Cartagena
After a sleepless night on the overnight bus, we arrived in Cartagena, a dusty, hazy furnace that increased our sleepiness exponentially. The lengthy taxi ride to the middle of town zigzagged through a crumbling city that felt distinctly different from what we had seen of Colombia so far. That changed when we arrived out our accommodation in the historic centre, which was clearly the tourist zone. Narrow streets were lined with gorgeous colourful buildings, a constant parade of street vendors tried to sell us everything under the sun, and Caribbean music blasted along every street. It immediately transported us back to Cuba, although this was a more well-maintained version. Within 2 minutes we had seen more tourists here than we had in the past 9 days of travel. Surprisingly, English was just as common as Spanish, which helped us immensely. I had been thinking that Colombia mustn't be a popular country to visit, but apparently everyone had just congregated here.
All afternoon we wandered the streets without a purpose, not caring that we were lost half the time. We popped into the tiny modern art museum, which was filled with decent artwork by Latin American artists but, more importantly, gave us a break from the piercing sun. Prices for everything were significantly higher here, although I was sure it was a different story outside the old city walls that enclosed the tourist area.
Parque Centenario was rumoured to have a family of 7 sloths living in its trees. It wasn't hard to follow the groups of people pointing up into the branches to locate them. I watched 2 sloths for an eternity, slowly moving from branch to branch with dopey looks on their faces. Although they weren't caged in, they didn't really have anywhere else to go outside the confines of the small park.
Getsemani was easily our favourite district in the historic centre, with grungy street art, brightly coloured laneways crammed with outdoor bars offering happy hour, and a chilled out vibe. We spent most of the afternoon and evening here, bar-hopping and eating Caribbean food. The streets filled up with tourists and food stalls over the night, and a party atmosphere quickly formed. Despite feeling safer and more at ease in this popular city, in some ways I missed the minimal tourism I had become accustomed to in San Gil and Bogota.
Colombia
Joining a day trip to the Rosario Islands in the Caribbean Sea seemed to be the number one thing to do in Cartagena, so we followed the masses for a day out on the water. It was a bit of madhouse trying to organise who was going where, and we had to endure numerous roll calls before we could jump on a bus that would take us to the jetty. Once on board the boat, we could finally relax. Well, we could have if the Latino music wasn't blaring from the speakers on the compact 20-person vessel.
After passing an old fort with a not-so-nice history of European invasion, we reached the centre of the islands. Our guide pointed out one of the smallest pieces of land, which had a single building on it. We were informed that only government officials could use this island. Seemed like a good use of taxpayer pesos.
Next stop was snorkelling, where we were given a mask but no snorkel. Apparently this policy had been put in place during Covid-19 and hadn't been retracted. Snorkelling is not nearly as enjoyable when you can't breathe underwater. At least the water was perfectly warm. We saw a variety of fish but not in huge numbers, and the coral was nothing special.
Nearby was another snorkelling site where one of Pablo Escobar's planes had been sunk by the government. Through the murky water we glimpsed a vague silhouette of a wing and not much else. From the boat we could see an old resort that also once belonged to Escobar, which now lay in ruins.
Lunch was located at a small resort on another island, where there were tiny plunge pools overlooking a narrow stretch of water. The scenery wasn't mind-blowing but it was nice to chill out in a hammock for a while.
Cholon Island was mayhem. Dozens of tour boats pulled up at the same time, and hordes of people all jumped out into thigh-deep water to stand at wooden tables under umbrellas or thatched roofs. A couple of plastic chairs floated by, so we grabbed these and kicked back in the sea. All we could do was buy food and drinks (not appealing after just eating lunch), pay for jet skiing, or just wait around for an hour. We did the latter. I thought we had left the touts behind in Cartagena but they were just as prolific here. It wasn't exactly relaxing.
Our final stop was a beach resort on the Baru Peninsula. The water again was a beautiful temperature but incredibly salty. An hour later we were back on the boat, returning to the city. Overall it was an entertaining day out but not one of the best snorkelling/boat/island-hopping tours we had experienced.
I woke to rain, but it didn't stop me from heading out for a run in the drizzle. Many of the roads had flooded, and every now and then a tidal wave of water formed by a passing car would crash over me. The only saving grace was that it wasn't sunny, so it didn't feel blisteringly hot.
Taking advantage of the slightly cooler weather, we walked over to Castillo San Felipe, a fortress built in 1536. It wasn't the grandest looking fort going around, and the views from the top didn't wow us. However, we really enjoyed exploring the tunnels underneath the fort, which Danny pointed out would have made a perfect wine cellar if not for the heat. A crudely-made video gave us a brief history of the building, re-enacting several battles the Spanish faced from invading European forces. The film made it very clear the Spanish were immensely proud of themselves for holding back the British and basically stated how awful life would have been if the English had won.
Opposite the fort was a chocolate museum, a huge tourist trap that drew Danny in with its advertising of cold chocolate beer. After seeing the price he quickly left.
The middle part of the day involved walking along and beside the old city walls around the centro historico. I was hoping for dazzling views over the town but that didn't happen (the gloomy skies didn't help). All we really achieved was being approached by a never-ending line of touts.
Rain eventually forced us off the walls and back into the city centre. We roamed through the San Diego district, a much more peaceful area with less traffic, less tourism and less touts. The prices were still exorbitant though. Afterwards we returned to Getsemani, taking full advantage of happy hour and photographing the decorative streets. We loved our time here but we were looking forward to travelling to some more remote (i.e. less touristy) areas of Colombia.
