I wrote this piece for the April 2003 issue of National Geographic Traveler.
Never mind why I brought my surfboard to Cartagena, Colombia's jewel of a colonial seaside city—its waves, it turns out, are even more relaxed than its inhabitants.
The point is, the board is hanging out both back windows of our taxi (my wife, Nancy, and I crouching beneath it), and our driver is about to shoot us through an opening in the fortified wall surrounding Cartagena's Old City... but I'm not sure the board will squeeze through.
It does—phew—and we proceed, horn blaring, down alleys in the city's historic center, which is lined with a dress parade of 16th-century Spanish colonial buildings. Coconut vendors jump back, mothers shoo their kids onto sidewalks, and ice cream peddlers on bikes stop and stare at the surfboard.
"Now this is ambiente," says Nancy, a Guatemalan who has sung the praises of Cartagena—a UNESCO World Heritage site—since we met. Technically, ambiente means ambience, but my wife uses the term to mean the ambience she prefers: hot and loud, with plenty of action. Oh, and with a beach nearby.
Rich History
Cartagena de Indias (its official name) sits by a bay on Colombia's Caribbean coast, founded by conquistadores in 1533 as a port for shipping gold to Spain. The convoys of gold-laden galleons soon attracted the attention of pirates and privateers, including Sir Francis Drake ("El Draque"), who attacked Cartagena in 1586 and reportedly stripped the town of ten million pesos, a giant emerald, and the cathedral bells.
In response to this and like attacks, the Spaniards surrounded the city with walls and ramparts 50 feet thick, and had four nearly impregnable forts built, by slaves—at the time among the most formidable engineering feats in the Americas. Today, with the gold and pirates long gone, the walls protect another treasure: the city's rich trove of colonial architecture.
I know what you're thinking: That's great, but why would one choose to vacation in conflict- Colombia? For this reason: Cartagena has traditionally been considered a place apart by Colombians, a distinction that has kept it neatly out of the political and military turmoil the country has been subject to—so much so, in fact, that it is a popular stop for U.S. cruise ships.
The Colonial City
Eventually the taxi reaches our inn, Hostal Tres Banderas, a restored colonial mansion in the Old City—just the sort of sun-faded aristocratic residence that sometime Cartagena resident and Nobel Prize-winning author Gabriel García Marquez describes in his bestselling novel Love in the Time of Cholera. We pass through grand, high-ceilinged rooms to our guest room. In a Spanish-style courtyard a fountain splashes, and geraniums and bougainvillea seem to fill every spare space.
Once we're settled in our room, with its exposed beams and pimiento-red walls, we set out to explore the Old City on foot. Walking along the narrow streets of el centro, we pass colonial mansions similar to Tres Banderas, painted in rich, saturated shades of pumpkin, indigo, scarlet, and mustard. Many have wood balconies and doors, complete with centuries-old knockers in the shapes of lions, anchors, mermaids.
Sweets and Statues
Soon we arrive at Plaza de los Coches (Square of the Coaches), the most central of the city's plazas, with its tall, ocher-colored clock tower. Nearby lies the entrance to what was once the largest slave market in the New World; slaves were brought from Africa to, among other things, mine the precious metals the Europeans valued.
From here we wander into the arcades of the Portal de los Dulces (Portal of Sweets), where gray-haired señoras—many descendants of slaves—sell candies made of coconut, papaya, and other tropical fruits. We buy an assortment and finish it by the time we reach the Church of San Pedro Claver, located on the plaza of the same name and built of golden coral stone.
Dedicated to a Spanish missionary who was so intent on helping slaves that he declared himself a "slave to slaves," the church's cavelike interior is silent. We cautiously approach San Pedro's skeleton, in a glass case built into the high altar, when bells—apparently announcing the next Mass—chime out, surprising us. We then follow a staircase up to the second floor, where Nancy backs into a statue and nearly jumps out of her skin. We decide it's time for a little fresh air.
Plaza San Diego
For dinner that evening we walk over to Plaza San Diego, where restaurateurs promoting everything from arroz con pescado (rice with fish) to Argentine barbecue try to lure us to their tables. Choosing one, we sit under an enormous ceiba tree and sip tall glasses of mora con leche (a kind of blackberry milk shake) as three young men, two with guitars and one with maracas, sing boleros. The night is warm—about 75 degrees—and a salty breeze ruffles our hair.
