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Travel Guide

The Most Enjoyable Cycling Climbs Close to Bogotá

Posted on November 13, 2020
most enjoyable cycling climbs close to Bogotá

If you follow cycling at all, you’ll know Colombians are famous for being the best climbers. If you didn’t, now you know! It’s honestly no surprise with the amount of mountains we have here. It’s hard to go out for a ride and keep away from steep hills. Now, we’re no pros, but we’ve been on our fair share of extremely fun rides with really enjoyable climbs. These are our favorite and the most enjoyable cycling climbs close to Bogotá! Read to the end for our favorite! I marked all their starting points on the map below.

If you’d like to read about outdoor adventures close to Bogota, click here!

The Most Enjoyable Cycling Climbs Close to Bogotá

Club de la Montaña

If you really don’t want to leave the city, this is the climb for you! It is pretty far north (Calle 183), but it’s truly ideal. After entering a pretty nice neighborhood, you get to an unpaved road. The first two curves are the hardest, and then it’s up and up. The climb is a total of 1.1 kilometers at an 8% gradient. It’s not long, so it’s a good way to start biking or start acclimatizing to Bogota’s altitude. We enjoy going when there isn’t much time and do the climb 3 or 4 times.

Alto el Vino

As you head west from Bogotá on Calle 80, it’s mostly flat… for a little while. If you can withstand the traffic getting out of the city, a beautiful climb awaits you about an hour and a half out. The uphill section is 3.9 kilometers at an average 5.5% gradient. Not super tough, but a nice way to cap off the ride! BONUS: now, from the top of Alto del Vino, you can ride down the windy road to La Vega. Quite good cyclists do this, because the climb up back from there is 29 kilometers at a 5.7% average gradient.

Patios

This is probably the best-known cycling climb close to Bogota because it is literally in Bogota. You start right in the middle of the city, on the intersection between Calle 85 and Carrera 7 (I marked it on the map below). The climb is 6.5 kilometers at an average 7% gradient. This road gets really crowded, and it’s shared with cars, so I suggest getting up very early for it (starting the climb at 6 a.m.).

La Valvanera

This climb is in Chia, a town right outside of Bogota headed north. It’s absolutely beautiful, and makes for great exercise. It’s a 3.6 kilometer slope at a 5.4% gradient. What’s great about riding here is the amount of gorgeous routes that connect to each other, like La Valvanera does. If you’re going to do this climb, I suggest you get on Strava or a similar app and make up a route. Do note there are indigenous communities who sometimes block the roads around Chia. If this is the case, simply turn around!

Pionono

Let it be known, this is by far the hardest climb we’ve done yet. At one point, it has a 32% gradient!! It’s incredible though! You have to get to Sopó, a town known for Alpina and being a weekend getaway. Then, you get an insane hill right off the start, and it doesn’t ease up all that much until you get to the Pionono Ecological Park. All in all, it’s about 4 kilometers at an average 14.7% gradient. Not for the faint of heart, but SO worth it!

El Verjón

This is one of the most enjoyable cycling climbs close to Bogota! Actually, it’s Lala’s favorite. It starts off in downtown Bogota, right next to the ticket office to go up to Monserrate. What’s great about this ride is you immediately feel like you’re in nature because, well, you really are. This cycling climb is longer, but not quite as tough: 16 kilometers at a 4% gradient. You can choose to ride another 4 kilometers to Col 86, with some ups and downs, which is where the road down to Choachí begins. BONUS: if you ride all the way down to Choachí to ride back up, you’re in for a treat. That climb is very difficult, at 22.5 kilometers and a 6% gradient, but is truly breathtaking!

Yerbabuena

Now this is my favorite place to ride uphill on a bike close to Bogota! It’s just barely outside of the city headed north, and we enjoy it so much because it’s never as crowded as other popular spots and is simply very green. At just 3.5 kilometers and a 9% gradient, it’s just perfect for a quick ride, or you can pair it with a bunch of other routes north of the city!

Don’t hesitate to do these enjoyable cycling climbs close to Bogota! They’re tough, but with a little bit of grit, anyone can do them. Biking is an incredible way to burn a bunch of calories and get to know new places while you’re at it.

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Becoming a Better Photographer

Getting Over the Flicker | Day-to-Night Time-lapses

Posted on September 11, 2020
sunset, bogota, time-lapses

I’ve always loved time-lapses, but I’ve put off learning how to make one in changing light for the longest time. Usually, if I made a time-lapse during a sunset, also known as a holy grail time-lapse, one of two things would happen. It would either get dark way too quickly when there were still colors and clouds I wanted to capture (I wouldn’t change any settings for the time-lapse), or the time-lapse would flicker as the light changed (I would let my camera automatically expose for every shot or expose manually for every shot).

So I read up on the subject and, as it turns out, there is some technical work to be done while taking the time-lapse pictures, but what it really comes down to is the software you use to edit time-lapses. Good thing is, it’s FREE.

