Doug’s World

Photos from Colombia, Mexico, and points in between

I spent some time today organizing all the photos I’ve taken in the last week, and here are a few from Bogota and Mexico City …

Here are some shots from a lookout we went to at the end of the day Friday. It’s a mile or so out of town, up high on a nearby hill and overlooking the city. Bogota is over 7000 feet above sea level, and the mountains nearby are steep and rugged.

Security at the Bogota airport was very high. Our Microsoft colleague Sandra had arranged for two American Express people to meet us there and help us get through security, which was a nice touch. We thought they were a scam at first, when they approached us on the sidewalk out front, but when we saw they had a form with our names and flight information on it so we figured they knew what they were doing.

Every item in my checked luggage was removed and manually inspected, and the security guard even removed the lining of my suitcase to check beneath it. (I hadn’t know it was removable, actually, or I surely would have stashed a kilo of cocaine in there.) And he sniffed everything with his own nose — even my dirty laundry. Then at another checkpoint they made me turn on my laptop and boot it up, and they also went through everything in my carry-on luggage by hand. After all that, and two metal detectors, I still got patted down as a final step.

From the way the security guards were sniffing everything (here’s one sniffing a tourist’s bag of Colombian coffee) it appeared they were more concerned about drugs than weapons. Please report back to the planners of the war on drugs that Colombia is doing everything we want them to do, and there should be no use of marijuana or cocaine worldwide shortly, right around the time Iraq becomes a peaceful democracy.

Here are four shots from the flight, taken over Colombia, Panama, and Mexico:

And now we’re in Mexico City. Last night we hooked up with Guillermo, and after Megan showed him around Second Life a bit we went out to a rocking gay bar in the central part of the city. Lots more on that in the next post.

Our hotel here in Mexico City, Camino Real, is pretty cool. Here are two shots showing the combination of beauty and practical playground utility …

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 13th, 2007 at 3:23 pm. You can subscribe to comments on this post through its RSS feed.