Santa Marta

From Medellin we took an early morning flight to Cartagena and caught an 4.5 hour mini bus to Santa Marta. Things were really starting to heat up, literally. We were now on the Caribbean coast and temperatures are generally around 35C and don’t get much lower than 28C at night. Sweaty. We stayed at a really cool hostel called Villana Hostel which had a courtyard in the middle with a pool in it that was shaded by palm trees, and a bar. We spent our day just walking around the town, drinking the lemon slushies from the street vendors, drinking beers in our hostel pool, and then eating really good fried chicken from a place called Caribbean Wings.
Santa Marta is a beachside town that didn’t overly impress me to be honest. To be fair we didn’t go to Playa Blanca which is the beach nearby, and we weren’t there for the Saturday rooftop party that apparently is cool. But you kind of have to stay there to do day trips, and it isn’t a bad spot for that.

Tayrona

The next morning we were off at Sparrow’s fart to get to Tayrona National Park early. The park is an extremely photogenic stretch of land about 45 minutes bus ride from Santa Marta that is home to some really cool beaches. You can stay the night in a couple of the beaches, but we were told spaces are limited so you have to get there super early. By 8.30am we had started the two-hour hike from the entrance to Cabo San Juan, the most popular beach. The walk was really beautiful and really sweaty. It took us along the coast and through the jungle, past indigenous families who still live there exactly as they did hundreds of years ago. It was very surreal to come across a 5-ish-year-old girl (may have been a boy), in a hessian sack, cutting open coconuts with a machete.

We were at Cabo San Juan by about 10am, very excited to get the prime hammock spots on top of the hill only to find out that check in didn’t open until 1.30. By then, as you can imagine, everyone was there, and we missed out on the best spots. But it didn’t end up being an issue as we actually slept really well in the hammocks down by the water 🙂 We spent the day there just chilling, swimming, reading, eating from the little restaurant, and drinking a beer as we watched the sunset. As there is no music allowed, no power, and not a lot of cover, we were in bed at about 8pm. But not before we were treated to a stunning thunder and lightening show that lit up the sky like it was day time (see the blurry purple photo below). So cool. The next morning we woke up with the sun (not hard when you’re in a hammock outside), and Scott and I walked to the water’s edge to watch the sunrise with a few other early risers. It was already so warm so we decided to go for a swim and wondered why no one else was joining us. Turns out it was 5.30am, perhaps a little early for other people. We were on our way back out of the park by 6.30am and this time got to see monkeys on our walk! On the whole we both felt the hype of Tayrona was more than the actual experience; there were so many tourists there and it might even look a little better in the photos. But it was a really cool thing to do and the sunrise swim was a stand out highlight for both of us.

By 8.30am we were on the bus back to Santa Marta to get our big packs we had stored at the hostel and catch the bus back out to Palomino.

Palomino

Palomino is another hour past Tayrona, and if we had known you can leave your big packs at the entrance to Tayrona, we would have done that to save the trip back into Santa Marta. So do that if you are going to do your trip in this order 🙂

Palomino is a very small town in the middle of not much that has found itself turned into a little hippy/beachbum/backpacker hangout. The ‘main road’ doesn’t really have anything on it, but the road that goes off the main road down to the beach is lined with cool hostels, rustic restaurants, markets, and bars. It reminded me very much of the Costa Rican beach towns, and I have a feeling we will be seeing much more like it in the coming month. We were staying a little bit up the main road in a place called Color Hostel because it was cheap for a double room with air con, and because it was quiet. The hostel had bikes so we rode those to the beach and spent the rest of our first day sitting at the beach having a very cold beer, before getting a surprisingly good woodfired pizza from Primaluna hostel, and heading home. The next day we planned to go tubing. It’s pretty much the main/only thing to actually ‘do’ in Palomino, and every morning you will find that street lined with big rubber tubes from different vendors. We just rocked up to some guys said ‘tubing’, paid the equivalent of $10NZD each, and before we knew it we were each on the back of a motorbike clinging onto our tube, speeding through the Colombian jungle. After about 15 minutes on the bikes we hopped off and had to walk up a hill for 15 minutes, and down for 10 before reach the river. I have NEVER been so sweaty in my life. Wowza. The tubing was awesome. The current is just stong enough to carry you down and there are a few super mellow little rapids which make it fun. We took 6 beers and drunk them on the way down, keeping them cool by floating them in our tubes with us. It took about 2 hours and takes you through stunning jungle and past local families playing in the water. You end up out at the beach, walk 10 minutes, and you’re back where you started. Easy Peasy. Definitely do it. Managed to only take one photo though…

That afternoon we went to the main hostel in Palomino – The Dreamer Hostel – pretended we were staying there, bought a drink from their bar and drunk it in the pool. The rest of the day was spent chilling in our room with the air con. I ended up getting a bikini made for me by one of the stalls. I picked the style and the fabric and it was ready in 5 hours! We had an early dinner at an epic place called Colomvivo, which looked to be made from recycled materials. The food was so delicious; a super fresh ceviche and a quinoa salad thing with heaps of yum vegies that was soooooo good. We are looking forward to a little less fried food and a lot more fresh food in Central America.