Amateur Takes on Sunset Time-lapses

The Shooting

Though creating an awesome time-lapse does mostly come down to using LRTimelapse, there is a best way to shoot time-lapses for them to come out as smooth as possible. (There may be other ways, but this is how I learned.)

To sum it up, you need to set the exposure as you want it, which will usually be ‘0’ on your exposure meter, and then switch back to 0 as it gets darker or lighter on your exposure meter.

I’ll share my learning process to get the hang of this with you – I made sunset time-lapses because 6 a.m. is too early. First, I set up my camera and balanced my image by setting the exposure meter to ‘0.’ With coffee in hand and a book to read, I clicked the intervalometer to begin my time-lapse at an interval of 6 seconds. Then, I kept watch for when the light began to change.

As the sun set, it got darker and my exposure meter read -1/3, then -2/3 and finally 1. That’s when I switched back to 0 and repeated the process for as long as I wished. The second day, I set everything up and decided to be more precise, so every time it got darker and my exposure meter read -1/3, I adjusted it back to 0. This meant smaller jumps in light between sets of pictures than the first day and is better for when the time comes to edit the pictures into a time-lapse.

On the third day, I again adjusted every -1/3, but added a little something. See, once the sun dips under the horizon, the idea is for the time-lapse to show that it indeed has gotten darker (time passing) without letting it get so dark that you can’t see the beautiful details of the blue hour and night. This is a little hard to explain, but I’ll do my best.

As it gets dark, you need to end up adjusting your exposure to -1, not 0. To do this gradually, once the sun set, I left the exposure meter until it read -2/3 and then adjusted it to -1/3 four or five times. Then I let it fall to -1 and adjusted it to -2/3 four or five times. Finally, I let it fall to -1 and 1/3 and from then on adjusted to -1 until I was done with the time-lapse.

After day 3, that was pretty much it, so I continued to play around with techniques and settings. All in all, it’s pretty simple and straightforward. Some key points: adjust your exposure through shutter speed until the shutter speed is half your time-lapse interval (so, if you’re taking pictures every 6 seconds, don’t set your shutter speed over 3 seconds). Once you get to that point, start changing your ISO. Also, it’s best to pause your intervalometer every time you adjust your exposure, but don’t take too long because you want to maintain the time-lapse’s continuity.

I had a blast sitting on the balcony reading and making time-lapses. We switched apartments since then and, though it’s an upgrade, we don’t have quite the view. See all the time-lapses I made right here below!

The Editing

I learned the art of holy-grail time-lapsing using Lightroom and LRTimelapse. Thankfully, LRTimelapse is free… to a certain extent. But it was a sufficient extent! The most limiting factor about LRTimelapse for an amateur like myself is that you can only make time-lapses with 400 pictures. I had some 900-picture time-lapses to make, which meant I had to make three separate time-lapses and put them together in Premiere. This led to some jumps in exposure, but I’ll take it.

Now, I’m not going to go in-depth on how to use the software, but it works like this: you import your photos into LRTimelapse, straighten some squiggly lines, move your photos to Lightroom to edit them, move them back to LRTimelapse to create the transitions between pictures and de-flicker your time-lapse, and finally move back to Lightroom to export your completed time-lapse as a video.

This may sound like complete nonsense to you coming from me, which reminds me – here are the links to the guides I read and watched to learn how to make day-night time-lapses.

This was my very first blog post in the “Becoming a Better Photographer” series. Check them all out here!

Travel Guide

Where to Climb in Colombia

Posted on January 25, 2019
where to climb in Colombia, la mojarra, rock climbing

For us, one of the best reasons to travel is to go climb. Getting to know a new place with friends and climbing on new rock is wonderful. Now, if you’re wondering if there’s climbing in Colombia because you’re coming or might come, let me tell you: there sure is! Colombia has some ridiculously amazing climbing, from an enormous cave in the middle of nowhere with a waterfall spraying from its mouth to small and famous crags an hour from the city. This is where to climb in Colombia.

Since I talked about the cave, I guess we’ll start there!

Where to Climb in Colombia

Florian

There are 4 climbing areas at Florian, one of which is this cave. Obviously, it’s the main attraction. As you gain height on the limestone tufas, all you can hear is the raging waterfall below you and your own yells as you crush your project (the waterfall only rushes during the rainy season). The other areas are cool too, though! This climbing area has everything from 5.10 to 5.14. Getting here is quite the journey because, like I said, Florian is in the middle of nowhere. Part of the drive is 48 km (30 miles) of unpaved roads, putting Florian at about 5 hours from Bogota! There is a new guide for Florian. For info on the guide, how to get there and more, read this blog post!

