Casa Del Tejadillo Cartagena

What visit to Colombia would be complete without a mud bath?

Apparently, not ours. Just outside of Cartagena is one of the more unusual volcanos we've encountered so far. First, I have a hard time calling it a volcano, seeing as it's all of 45 feet high. You climb up the outside, and look down into the crater, which is about 15 feet by 15 feet. Climbing down a short ladder, maybe 10 feet into the crater, you find yourself floating ...

... tourist destination. It is one of the oldest cities of the New World. Throughout the 16th century, Spain governed the city through a system of Viceroys. When the Spanish conquistadors discovered that the interior of Columbia was rich in gold and emeralds, these items flowed into Cartagena for shipment to Spain. To defend against pirate attacks, King Felipe II ordered a protective wall to be build around the city. In ...

... There were 18 items on each menu and lets just say the english version was worse than the spanish version. I couldnt comprehend the spanish version as well as I would have liked so I took a look at the english version and all it said was Chinese Food #1 Chinese Food #2 Chinese Food #3 Chinese Food #4 all the way up to 18. Thats It. No descriptions, no colors. no pictures. nada. So i pretty much did ennie minie miny moe. Pointed to 2 meals and hoped for the best. They were fine but ...

... friendly face, Kate, who we had the pleasure of meeting in Bogota. She was off to Lima in a few days but she had just finished doing the mud volcano, so we picked up a few tips. One was that the included lunch, again, was not something to look forward to, and she advised us to opt out if we could, since street sellers had plenty of empanadas and ariepas for sale. We decided to opt out and returned to where we booked earlier but the booking office was closed. We would ...

... age well here. The men are nice looking as well, but I think they are inferior in looks to their female compatriots.

I went to the hostel I had hoped to stay at, Casa Viena. It was full, so they sent me around the corner to Hostal Real. Hostal Real turned out to be a real treat (said with some sarcasm). I asked immediately about a private room as I am tiring of the whole dorm room scene. $10/night with fan and private bathroom. YES! Sign me up! And then I got ...

... people. I am just sweaty, hot, and hungry, but happy to have experienced another proof ex negativo of who I am today. After that I take a shower. Why not write a story about my seven-second fight with gravity and the soap? They have every right to be honored here. The soap is a piece of cheap red perfumed soap I bought in Santa Cruz for my private bump who refused to use it. It's very slippery but it does what it should do: take away the sweat. I keep it in a plastic bag so that it doesn ...

... the river. I jumped back as they did. Took there pictures and found out that they are not commonly seen and are very poisonous. Good thing they were having sex when I came upon them. I found a horse shoe and had it in my pocket so now I have that with my travels for luck. We took a speed boat for two hours, a jeep ride with me riding in the back with the bags for half the trip for four hours and then a small bus ride for four ...

... to the big 3.


Arriving in Piura we check into a cheap hotel and track down two local girls (Mapi and Carmen) who we met in Valparaiso. They have offered to show us around their part of Peru and with a phone call we meet up for dinner and plan to spend a weekend at a friend's beach house an hour away.


Saturday March 07th and Sunday March 8th


REST DAYS: PIURA AND COLAN


Before heading out to Colan Playa, we bump into a Norwegian backpacker near our ...

... tattoo dried at carnival...i guess i just got lucky! :-)

Anyways, we got to Cartagena with no issues.

As for Cartagena...it's pretty, but that's all there is to it. If you saw the pics, you might have been in Prague, Granada, Leon, Antigua or any other such place. Maybe it really gets going at the weekend, but there was no party to be had either. Unimpressed - it deserves a day but no more.

In an effort to get away, i took a ...

... a young girl in Colombia I've been sponsoring. When I started sponsoring her 2 years (since 2005) I never thought I'd get to meet her so soon - and now the day was here! I also sponsor Yeimi from Guatemala, which I had went to visit in Guatemala the year before. For those who want to read my story from the two visits, check here.

I sponsor her through Children International, which has an office in Barranquilla, where I was made welcome and shown all around ...