Let me say a few words about Cartagena first. This is a city that was founded sometime in the 1500s by the Spanish conquistadors (obviously there was a settlement here before but I didn't understand enough of the museum's exhibits to be able to discuss it).
Anyway - it was a major port and fortress for the Spanish empire that witnessed hundreds of years of continuous destruction (mostly by the British) and fortification - hence the fact that the old walled city is now a World Heritage Site. Walking around the walled city is like stepping back in time; old buildings, cobbled stone paths and horse-drawn carts. The shed load of tourists and accompanying crap-selling locals do take away slightly from the experience but that's to be expected...
Cartagena is a beautiful, romantic and incredibly hot city - flanked by water on two sides and facing west over the Caribbean Sea. We stayed in Cartagena for a total of just under three weeks. There we got to grips with Latin American Spanish - having three hours of lessons practically every morning for three weeks really worked my obviously underused brain, our teacher (Amaury) was great and we learnt a huge amount in a very short period of time. We are now able to (just) converse with 'la gente' over here. It's nigh-on impossible to understand any response we receive but it's a start.
We stayed with a local family (who forced us to speak Spanish), our host was a lady called Ana Cecilia who also ran a catering business - hence we ate incredibly well (she was a feeder) and Fat Nilly is trying to make a comeback. It was great staying with such a wonderful family - we owe a great deal of thanks to all of them for making us feel so welcome - Ana, Daniela (her English a god-send), Julio (who got me involved in a couple of football games), Bilma (chef supreme) and Maria Paulina (5 months old...).
'Our Family'
There's not a huge amount to do in Cartagena - save from lovely museums, strolling around the old city - something we enjoyed a lot, and hitting its bars and music venues (music pumps out onto the street everywhere you go!).
The sunsets were stunning and the whole city had a very relaxed vibe - welcome after 10 days in Rio.
Typical scene from Cartagena
Evening shot of one of its many plazas
Cafe del Mar (trendy bar) - opposite our sunset spot
One of many sunset photos
Big Weapon (sorry Jo)
Bocagrande at night
We made a couple of cool trips away from Cartagena. The first was to some stunning tropical islands (Islas De Rosario) - on a crazy party boat full of Colombians on their weekend blow-out. Unfortunately we only did a day trip so the beach (Playa Blanca) was fairly crowded but still sensational!
The next was to a real (!), active mud volcano. A very very strange experience - basically getting into a volcano filled with warm mud with loads of other tourists and getting massaged by random Colombians - then being washed in a lagoon by some more random Colombians (all which had to be paid for of course).
The last was to Taganga (a beautiful fishing village 5 years ago but now a hippy / party resort without any infrastructure), Tayrona National Park (incredibly 'Jurassic Park' like scenery / isolation) and Santa Marta (historic town where Simon Bolivar died). Tayrona was definitely the highlight - a couple of hours of hiking through deserted rainforests was rewarded by some amazing coastal scenery....
Tayrona National Park
That almost brings us up to the present-day. Right now (as I write this) we are in Medellin, formerly the most murderous city in the world (centre of the Cocaine trade and the infamous Escobar Cartel) but now a very progressive, scenic and hard-working city that's apparently totally turned itself around into one of Colombia's gems. I love it here - and we've had a great time in our first couple of days, but that will follow in the next update...