The next morning we woke without a plan. We had wanted to visited Costeno – a really cool looking surf camp hostel – but hadn’t heard back from them / ran outta cash with no ATM in sight. We also wanted to stay at a place called Casa Loma in Minca which we had heard was amazing but hadn’t heard back from them either. So we ended up going back to Santa Marta and during a really really good brunch at a place called Lulo (with THE BEST super refreshing strawberry and mint lemonade slushies), we got confirmation from Minca that they had room for us, so off we went!

Minca

Minca is an easy 45 minute Jeep ride from Santa Marta up into the jungle. Once we got there it was a not-so-easy 15 minute walk with our packs on up a very steep track to Casa Loma. But boy oh boy was it worth it. This place is so magical. It is run by a Brit and a German and was exactly what we wanted. We were greeted at the hostel puffing and sweating by two glasses of water and the applause of the other guests who understood our pain. They have a number of different accommodation types but we had booked their version of a ‘Presidential Suite’. The Mirador room was on top of the main hangout area and had its own private deck overlooking the stunning lush valley right down to the sea at Santa Marta, for $40NZD. The rest of that day was spent reading and napping, and soaking in the chilled out and homely atmosphere. In standard us fashion, around 5.30pm we bought a bottle of red wine from the hostel and drunk it while watching the sunset from our deck. It was about then that we decided we wanted another night here. They didn’t have the same room available so we booked a little cabana a little further up the hill called Casa Luna and walked down to the town to get something to eat and to join the locals in watching Colombia beat Peru to make the Semi-final of Copa America.

The next day we woke with the dawn and had a delicious breakfast at our hostel before walking one hour to a waterfall in the middle of the jungle. We spent an hour or so there swimming and in Scott’s case frolicking, in the water. On our way back we walked around the town for a bit and had a wee treat at a local cafe before heading back to Casa Loma for the best vegetarian burger I have ever had, amazing fresh veggie pasta, and an afternoon of reading in the hammock with the welcome breeze cooling us down. Oh also we got some brownie.

After a few house cocktails and another great meal for dinner we went to discover Casa Luna, our new home for the night. It was a lot more basic the the Mirador but equally as beautiful. It is the furthest accomm away from the main area so is completely silent. The comfy double bed was beautifully made up and though there weren’t exactly doors, there was a thatched roof, waterproof cover and mosquito net. I didn’t know how well I’d sleep but i closed my eyes and opened them again with the sun rising and the jungle birds waking up around us, so there you go.

It probably doesn’t have to be said, but definitely go to Casa Loma, and be prepared to want to spend an extra night or two.

Cartagena

After the 4.5 hour mini bus ride back to Cartagena from Santa Marta we checked into the AirBnB we had booked inside the beautiful walled city of Cartagena. This is one of the most insanely beautiful towns I have ever been to. Every inch of it is beautifully coloured and dripping in flowers and ivy. The cute little town squares are surrounded by bars and restaurants with tables out on the cobblestoned roads and markets where locals sell everything from street food to sun hats to watercolour art (one of which we bought). Our Air BnB was less of an AirBnB and more of a hotel – no complaints here! The big wooden door opened onto a beautiful little courtyard where both mornings we enjoyed a yummy breakfast included in our room. We also got a room upgrade which saw us being put in the best room in the place (remembering there are only 4 rooms), but it was by the far the biggest and most fancy room we have had the whole time. Scott could starfish on the bed and his feet and hands wouldn’t be anywhere near the corners. That day I wasn’t feeling too good – we think from some bad water, so Scott went out for dinner and to find the NBA, which he did, while I watched Parks and Rec reruns in bed.

The next day was our only full day in Cartagena. There isn’t really a lot to do here, in fact the biggest attraction is to just walk around the city and admire. So that’s what we did. We spent the day perusing the markets, buying some little art prints and repeatedly saying how stunning the place was. The photos don’t really do it justice. Another reason you probably don’t want too much time here is because it is very expensive. There are some seriously fancy hotels here, and fancy guests to go in them, so it was a bit of a shock to the backpacker budget. But, for our last night we wanted to toast the end of our South America leg, so we didn’t hold back too much. We had a cocktail each and a little cheese platter at an epic spot called El Baron – go here. Fantastic cocktails and cool jazz music. Then we walked passed live street music, buzzing restaurants and upscale boutiques to El Burlador de Sevilla where we had a yummy dinner of seafood paella, stuffed chicken, and bottle of red accompanied by some traditional live South American music. On the way home we shared a gelato from Gelateria Tramonti. It’s rated number 1 out of 539 places to eat in Cartagena on TripAdvisor, and it’s an ice cream place, that never happens. It was delicious.

Slightly tipsy and very happy, we strolled back to our room still not quite believing how pretty this city was, and still not quite believing how lucky we were to have had such an amazing two and half months in South America.