Medellín's Feria de las Flores

Feria de las Flores, or the Festival of Flowers, has been a highlight in Medellín for over 50 years. The week-long festivities include concerts, parades and of course flower displays around the city! It was coincidently perfect timing that David had chosen this week to visit us, when Medellín is overflowing with energy. Earlier in the week, we visited downtown to see the vibrant animal sculptures constructed with flowers, but you didn't have to go out of your way to see a flower display as most restaurants, shops, and hotels had some sort of flower arrangement showcased for the week. Then midweek, we all went to the Classic Car Parade and enjoyed a few Colombian-style micheladas. Micheladas in Colombia are unlike the ones I've had in the States. They aren't spicy at all! The vendors around Medellín coat the rim of the cup with lime and salt, fill 1/5 of the cup with freshly squeezed lime juice, and finish it off with either a Pilsen or Aguila beer. We also devoured candied coconut strips. Quite the combination! The celebrations concluded with the much anticipated Flower Parade. We secured our spots towards the finish line an hour before the parade started. Good thing we did, otherwise we would not have been able to see anything past the crowds. The three-hour parade included dancers, singers, and oddly enough, circus performers. However, the men and women carrying silletas, various types of flower arrangements, stole the show. Since we were near the end of the route, we saw some men and women on the verge of tears due to the weight of these arrangements. But the crowd never stopped chanting the phrase "sí, se puede" while clapping and cheering them on. This phrase translates to "yes we can" and it was awe-inspiring to hear the crowd's chants motivate the silleteros to not only carry on, but with smiles on their faces. This was the perfect way to end a memorable week in one of the best cities in Colombia.

[ flower sculptures ]

Flower power frog

Largest sculpture of the bunch

Silleta at the top of Parque Arví

 

[ classic car parade ]

Pilsen: our favorite beer for micheladas

Front and center at the parade

Classic chiva party bus

Luckiest girl at the parade

[ flower festival ]

First group of dancers

Just a handful of silleteros

Circus performers doing their thing 

More dancers

"We paint our lives"

The last dancers had the best costumes 

A silletero bearing the load

Touring Medellín

To get the most out of our week in the city, we decided to do a walking tour of downtown and a second tour of important places around the city relating to Pablo Escobar. The walking tour was the longest we have ever been on (4 hours) but it was well worth it. Our guide, Hernan, was extremely knowledgeable and remembered each person's name after hearing it only once. We started out close to the government offices and walked through all of the famous plazas and marketplaces. In the mid 1990s, the government started transforming these drug-ridden areas into parks and monuments to show residents that progress was being made and that the cartels were losing their grip on the city. Today, Medellín has a look and feel of a bustling American or European city.

The second tour dove into the rise and fall of one of world's most infamous criminals, Pablo Escobar. While Pablo owned hundreds of properties in Medellín, we only visited a handful. Most of them have been repossessed by the government but you can still see the amount of influence that he weilded in the city. At the height of his power, most cops and government officials in Medellín were either under his authority or killed off. Since he spent generously on public projects for the poor, there were many that became sympathetic towards him. However, by the time he was killed, it was impossible to ignore the physical and emotional damage attributed to his reign of terror. We would recommend reading Killing Pablo if you're interested in learning more.

Starting the tour with Hernan

Looking up from the Plaza of Lights

Our bingo friends 

Local mall in a building from the 1920s

The mall's skylight

Dutch architecture near downtown

Walking along one of the main avenues

One of Pablo's primary residences

Young Pablo's ID card

The house where he was shot 

Admirers still leave flowers at his grave