La Costa: Part III

Cartagena
April 8, 2009


This morning we got up fairly eartly to get started on our way to Cartagena. I ate my pan de chocolate on the beach, saying a last farewell to the beaches of Tayrona. They are beautiful, but I wasn't sad to leave the sketchy bathroom and living out of a backpack on a dirt floor. We hiked out fairly early and it was already getting warm. It had rained the night before (quite snuggy to listen to in my hammock) so the trail out was completely muddy.

Where the path ends, you have to take a jeep to the gate of the park or walk several miles more. We opted for the jeep and were dropped at the entrance to Tayrona. From there, you have to catch a bus to bring you to the terminal in Santa Marta. This involves flagging down random buses driving by on the highway to see if they will stop in the terminal. We got on one almost immediately with another couple we had left Tayrona with.

I'm not sure if sketchy is a sufficient word to describe the bus we got on. It was a coach bus, considerably older than what we rode to get here. There were children EVERYWHERE, sitting on parents laps and sitting 3+ to a seat. The TV was playing one of the most graphic movies I have ever seen and seemed to be bothering no one that it was in no way appropriate for all the children watching.

We stayed on this bus for quite some time while it continuously stopped to let people on and off, to let vendors on to sell us things and once where all the men had to get off while the luggage was searched in the presence of what I believe to be Colombian customs officers (I think the bus may have come from near Venezuela.) After awhile we started realizing we had been on the bus for an awful long time. The woman of the couple we were with went up to ask and it turns out we had passed the Santa Marta terminal and Santa Marta itself quite some time before.

Cool.

So we hopped off this bus to await another that could take us straight on to Barranquilla. While chatting with the man and woman we were with, I learned he is actually one of the Liz's roommates in Bogota. Small word? Apparently. Does Liz know everyone in Colombia? Maybe. We didn't have to wait too long for a Costena bus that had free seats to Barranquilla. We paid $20,000 pesos for a trip to Cartagena, which is pretty decent. It was a 2ish hour ride to B/quilla, where we had to briefly change buses for another 2+ ride to Cartagena.


Upon arriving on the outskirts of Cartagena, we realized we should probably do something about the fact that we had nowhere to stay. Pei called an @er from B/manga whose family lives in Cartagena. She came to the terminal to get us and brought us to her house. Showers and fresh clothes (We were nasty after a 45 minute sweaty hike, a jeep ride and 3 bus rides) were amazing.

Then we took a bus to Centro, the walled city, which was unfortunately far from Carmelita's house. The old town was beautiful at night. The entire part of town is surrounded by a wall and is right on the ocean, which used to go all the way up to the stone. Inside the wall, the buildings are very European with pretty paint jobs and amazing balconies. Streets are quite narrow and lined with vendors, horse drawn carriages and boutiques (if you were to suddenly need a United Colors of Benetton, Cartagena'd have you covered.)



We met up with two AIESEC Cartagena members and got dinner at Crepes and Waffles. Pei and I shared a cheese crepe with prosciutto (said jamon on the menu and I was pleasantly surprised to find this did not mean bologna, as it usually does) that had pesto on the side. It was good pesto, too (Mama you know how picky I am about my pesto.) After a delish C&W ice cream concoction for dessert we wondered a bit more before heading back to Carmelita's.