"I could sit here forever," says Nancy.
So could I.
But we don't: There's more to see.
Bocagrande
The point is, the board is hanging out both back windows of our taxi (my wife, Nancy, and I crouching beneath it), and our driver is about to shoot us through an opening in the fortified wall surrounding Cartagena's Old City... but I'm not sure the board will squeeze through.
It does—phew—and we proceed, horn blaring, down alleys in the city's historic center, which is lined with a dress parade of 16th-century Spanish colonial buildings. Coconut vendors jump back, mothers shoo their kids onto sidewalks, and ice cream peddlers on bikes stop and stare at the surfboard.
"Now this is ambiente," says Nancy, a Guatemalan who has sung the praises of Cartagena—a UNESCO World Heritage site—since we met. Technically, ambiente means ambience, but my wife uses the term to mean the ambience she prefers: hot and loud, with plenty of action. Oh, and with a beach nearby.
 |
| A narrow street in Cartagena's historic district. |
Rich History
Cartagena de Indias (its official name) sits by a bay on Colombia's Caribbean coast, founded by conquistadores in 1533 as a port for shipping gold to Spain. The convoys of gold-laden galleons soon attracted the attention of pirates and privateers, including Sir Francis Drake ("El Draque"), who attacked Cartagena in 1586 and reportedly stripped the town of ten million pesos, a giant emerald, and the cathedral bells.
In response to this and like attacks, the Spaniards surrounded the city with walls and ramparts 50 feet thick, and had four nearly impregnable forts built, by slaves—at the time among the most formidable engineering feats in the Americas. Today, with the gold and pirates long gone, the walls protect another treasure: the city's rich trove of colonial architecture.
I know what you're thinking: That's great, but why would one choose to vacation in conflict- Colombia? For this reason: Cartagena has traditionally been considered a place apart by Colombians, a distinction that has kept it neatly out of the political and military turmoil the country has been subject to—so much so, in fact, that it is a popular stop for U.S. cruise ships.
 |
| Cartagena Harbor |
The Colonial City
Eventually the taxi reaches our inn, Hostal Tres Banderas, a restored colonial mansion in the Old City—just the sort of sun-faded aristocratic residence that sometime Cartagena resident and Nobel Prize-winning author Gabriel García Marquez describes in his bestselling novel Love in the Time of Cholera. We pass through grand, high-ceilinged rooms to our guest room. In a Spanish-style courtyard a fountain splashes, and geraniums and bougainvillea seem to fill every spare space.
Once we're settled in our room, with its exposed beams and pimiento-red walls, we set out to explore the Old City on foot. Walking along the narrow streets of el centro, we pass colonial mansions similar to Tres Banderas, painted in rich, saturated shades of pumpkin, indigo, scarlet, and mustard. Many have wood balconies and doors, complete with centuries-old knockers in the shapes of lions, anchors, mermaids.
 |
| Hostal Tres Banderas |
Sweets and Statues
Soon we arrive at Plaza de los Coches (Square of the Coaches), the most central of the city's plazas, with its tall, ocher-colored clock tower. Nearby lies the entrance to what was once the largest slave market in the New World; slaves were brought from Africa to, among other things, mine the precious metals the Europeans valued.
From here we wander into the arcades of the Portal de los Dulces (Portal of Sweets), where gray-haired señoras—many descendants of slaves—sell candies made of coconut, papaya, and other tropical fruits. We buy an assortment and finish it by the time we reach the Church of San Pedro Claver, located on the plaza of the same name and built of golden coral stone.
Dedicated to a Spanish missionary who was so intent on helping slaves that he declared himself a "slave to slaves," the church's cavelike interior is silent. We cautiously approach San Pedro's skeleton, in a glass case built into the high altar, when bells—apparently announcing the next Mass—chime out, surprising us. We then follow a staircase up to the second floor, where Nancy backs into a statue and nearly jumps out of her skin. We decide it's time for a little fresh air.
| The Church of San Pedro Claver |
Plaza San Diego
For dinner that evening we walk over to Plaza San Diego, where restaurateurs promoting everything from arroz con pescado (rice with fish) to Argentine barbecue try to lure us to their tables. Choosing one, we sit under an enormous ceiba tree and sip tall glasses of mora con leche (a kind of blackberry milk shake) as three young men, two with guitars and one with maracas, sing boleros. The night is warm—about 75 degrees—and a salty breeze ruffles our hair.
