Mompox Visited

Mompox ended up exactly as advertised. It was a sleepy little town on an island in the middle of no-where. The river flowed around the town, only about six feet below the town’s street level. This was our last couple of days off the gringo trail, and it was evident. This town is so hard to get to, that it is even off the Colombian tourist trail. During the day, the kids play in the very-brown river, as small river boats delivered their produce, while in the evening, the old folks sit out in front of their house in their official Mompox designed rocking chairs and watch the bats catch their quota of insects.

The town has a very interesting story as it is the gateway up the river to the interior of the country from Cartagena. First built in 1537, it was a very rich town with grande haciendas, churches, and plazas. Their real claim to fame though was that 400 men from the town volunteered to fight alongside Simon Bolivar in Venezuela for the final liberty from Spain. Bolivar had a soft spot in his heart for the town and returned there about 10 times over a 20 year period – and typical of a proud South American community, they have the plaques and statues to commemorate the visits.

Being the only tourists (I’m sure since Easter), the people were very friendly, always willing to strike up a conversation or show us their version of a fruit wine. The reason for the lack of tourists is no doubt the lack of recognition of the government of Colombia – an obvious sore point which was clearly noted in a tourist brochure. Specifically, there is no full road access, just ferrys, old bridges, and dirt roads. Because of this, the town stays in a time capsule, somewhere in the 1800’s…

While we don’t think that we contracted malaria, or even received one mosquito bite, judging from the amount of standing water all around the country-side, we can certainly understand why it would be high risk area. As a matter of fact, one of the biggest surprises to us during our whole trip through South America has been the comparative lack of insects versus good old British Columbia.