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How to get to Atlantis, Colombia:

From Bogota :

Take a bus to La Plata – Huila. It leaves the Bogota Bus Terminal from Module 1 between 8.30pm to 9 pm (get there at least half an hour earlier).

The two bus companies who serve this route are called Cootranshuila and Coomotor . The first bit of the journey is cold and then the rest is quite warm, so dress accordingly.

People have been robbed at the Bus Terminal, especially by thieves acting as the bus drivers assistant (ayudante) who'll offer to help you with your bags.
If you feel confused ask other passengers to help you. Colombians like helping foreigners and hate the bad reputation that thieves have given their country. Make sure you entrust your luggage only to bus company personnel and don't leave your bags lying around unattended . Keep a sharp eye on your bag/rucksack until it's been safely stored in the boot of the bus.

You'll arrive in La Plata about 4.30 a.m. Ask around for the bus that leaves for Popayan at 5.30 a.m. Ask the driver and the passengers (sometimes the driver doesn’t know the route well) to make sure you get off at La Estacion , which is simply a wooden house with a little shop by the side of the road, about an hour and a half from La Plata, and about 10 minutes beyond the small town of Belen. Outside Belen you'll likely be stopped by the army who may ask for I.D. They are generally polite and curious.

When you get off at La Estacion , tell the owners you are visiting us. You can leave your bags there in complete safety, we'll get them collected later.
Ask for directions to get to our farm, it's a 2 – 3 hour walk mostly along an unpaved road, plenty of streams to drink from, delicious air and lovely scenery.
Wear good walking shoes, sun-hat and light clothes as it gets hot later in the morning.

After about 2 hours walk you'll come upon a big new wooden house on the right hand side of the road with a blue roof, that's Alices farm and someone there will point you in the right direction to get to our farm.

Alice

Things you need to bring:

1. Rubber boots are very useful and we'd be very grateful if you didn't mind leaving them with us when you go.
2. Insect repellent (we suffer from few mosquitoes but there are midgies).
3. Scruffy clothes that you don't mind using for farm-work and that you also wouldn't mind leaving behind when you go (we are mainly bigger, and bigger-footed than local people and try to never buy new clothes).
4. A sensible sun-hat.

You won't need:

• Bedding of any kind.
• Mosquito net.
• And we strongly suggest that smokers use their visit to our farm
  as an opportunity to kick the habit!

An open attitude and a willingness to use your physical energy to the full.

Before you come, please read the Green Letters that are published on this site, as they will give you an idea of our life-style, our attitudes, our history and involvement here. You will almost definitely find us very different from how you imagined us!

We are passionately vegetarian (as we haven't yet seen proof that humans are superior to animals), atheists (but also astrologers and psychics), very left-wing (but in a politically incorrect sort of way: for example we don't unquestioningly adore the modern sacred cows of pacifism, feminism or pro-gay rights, especially when these impinge on everyone else's rights).
We work extremely hard, and we are very direct and outspoken with each other, which sometimes shocks visitors. Don't worry, we don't expect our visitors to work as hard as we do, nor to be as frank as we are - after all, we've known each other through thick and thin for many decades. We also laugh a lot, play music and have built a lovely, healthy lifestyle that you're welcome to share for as long as you like!

It is important for visitors to be aware that we've chosen this lifestyle very deliberately and have worked harder than you can probably imagine to maintain it, so please don't tell try to tell us how we SHOULD behave/live/eat/work/talk.

My apologies to more sensitive potential visitors about this statement, but as we run an open house where anyone can arrive at any time and stay as long as they like, we have sometimes had to protect ourselves from this kind of behaviour.

Sometimes people ask us what kind of gifts we like to receive.

• Oil and rice, neither of which we can produce, at our altitude (2,000 metres) are always welcome.
• Soya sauce or yeast extract are welcome luxuries.
• We are completely vegetarian and we don't use drugs of any kind (see below) but love receiving any kinds of natural creams and oils such as Arnica, Calendula, Rescue Remedy and Tea Tree Oil.
• Vegetable and flower seeds from cool wet climates.
• Soaps, toothpaste and other toiletries.

Alice, whose artistic work is displayed on this site, is also the local doctor, nurse, vet and midwife and often has to stitch up wounds that result from accidents with machetes, so she really appreciate gifts of

• suturing equipment
• local anaesthetic for injection and
• good painkillers.

(See Green Letter 83 for more details of her work and the equipment she often needs).

Crafts materials:

• wools
• beads
• paints
• DVD's of politically interesting documentaries or film.

Thank you. Contact us for more info at: atlantiscommune@hotmail.com .

See you!