Friday in Cartagena

Cartagena, Colombia

We slept in a little later today before heading downstairs for another amazing breakfast. It was then time for a solo walk on the beach for me while Matthew dealt with some work stuff upstairs.

The beach in La Boquilla (which is the area of Cartagena where we were staying) is flat and smooth with sand that is similar in color to the Southern California beaches (slightly brownish). There are tents set up all along the water, some with plastic chairs that you can rent for the day, and some with vendors selling all manner of items such as jewelry, clothing, sunglasses, hats, and even food and massages. These vendors also walk up and down the beach with pushcarts selling their wares. I was told to be very careful when dealing with them, especially since I don’t speak the language, so I just admired them from a distance. As I mentioned before, there are also lots of people windsurfing and kitesurfing in the water which is very cool to watch! I got the feeling that most of the beach-goers were South American – I didn’t hear any English as I walked. I felt 100% safe walking alone though I didn’t venture beyond the line of hotels.

After my walk, Matthew met me down at the pool where we relaxed for a while before showering and heading back into town. We went to a local phone store (Claro which is similar to Verizon) so Matthew could buy a SIM card for his phone. While our hotel had sufficient Wi-Fi for us to use, once we left the hotel we didn’t have any way to use our phones. It was quite a production getting the SIM card. Apparently, you can’t just buy them on the street like you can in Europe. Each card has to be “registered” before it’s usable.

Anyway, once we got that taken care of, we headed back into the Old City for more walking and a little shopping. I had found a painting the day before that I really loved, so we tracked down the artist, a lovely man named Ada, and bought it along with some trinkets for our girls. We then made our way to La Cevicheria, a restaurant Matthew had read about. Though we had to wait a bit for an outdoor table, it was totally worth it! We sat streetside, had a cold drink, ate some delicious food, and were entertained by various musicians, vendors, and the multitude of tourists in the area.

Once we finished our meal, we walked around a bit more, making our way back to the main square where a multitude of sweets vendors had set up their wares. I opted for a tamarind candy that was super sweet and delicious!