Suesca

If you’ve been researching where to climb in Colombia, I’m sure this place has come up. Suesca is Colombia’s oldest and most well-known climbing area. The rock is sandstonemnand you can find everything from 5.6 to 5.14 sport climbing and trad. Since this place is so popular, the rock is really slick, and almost everything is vertical. You’ll have a hard time finding something really overhung. Guidebooks are available at any Monodedo store in Bogota or in Suesca. This place is also just 1 hour from Bogota, Colombia’s capital city. Click here to read a full guide on Suesca!

Sutatausa

Sutatausa is also known as Sutanblue because of its similarities to the climbing in Fontainebleau, in France (so, sandstone). I’m not so sure about that, but it is Colombia’s best bouldering area. And though it’s known for its boulders, it also has sport climbing on the imposing cliff-line above. I love this place because it’s extremely beautiful… and it’s only about 2 hours north of Bogota! There is no official guidebook, but you can get a “guide drawing” at the nearby hostel. To read about that and other details regarding Sutatausa, click here!

Macheta

Now, if you read “vertical” for Suesca and didn’t like the sound of it, Macheta is the place for you. Everything is overhung and almost everything is above 5.12. But that’s old Macheta. New Macheta is VERY vertical, and has some gorgeous, extremely long routes that follow splitter cracks in the rock. The place is called the Hall of Justice. A 5-star name for a 5-star climbing area. About 2.5 hours north of Bogota, this spot is a must-visit! You can get a guidebook to Old Macheta at any Monodedo store in Bogota or in Suesca, but there is no guide for New Macheta. To read more about both areas of Macheta, click here!

La Mojarra

The Mecca of Colombian sport climbing. Orange, South American sandstone, amazing routes and a mountainous landscape make La Mojarra something out of a dream. When people ask me where to climb in Colombia, I always recommend this place. It has easy climbs and hard climbs, and they’re all beautiful. It’s 8 hours from Bogota and about 2 from the city of Bucaramanga. The weather is warm and the sun hits the cliff-line in the morning, giving climbers the excuse to sleep in to climb in the afternoon’s sweet temps. You can get a guidebook at Refugio la Roca, a hostel right above the cliff, or on their website. Read more about this climbing area in La Mesa de los Santos here!

Puente Reyes

This place, also known as La Peña de las Aguilas (The Eagles’ Crag, with no eagles though) is a beautiful climbing area in Boyacá. It’s right next to a river in an area of the country where the weather is constantly changing. It has over 40 routes, all on sandstone, with way more to be developed. It’s an almost perfect place for some sport climbing. There’s also a lot to do nearby! There’s quaint towns, like Mongui, hikes, and paradisical natural scenes, like the Laguna Negra. Puente Reyes has a guidebook (more like guide-PDF) which you can access here!

El Peñol

If you’re visiting Medellin, Colombia’s 2nd-largest and best city, you’re probably going to want to visit El Peñol. El Peñol is a gigantic granite monolith that rises from the ground beside a beautiful dam. As touristy as this place is, something VERY few people do is rock climb to the top. Just imagine people’s faces (because normal people can climb up an infinite staircase to the top) as you mantle onto the lookout and belay your partner up. El Peñol has sport climbing and trad from 5.8 to 5.12 and is one enourmous slabby slab.

La Peña

This place, close to Medellin, is said to be the climbing area with the most potential in Antioquia. It’s a young area, less developed than others, but already has over 40 routes from 5.8 to 5.13c and a hostal that’s also in its beginning stages, but is beautiful (another lodging option is the crazy “Aero Hostal”). From what I’ve seen in pictures and photos, the place is gorgeous and in the middle of nowhere. The development it has had is high-quality – they even have a guide already! La Peña is about 3 hours from Medellin. Click here for how to get there.

Choachí – Valle Escondido

This cloudy place right behind the mountains of Bogota houses some great climbing and the 6th tallest waterfall in South America. It’s called Valle Escondido, or Hidden Valley. Also, some (I) would say it’s magical. The climbing area is pretty undeveloped, but has the potential to be as amazing as La Mojarra. The rock, (surprise!) is sandstone. This climbing area is only an hour and a half from Bogota going east and definitely worth a visit! Another cool thing about this place is that its 3,100 meters (10,170 feet) above sea level. So you’ll get some high-altitude climbing! There’s a guide for this place, and you can get it there or at Zona de Bloque. Read a full guide on how to get there here!

Tona

Imagine a cliff-side with two levels. Each level has tons of different climbing – from vertical climbing much like La Mojarra’s to overhangs like Macheta’s. The potential is crazy! And I say potential because this place is just now being developed, and getting here is quite a journey. That’s what makes it so worth it. A friend of our bought some land to start a hostel and develop the climbing, and it feels in the middle of nowhere, although it’s 3 hours from Bucaramanga. Click here to read all about this place’s awesome story!

Well, I hope knowing where to climb in Colombia has motivated you to come visit this country, meet new people, and climb on new rock. If you are, maybe send us a message and we’ll see if we can go climb with you!

Finally, if you like hiking at high altitudes, you might also enjoy reading about Colombia’s paramos!

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