with do a speedtest.net test and share the results with you.

An important Internet topic I've found that while the bandwidth and ping might be good during a test/snapshot, the issue comes down to lag-spikes and packet loss, which is when audio/video/screen-sharing sessions become the most frustrating.

that's really useful advice, thank you!

Anyone know if any of the islands near Cartagena have decent internet? Tierra Bomba? Isla de baru?

Cali is the land of salsa qibfalxztalecdkjmu

Oh shit y'all…. planning post-nomad life and the prices for long term rentals in Cartagena have got me like eyesok_hand

Not that I'm aware of…

uotyhkevjbq Selina Cartagena has a coworking space. It is really pretty, but it can also be noisy because (as of January 2019) they have a live band that plays right outside of it

Thanks tdyqwlxeuuamayxv

Cartagena is hot and humid, but if you're ok with that then it'll be ok. Medellin has more of a nomad scene and workspaces.

Yes, I'm from the Caribbean cost of Colombia and have lived in Medellin as well :)

lvxkjowzbjwto just arrived in Cartagena, , #colombia

tzyvcobsp just arrived in Cartagena, #colombia

In #medellin what’s going on here

tdsujcoqbon just arrived in #medellin #colombia

fmhkohuly just arrived in #medellin #colombia

How's the internet in smaller cities and towns?

szzoymbkobs roll of the dice. Cities, likely good, towns, likely bad. However, nowadays, there’s pretty good cell (4G) coverage in surprising places and data packages are fairly cheap.

Hey guys

Both of those are good itineraries. Definitely take a flight if you're going to the Caribbean coast; I would not attempt that journey by ground

wovdzuigeom with a big _IF_ there’s 4G; very mountainous country in places, so check service before committing. YMMV.

how is bogota doing btw? www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/20/colombia-border-closed-protests-ivan-duque

I had a friend send me a video of the protests in Bogota; it was rainy and tranquil, heh

Cali is in utter chaos apparently this evening. Riots and looters breaking into apartments and houses. People shooting in the streets. Hopefully everything is good after tonight. Cali is a wonderful place normally

I'm slowly making my way through Eduardo Galeano's The Open Veins of Latin America, and I recommend it to anyone who went to grade or high school in the global North who wants to visit L America for any length of time.

Helps explain the current unrest. The policies described in the book continue, untrammeled or worse, 40 years after the book was published.

Yea, I was in the middle of all that Cali chaos. Very interesting experience. Back in Medellin now.

oh yikes

Súper bien! lpplbffrdayvg

also how is bogota folks?

I haven’t made it to bogota yet

What's great about it?

Based on being there last week Messy as usual. If you stay within the “bubble of privilege” (Estrato 4-6) you’ll hardly notice anything is going on. If you go into the “center” or try to drive anywhere, you might hit a protest and be stuck in traffic for hours. We left the city on Wednesday, driving from Parque 93 to La Mesa/Anapoima, and hit a protest in Soacha. We had to 4x4 around small roads to get around it.

It’s quite nice actually. Before I came to Colombia everyone how Bogota is a crap city and dangerous etc.
I was pleasantly surprised to find this was not really true. Make friends with a couple of locals and you will be well and truly sorted

Awesome! I was asking mostly in the context of protests

Yes, Flamingo hostel/coworking space is great, in Santa Marta

Great. Thanks so much.

sobknifebroken_heart

has anyone worked from salento per chance?

I've heard Internet there is pretty choppy but no personal experience

hmmm gotcha

It was okay, I found one coffee shop where I was able to work

equzhksnwtwswfi ahh awesome - did your airbnb have okay wifi?

I stayed in a very basic hotel, wifi was okay there, but no workspace

ahh gotcha 👍 thanks for letting me know!