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Another Trip to Colombia

Its a new year and I am back in Colombia. Currently in Guaduas or Monday, but may go to Bogota tomorrow depending on when my spouse wants to go.

We left Fort Lauderdale, Florida on this trip and had about the same 3 to 4 hour flight to Bogota on Avianca and arrived earlier in the day than the last trip and had over one hour driving in the city looking for our ride to Guaduas. We arrived at our hotel two and one half hours after finding our ride to the hotel. It was a rather invigorating trip, traffic being somewhat heavy. Guaduas and the hotel are much as I remember them, quiet and comfortable.

Much of my time is spent on the computer and I am happy with the working wifi at the hotel. I am able to keep up with my email and general news and events. It is nice not being exposed to the chaos and hyper news cycle from the states unless I want to dip my toe in, a welcome respite.

A project I started in December and January I continued this trip. Thinking about solar retrofit at the hotel. It is a traditional colonial style building with a few rooms. They are surrounding a courtyard with one roof facing west and one more in each of the other three directions. The roof is a typical tile roof and all in all looks very picturesque. In some ways the building looks like it could have come from the Zorro television set.

A solar retrofit would entail putting solar panes on the south and west facing roof and the primary benefit in Colombia would be reduction of electric bills and maybe more consistent power. Electricity is generally good, but there are intermittent power outages that are usually of a short duration, but may last for several hours.

Unlike the states, Colombia generates most of its power from renewable sources, principally water. The residual power comes from diesel generators. Here about 65% of the power is water generated. It is refreshing being in a place that  uses what is naturally available in the environment to that degree. Well, lunch is being served and I am beginning to get hungry, so bye for now.

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