Cartagena - Day 1

Tayrona - Cartagena - This day started out nice, we ate breakfast and hiked the 45 minutes back to the pick up spot to go to the bus station of Santa Marta. We bought our ticket and boarded the bus to Cartagena. After about an hour of driving, we stopped for 4 hours because of a protest that shut down a bridge. The military and police showed up and had to use water and other elements to dispatch the crowd the reopen the bridge. We have no idea why they were protesting but we do know the protesters got angry. Our bus driver suddenly boarded the bus and turned us around to drive in the opposite direction because the angry protesters were breaking car windows out of anger of being disbanded. We eventually were far enough away from them to turn back around and after about 4 hours of waiting, we started moving again. As we got onto the bridge, we heard the radio operator ask our driver where we were and he told them we had just made onto the bridge and the operator told him to go go go because they were about to close the bridge again. We went through Barranquilla and eventually arrived to Cartagena around 7 p.m. that night. We took a cab ride with one of the coolest cab drivers, who was cruising in an old Dodge Dart. We stayed in some ocean front apartments for our stay in Cartagena. The only downside to Cartagena is that it is a tourist trap so there are vendors everywhere screaming "Rosarios, Rosarios, collares, apartamentos!" trying to sell you whatever they have. The cost of everything in the city is also higher than say Bogotá. On Friday, we walked down to the old part of the city but it rained on us a lot. We ended up going through the Museum of the Inquisition and saw the various torture devices used in medieval times. We also went by an old convent called Santa Clara that is now the most expensive hotel in Colombia. Cartagena is beautiful and full of history but with the amount of tourists there, it almost takes something away from the beauty of the city. Nevertheless, we enjoyed our stay somewhat. Enjoy the pictures.

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