My family and I spent 5 days in Cartagena, Colombia for my 40th birthday. We stayed at an Airbnb inside the walled city near the Clock Tower. We went on two excursions, Palenque tour and a 5 island boat tour. Both excursions lasted the majority of the day. We also did a 20 minute horse and carriage ride in the walled city. Cartagena is full of history; the city is surrounded by forts and castles and the “devil’s” house on top of a hill. You definitely need to know a little Spanish in Cartagena, not everyone speaks English. The street vendors are very intense. You need to say a strong “no” if you’re not interested in buying anything. The best thing about Cartagena is the food. Everything we ate tasted and looked amazing, you can tell they took their time with the cooking and preparation. Most surprising was the amount of police presence at night due to women working the night shift on the street. Most interesting was the amount of monuments of women around the city. I learned that Cartagena produces most of the world’s emeralds which is why there are so many emerald shops. This is a city I definitely recommend, the flight is less than
San Basilio de Palenque
San Basilio de Palenque is the first free black town in all of the Americas. African slaves in Cartagena escaped to this area. Today, it’s still an all black village that’s so peaceful they don’t need police. The village is full of history and beautiful, picturesque buildings. We got to visit with the village doctor who shared their natural healing practices and watch a dance performance.
5 Island Boat Tour
The five island boat tour started at 8am and ended at 5pm. The first stop was a private beach, the second stop was snorkeling in a small area, the third stop was a beach party. Stop three was pretty wild. There were people on smaller boats selling alcohol and oysters. There was even hookah in the ocean. The fourth stop was another beach where we ate lunch. The fifth stop was a pool by a quiet beach.
Getsemani
This neighborhood full of murals is walking distance from the walled city. During our walk we came across a chocolate factory and tried the famous Dubai Chocolate (chocolate with pistachios) which surprisingly was really good.
Cartagena Food
As stated earlier, the food in Cartagena is amazing, it reminds me of typical Caribbean food (rice, plantain, chicken, fish). Everything looked and tasted great. I was surprised that almost every restaurant had vegetarian options. There were also a few Italian restaurants in the area.
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