We decided to fly to Cartagena as to take a bus it would have been over a 20 hour journey. Now I know that the whole continent is huge so the distances to travel are very long, but we weren't ready for those long journeys just yet! We took the flight from Bogota to Cartagena and to be honest the flight wasn't much more expensive than the bus journey anyway so just made more sense to do it that way and save time. We took an afternoon flight there, I was wearing walking trousers and a waterproof jacket, as it had been raining in Bogota before we left. However, when we got off the flight at Cartagena airport the heat was stifling and really humid, even with just a vest top and trousers. We were pretty quick to collect our baggage and left the airport straight away, although as it was all so quick, one of the airport staff checked that we were taking our own bags, as for all he knew, we could have been anyone walking off with someone's stuff! We grabbed a taxi from outside the airport and asked the driver to take us to the hotel we were staying, thinking he would probably try and rip us off... When he told us we were there he insisted we had to get out and walk the rest of the way, we thought that a little strange, however he actually carried one of our backpacks to the hotel, and saw us in there safely. When we asked "cuanto" I thought he said 20,000 pesos and would have been willing to give that to him, so gave a 20,000 note and he gave us 18,000 change so it was actually only 2000 pesos, so it cost around 80p! Bargain.

Once we'd checked in to the hotel, yes hotel I hear you say .... a hotel wasn't actually that much more than a hostel in Cartagena, so thought we would stay there rather than a hostel, we had a wander around the local area. The street we were staying on is the main street for hostels in Cartagena, it's the Calle de la Media Luna. Along this street are many bars, restaurants, nightclubs and mini supermercados, and even a shop selling frozen yogurts which proved to be a good thing for me, while John was happy that there were lots of bars and a supermarket selling "cervezas"-beers! Erica our previous host at another hostel we stayed at, suggested we stay at a hostel called Media Luna as in the Calle because it was suppose to be the best hostel around with a pool, bar and nightclub all in one, however it only had dorms and we weren't ready for those yet either, so settled for a hotel instead. While we wandered down the old town in Cartagena, we stumbled across the hostel Media Luna and it looked nice so we thought we'd stop there and have a drink on the way back.

While wandering through the streets of Cartagena it was starting to get dark, but unlike Bogota where you didn't feel safe at night, you felt perfectly fine here . I thought that the place had a really good vibe to it and you could tell that there was definitely a Caribbean influence. I just felt that I liked the place much more than Bogota, perhaps as this was a lot hotter than Bogota and is on the Caribbean coast. It was the same set up as Bogota as it had Calles and Carreras (streets and roads). If anyone's been to New York it's similar to there where each block is adjacent to the next and the roads and streets all run parallel to each other. All the streets are set out in a grid plan, all the carreras run one way, and the calles run the other way, so it's pretty each to check which street you are on and find you're way around... most of the time!

The old town of Cartagena is surrounded by "Las Muralles" (thick walls) which were built to protect the city. It was actually declared a UN World Heritage Site. The architecture of the town is pretty too, there are many churches, monasteries, plazas, and mansions. In the main square there is a sculpture by ... you've guessed it- Botero which is of a fat lady surprisingly. It seems to be quite a historic town with lots to see and do. Once walking round we saw some horse drawn carts which were taking tourists around the city, we didn't take a ride tho! We took a look at the walls of the city and there were some nice sea views from up on the wall, but it was starting to get dark, so we couldn't see much really and we must have missed the sunset already....

