In Cartagena

No panic, we are still alive.

We are experiencing some technical difficulties to upload pictures and access my blog account and load pictures. I have been struggling during the last two or three days, and I hope to be luckier today.

We stumble on a little problem: there was a container congestion at the port of Cartagena and, as a consequence, all shipping was delayed. it took us 10 days of waiting and finally on Tuesday afternoon I was able to get my car out of the port.

What did we do during all this time? Well, first of all we put our brains in sleeping mode (not that it was too noticeable) and took very long naps during the hot Cartagena afternoons. We also took long walks along the old city center, the fortresses, and the beaches. It was a nice break for our routine, but it was way too long, so once we got our car we decided to leave immediately. Now, after a 13 hour drive we arrived to Medellin, from where we will continue to Cali.

Cartagena has very nice features for the tourist, such as the old city center, the San Felipe Fortress, the long walls protecting the city from attacks by the pirates, and the museums. We particularly enjoyed the Gold Museum, showing fantastic work by the indians before the Spanish arrival. Also, the Modern Art museum has a great collection of works by Enrique Grau. I recommend both museums to anybody wishing to spend some time in Cartagena.

We also visited the Inquisition Museum by it was revolting, and also the Historic Museum, but we found it too simplistic and biased, so we don't recommend any of them.

The beach areas are well developed and remind me of places as Miami Beach, crowded with tourists.

However, there is a big contrast between the areas visited by the tourists and the rest. Walking a few blocks away from the tourist attractions starts the real Cartagena, where normal people lives and conduct their businesses. Those places are crowded, with broken streets, garbage everywhere, and polluted air. That put Cartagena much closer to hell than to heaven, and this is odd in a place that is apparently rich enough to live in better conditions. At this point one can ask what is the rol of the government, because, for what one can see, the rich part of the city gets more than their fair share of the funds. Nothing new under the sun.

 

We took route 25 from Cartagena to Medellin. This is all mountain road, twisting alongside the Cauca River, and going through many little towns. Driving is slow and tiresome, but very picturesque.

 

 

The Castillo de San Felipe. This is a fortress built by the Spaniards between 1600 and 1700 to protect the city against the pirates.

 

Another view of Castillo de San Felipe

 

 

Don Blas de Leso. This was a basque who faught many battles for the s crown. In some of these battles he lost one leg, one arm, one eye, and, according to rumors, he also lost a very uniquely masculine feature.

He successfully commanded the defense of the city aginst the attack by Admiral Vernon. He gave them a good trashing just to remind them not to mess with basque people.

 

 

The historic city center. Narrow streets showing colorful houses, many of them with plenty of flowers in the balconies.

 

 

Another view of the historic district

 

 

The beach area of Bocagrande. Typically flooded with tourists from all over the world.

 

 

The business district as seen from Bocagrande

 

A view from the hotel room. On the background we have the Convento de la Popa at the top of a hill. Very dangerous to climb it on foot.

 

One more view from the hotel room.