"I could sit here forever," says Nancy.
So could I.
But we don't: There's more to see.
 |
| Plaza San Diego |
Bocagrande
The next morning we explore Bocagrande, the newer section of town that is home to Cartagena's high-rise hotels and Internet cafés. As we walk along Avenida El Malecón, we watch families frolicking in the calm surf to the beat of merengue tunes blasting out of hundreds of CD players. Someone has even sculpted the Last Supper in sand.
We scarf down a breakfast of beans, patacones (fried, semi-mashed plantains), and passion fruit juice in the courtyard of the 1940s-vintage Hotel Caribe, then buy two gelati at Heladería Italiana Cartagena. A man approaches us with a sketch of a Spanish galleon in Cartagena's harbor. It is obviously a copy.
"This is original," he says in English, licking his finger and rubbing it onto the paper. “I painted it myself.”
Since he only wants 5,000 pesos ($3), I buy it.
When we get back to our hotel, we find our host, Manuel Rey, stretched out on a rattan rocker on the patio.
"Time for siesta," he says.
Good idea; we do the same.
Torture and Tunnels
We set off later that afternoon for the Palace of the Inquisition (which was about to undergo renovation), incongruously located along lovely, tree-filled Parque de Bolívar. This place is not for the squeamish: Various instruments of torture used to wrest confessions from innocent people are displayed in the dungeon, including an iron maiden, a rack, and a set of thumb screws. For gruesome narration, pay for a guide.
Almost as dungeon-like are the tunnels we snake through in the massivc Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas, once the strongest fort in the Spanish colonies and the pride of Cartagena. The tunnels allowed soldiers to dart protected between the fort's key parts, a necessity during long sieges.
We scarf down a breakfast of beans, patacones (fried, semi-mashed plantains), and passion fruit juice in the courtyard of the 1940s-vintage Hotel Caribe, then buy two gelati at Heladería Italiana Cartagena. A man approaches us with a sketch of a Spanish galleon in Cartagena's harbor. It is obviously a copy.
"This is original," he says in English, licking his finger and rubbing it onto the paper. “I painted it myself.”
Since he only wants 5,000 pesos ($3), I buy it.
When we get back to our hotel, we find our host, Manuel Rey, stretched out on a rattan rocker on the patio.
"Time for siesta," he says.
Good idea; we do the same.
 |
| Bocagrande: Cartagena's modern section. |
Torture and Tunnels
We set off later that afternoon for the Palace of the Inquisition (which was about to undergo renovation), incongruously located along lovely, tree-filled Parque de Bolívar. This place is not for the squeamish: Various instruments of torture used to wrest confessions from innocent people are displayed in the dungeon, including an iron maiden, a rack, and a set of thumb screws. For gruesome narration, pay for a guide.
Almost as dungeon-like are the tunnels we snake through in the massivc Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas, once the strongest fort in the Spanish colonies and the pride of Cartagena. The tunnels allowed soldiers to dart protected between the fort's key parts, a necessity during long sieges.
We walk some of the passageways, wondering at the thickness of the walls, the advanced-for-its time water system, and the fort's sheer size. I could see how Spanish naval hero Don Blas de Lezo, dispatched to defend Cartagena in 1741 from an assault by 27,000 British soldiers, held them off with a mere 3,000 troops: He had this fort—and the three others.
Saying Goodbye
On our last night in Cartagena we took a sunset carriage ride through the Old City—touristy, yes, but the best way to see the intricately carved stone doorways and bougainvillea-covered wood balconies that were built to be seen at a horse's pace. As we c1ip-clopped along streets with names like Calle del Estanco del Aguardiente (Street of the Firewater Warehouse), we could almost hear the ghosts of pirates and slaves and viceroys whispering, "Stay, stay."
 |
| The Palace of the Inquisition |
Saying Goodbye
On our last night in Cartagena we took a sunset carriage ride through the Old City—touristy, yes, but the best way to see the intricately carved stone doorways and bougainvillea-covered wood balconies that were built to be seen at a horse's pace. As we c1ip-clopped along streets with names like Calle del Estanco del Aguardiente (Street of the Firewater Warehouse), we could almost hear the ghosts of pirates and slaves and viceroys whispering, "Stay, stay."
Sure...but what do we do with the surfboard?
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