Top Three Things to do Outdoors in Medellin, Colombia

Medellin is a fantastic place to visit. It's a top tourist destination with over 550,000 international visitors each year. There are tons of things to do and places to visit. Here are some MUST-DO things for your next trip to Medellin, Colombia.

1. Rent Out a Motorcycle and Ride to the Top of Santa Elena

If you haven't read my other post on renting a motorcycle in Medellin, click here to read it! Anyways, now that you know about renting a motorcycle, let's talk about one of the greatest motorcycle adventures I've ever gone on.

The View Alongside the Climb Up Santa Elena

Santa Elena is a town roughly 10 miles from the downtown of Medellin. It's at the top of a mountain, and the views are amazing. The drive up to the town is full of winding roads, potholes, and sketchy curves. There is actually a tour bus that operates in the city and brings tourists up to the top of the mountain. These bus drivers really try to make their best time up the mountain, let me tell you.

The view overlooks the city of Medellin, and the mountains and stunning landscapes are breathtaking. There are several areas on the road where there is enough space to pull over and take in the view. If I were to do this again, I would definitely opt into taking a motorcycle with a slightly bigger engine. The little 200cc bike did the job though, and was able to get me and Bella up to the top by the end of it all.

So, what's at the top of the mountain? A colorful, artsy little town with lots of local shops and nature.

Source: Google Images

Once you've had your fun and are heading back from this small town, you can satisfy your hunger at Las Hortensias Restaurante Parrilla Bar:

Source: RestaurantGuru

This restaurant is small and cheap, and has decent ribs. It isn't the highest quality food, but it is convenient as it's literally on the side of the mountain as you drive back to Medellin. Plus, the view is pretty good!

If you are going to embark on this journey, keep in mind to bring some slightly warmer clothes, as you will on the top of a mountain. It may also be useful to bring a raincoat or poncho. As you can see in the photos, we got rained on pretty hard on this journey and were very cold by the end of it.

2. Hand Feed an Iguana at the Medellin Botanical Garden

Everyone says you HAVE to visit the botanical garden. I would agree with that. A detail that most people don't mention in their posts about the botanical garden is that there are quite a bit of large iguanas that just chill around the park. These iguanas are very accustomed to humans, and they won't attack you or freak out about you. Now, I'm not an iguana expert so don't listen to me, but I know iguanas can eat coconuts. I happened to have some of one of my favorite Venezuelan sweets, Cocosette, on me when I visited the botanical garden. I decided to try my luck at hand feeding an iguana on the side of the sidewalk. Here is the result of that:

Wow! I couldn't believe it actually worked and I was able to hand feed a wild iguana! So, since that worked, I decided to push it a little bit and see what would happen:

So there you have it folks! Go pet an iguana in the Medellin Botanical Garden!

3. Explore the vast Parque Arvi

Parque Arvi is a 16,000 hectare (62 square miles) park, with forests and 54 miles of walking trails. Needless to say, there are plenty of spaces to explore within the park. Inside there is a beautiful butterfly garden where you can feed butterflies and walk amongst them.

There are quite a few trails and bridges to explore on, with flowers and nature everywhere:

If you get hungry while exploring the park, you're in luck. The park has a small cafeteria, which actually serves some unexpectedly delicious food. The food is cheap and tasty, and the view of the park is amazing too!

There are also several options for the food in case, so you can customize it to your liking. They even give you a small chocolate for dessert! If you do eat here, you'll notice some insects flying around that look almost identical to bees, but a slightly darker color. It's really just a fly so there's no need to worry about getting stung.

Well, there you have it! Three must-do things in Medellin, Colombia. Got any other suggestions? Leave them down below in the comments! Make sure to subscribe to never miss a post!

Thanks for reading!