CARTAGENA

After almost two weeks it was time to move on and leave Taganga. Our next stop would be Cartagena, the old colonial city in the Caribbean coast. When we arrived at the bus terminal we decided to take a bus to the city center and not a taxi. Since we didn't know exactly were we had to get off it was quite adventurous. Luckily the driver told us where we had to get off. It was dark already and we didn't really know where we were and where to go. We started walking in the direction that looked best to us and tried to find the way to the hostel. In the end a local guy showed us the way (and asked for money for doing so). After we checked into the hostel we went for a short walk through Cartagena's old town.
The many old colonial houses were nicely lit and a lot of people were in the streets. The atmosphere was really nice with open stores, restaurants and bars. The next day we walked around the old town and along the wide walls surrounding the city. Since it was quite hot we got tired and lazy fast and decided to spend the afternoon relaxing at the hostel.

On Sunday were elections for the local government and selling and consumption of alcohol was prohibited. That meant that unfortunately most bars were closed and the city was very quite in the evenings.

We also went to a little monastery on a hill. Unfortunately we were ripped off by the taxi driver because I didn't understand what he was saying and he asked for way too much money that we didn't wanted to pay. The view from the monastery over the city was quite nice but all in all it wasn't worth going there. Especially since the view from the old fortress was great as well.

After the monastery we visited the Castillo San Felipe fortress just outside the old city walls. It is a huge complex with thick walls and a lot of little towers overlooking the surroundings. What was most interesting in the fortress were the many tunnels. There was a maze of long tunnels deep inside the fortress that people could walk around. It was a little scary (especially once you got to the point were there was very little light and water was standing in the tunnel) but very nice.
We spent the last morning going to the market Mercado Bazurto. Very interesting. The market was huge, unorganized and crazy. You could buy everything from fresh fish to shoes, meat, fruits, cow eyes, pencils, watches, pig heads, car repair parts, lunch, underwear and probably a lot of other things we didn't see. The smell in the little alleys was intense and I couldn't stand it very long.