creatures from the deep

Just before i left Cartegena, Jennie and i took a day trip to a mud volcano. Now this isn't actually a volcano but more a huge tower of liquid mud pushed up out of the ground by unusual gases underground, lovely i hear you thinking, well its quite a tourist attraction around these parts; and basically all the gringos bath in the mud, so we thought that we'd have a look. On arrival it did actually look alot like a volcano (with steps up the side), we were instructed to remove all our clothes before climbing up, at the top- the cone is about the size of a large jacuzzi and filled with people all bathing and many local all acting masseurs. Climbing in was the strangest sensation as the mud closes in around you, its very heavy, much more so than water; and the chosen method of moving around is to lie on your back and have someone push you along the surface otherwise you end up flailing around not actually moving but just covering everyone else with lots of mud! Once in the mud, after the obligatory massage and then marvelling at how much we all looked like maniquins covered completely in mud there wasn't alot else to do; we had also realised by this point that the mud did smell a bit odd! And so came the task of cleaning ourselves off; which bascially meant we walked down to the nearby river and washed there (not very sucessfully in my case!). my skin did feel lots softer afterwards so maybe there was some benefit.