As the setting of the great Gabriel Garcia Marquez romantic novel Love in the Time of Cholera , Cartagena is the ideal city for weddings, honeymoons and romantic escapes. Think myriad romantic boutique hotels , elegant bars and intimate restaurants, not to mention numerous high-end jewelry shops. Cartagena has a fascinating and often unbelievable history : once the largest slave port in the Americas, the city was regularly invaded and besieged by pirates and is home to some of the finest historical architecture in the country.
San Felipe Castle is the best example of a Spanish fort in the Americas and the old city walls are still home to the cannons that once kept Francis Drake at bay. In short, Cartagena oozes history from every street corner and a walk through the Walled City feels like a trip back in time. With artists also selling paintings and drawings of Cartagena is most plazas, the city radiates an unusually artistic sensibility. Cartagena offers a fascinating juxtaposition of the ancient and the modern.
From the walls of the Old City, the tower blocks and hotel chains of Bocagrande are an ever-present reminder that the city, while famous for its history and former glories, is also a modern place.
Tour companies take visitors to explore the culture of champeta, before teaching them the dance; or the more confident can don their dancing shoes and head to Bazurto Social Club, Donde Fidel Salsa Bar or Cafe Havana. With street dancers in the many squares of the Old City and myriad live music venues, Cartagena is one of the best cities in the Americas to enjoy music and dancing. We and our partners use cookies to better understand your needs, improve performance and provide you with personalised content and advertisements.
To allow us to provide a better and more tailored experience please click "OK". Sign Up. Cartagena's Old Town is a Unesco World Heritage Site — a maze of cobbled alleys, balconies covered in bougainvillea, and massive churches that cast their shadows across leafy plazas. This is a place to drop all sightseeing routines. Instead of trying to tick off all the sights, just stroll through the Old Town day and night.
Cartagena also boasts a wide range of exotic fruits including sweet coconut, mango, pineapple, papaya, guava among others which are sold by the palenqueras, the iconic fruit vendors that walk around the streets or beaches carrying a bowl of fruits so artistically in their heads.
The city has numerous good restaurants inside and outside the walled city. Arabic, Cuban, Italian and traditional Colombian restaurants can be found in the modern and historic areas representing the diversity and the flavors brought about by immigrants and inhabitants of the city.
Cartagena offers multiple bars, cafes, casinos and discotheques around the city. A t night, you may enjoying a horse drawn coach ride or take a long walk through the Old City admiring the splendid view lit up by romantic colonial street lights. You can also enjoy the sun at the beach, day-light walk trough its streets, romantic sunsets as well as clubbing nights that mix modern and antique stages.
Touring the Walled City in a horse-drawn coach and observing the colorful colonial houses is a true pleasure. Every single street in Cartagena has a history of its own. Chiva Tour: Tour the city in the unique "Chivas Rumberas" by day or night where visitors can enjoy the live music and national drinks offered by the open bar on board the chiva. The Chiva Rumbera gives a tour around the fortifications of the city, including the Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas and the walled city as well as the modern area of the city.
One of the many options is a trip to the Rosario Islands, a small and charming coral archipelago located just 45 minutes by boat from Cartagena. Its white beaches and transparent waters invite sun and beach lovers to become immersed in a marvelous landscape. Cartagena, 75mi km west of Barranquilla , has played a major part in the history of Colombia; fending off invasions, and battling pirates lured by the riches in the city.
Archaeologists believe humans have lived in the region from around 4,BCE, the earliest known inhabitants are called the Puerto Hormiga culture. These tribes survived until the European colonization many centuries later. The first Spanish settlers were sailors who arrived from Cartagena in Spain to start a new life; they established the town as Cartagena de Indias in reference to the Spanish counterpart.
At this time there were only about inhabitants and a church. In , a fire flattened all the wooden buildings, after which the governor ordered all the replacements to be made from stone. At this time, Spanish riches were transported through Cartagena, earning the city large sums to build mansions; people from all over the country came here looking to make their fortune. At the end of the 16th century, the city identified a need for protection, building a wall and fortress.
Then, in the 17th century, the King of Spain ordered Cartagena to become a slave trade hub, further adding to the city riches. In , Cartagena became a centerpiece in the war between Britain and Spain. The British forces, led by Edward Vernon, decided to invade every Spanish port in the Caribbean and take the country for their own.
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