Jardin, it’s people and pets

January 22-27, 2025

We had a pet for a day in Jardin. While birding with Daniel, we traveled about 4 miles up the Ventana Rd. We would drive about a quarter mile, stop and look at the birds and butterflies, etc. For some reason, a dog decided to adopt us and followed us the whole way up and back down to town. He would catch up at every stop and lay down to wait for us to move on. I started calling him Perrito (perro is dog is Spanish and perrito is little dog). He is a very muscular dog – maybe he chooses a new set of tourists to follow every day…

The town of Jardin is beautiful. It’s very interesting to us that very few buildings have glass in the windows. Wooden bars and shutters cover all the windows. When it’s warm the shutters are opened and you can see right into the houses. Every house, shop, garden, or manufacturing place is lined up with the sidewalk. Unless a door or window is open, you would never know if the building is a home, garage, garden, store, or manufacturing plant. I felt a little rude looking into people’s homes, but with no window, everything felt open. Homes are kept immacualately clean. It’s funny though because if the family doesn’t own a garage the motorcycle might be parked in the living room. I guess because there are no glass barriers, it feels as though there is comunal living (in the community sense, not communism or a hippy commune!) It feels like the town is in a continual party! Especially the town square at night!

We spent three days in Jardin doing tourist things and generally hanging out. On each side of the village, there are restuarants on the hills. One of the restuarants can be reached by a box cable car:

We took a tuk-tuk up to the restarant on the other side of the valley and then walked down to the village:

If I every wanted to be a media influencer, it would be to promote a wonderful little restaurant that is pretty new. It is a such a sweet place! The pavillion overlooks a stream surrounded by a garden with a little path down across the creek. Oh, and the food/coffee is good too! The people were exceptional. We enjoyed the spot so much, we went back a second day. When the staff saw us, they changed the music it Country Western. It was pretty awesome to sit in Colombia, drink coffee, look at Colombian Birds and sing along with Willie Nelson and George Strait. Truly, if you ever make it to Jardin, Colombia, make Cafe Social a must stop!!