Once we'd got our bearings around the city, which wasn't as big or as hard to get round as Bogota, we took a slow walk back towards the hotel to get some dinner. We thought we would pop in to hostel Media Luna for a drink as we weren't staying there and it looked like it would be a good atmosphere. I tried speaking Spanish but the guy who worked there spoke English so it was easier to communicate! They were serving burritos for the guests which looked good, so we decided to have some. Once seated, John was in his element as there was a Colombian football cup final game playing in the bar so we watched that . Lots of the hostel residents started to come in the bar for their burritos, so it would have been a good place to meet people if we were staying there. Once we left to go back to the hostel, John wanted some more beers, so we decided to stop off at the supermercado to get some. When we got in the shop, to our surprise, there were loads of people sitting in there with a big tv screen and they were all watching the cup final having beers. It seemed strange that they were allowed to sit in a shop drinking beers and watching the telly- but I guess this is not England so anything goes here. Cheap beer also!

Our second day in Cartagena was just spent getting to know the old town, we wandered round many plazas and squares. There are many market stalls selling all kinds of things including sombreros, jewellery, many carts selling cold drinks and lots of food stalls. The locals know when they see a foreigner coming so really tried hard to sell us things. We hadn't yet been to the beaches in Cartagena so took a walk there . Now you'd think as it's on the Caribbean coast that it would be a really nice beach with lush blue seas... But there were lots of rocks as sea defenses and you couldn't really go in the sea. We later discovered that there was another part to the beach which was a bit better. Lets just say the sea looked like the colour it is back at home. From Cartagena, the locals heavily advertise trips to Playa Blanca and the Isles de Rosario which is where the better beaches are. After researching this, we discovered that when you get a boat to the islands you get hassled by people trying to sell you stuff all the time, so you aren't just able to relax and enjoy the beach, so decided not to do these as we'll get to see some lovely beaches on the rest of the trip I'm sure.

Once we started to walk back from seeing the rocky beaches, the sky looked a bit grey and it started to pour down with rain.... just our luck to be in a rainy Cartagena as well as Bogota! So not so much the Caribbean as we had first thought! The heavens literally opened and we were just dressed in flip flops and shorts and were getting drenched, so we decided to stops for some shelter . While stopped, another Colombian man with his stall full of cakes and pasties came past, trying to dry the glass cabinet off. He didn't try to pester us or ask if we wanted a cake, but people who know me, know I love cakes, and I was a bit peckish so I had a nice little cake with jam in it and John had a pastie. They only came to about 40 pence for both of them so another bargain there! The rain soon stopped afterwards so we wandered back towards the old town. A guy who spoke English stopped us and started chatting so we went into his bar and had a drink. He gave us some good information about the country and what was to see and do. I asked about the rain and he said its usual for Cartagena to have some rain about once every 10 days, so I guess we just went there on the wrong few days. It was still baking hot tho- about 32 degrees centigrade so in a way the rain cooled you down.

Later that evening we decided to try and find a restaurant that John looked up on trip advisor which was suppose to be really nice food, and at a good price too, we tried to find it but couldn't, so had to just wander round finding somewhere else instead . We'd gone away from the Calle de Media Luna and started to find more local Colombian restaurants, a small local man tried to tempt us in by showing us the menu and at first I wasn't going to try that restaurant but John said come on let's eat here. I'm so glad we did end up going there, as I had the best meal out of the whole time I've been in Colombia so far. It was a dish called La petuga planche y arroz basically it was some kind of pan-fried chicken dish with rice, and some kind of local planche thing which is part of the banana family and tasted slightly like a fried banana mixed with potatoes. It was really lush. John had the same but he chose the fish dish instead of chicken and he really enjoyed that too. So I'll have to be more adventurous with trying places that I wouldn't normally go to or I could be missing out on the best food of my life! On the way back from the restaurant we tried to find our road but ended up getting a bit lost because there was a massive thunder storm. The lightening was some of the largest strikes we've ever seen, and it literally lit up the whole sky, at first we thought it was fireworks before we actually saw the lightening so it was quite amazing to experience a storm in a different country. What was strange, while it was thunder and lightening it wasn't actually raining. Wish I could have captured some pictures of the lightening. We eventually made it back to the hotel luckily as we were walking through a bit of a dodgy area. Tomorrow we're off to a mud volcano which will be an experience!