Regatta Cartagena Suites

... some driving through the city to our next Shopping stop. We drive past a whole bunch of Horse-drawn buggies. You can hear comments all over the bus. “Why didn’t we book that?” Guess we’re not the only two that aren’t happy. We stop at out next mall; Los Bovedas or `The Dungeons` as they`re called. It’s in the Old City. We get off the bus and as others are going into the shops, Angie ...

... gorgeous paradise beach. An author for Lonely Planet wrote that "there are only about seven or eight ways to describe an attractive beach... the (gorgeous/splendid/beautiful) beach of (white/powdery/perfect) sand and (sky blue/crystalline/aquamarine) water is backed by (plam/mountain/rainforest) fringed ..."<br><br>Playa Blanca was all of these things, and all I can say to describe it was that it was softer sand, warmer water, and a ...

... fruit juices, including blackberry, 3 different types of passionfruit, mango, soursop, custard apple, papaya, zapote, feijoa and guava. Actually the hot and humid weather means 2 things.......a close following of the Caribbean fashion for the ladies, which means the fatter you are, the tighter, smaller and more lurid the lycra you must wear! Obviously these ladies are not making the most of the abundance of fruit, but are following the Colombian ...

Made it to Bogota without event this morning. Waited in the airport for just a few hours, before flying to Cartagena. Found our hotel which amazingly had our reservation. My spanish paying off. Didn't really do anything today. Wandered around town and took a nap. It's a pretty nice city, but pretty dead on Sunday. Our hotel is pretty decent. AC is a must here -- high 80's with 100% humidity.<br><br>We will go diving tomorrow ...

... warned me that there was a lot of poverty around Cartagena. She was right. The bus terminal is situated far outside the city. The taxi drove through extremely poor neighborhoods, some where houses were little more than shacks. There was also an abundance of trash all around, especially in areas that looked as though they should be parks or waterways. Houses without doors. Kids without shoes in filthy clothes. I have seen poverty here, but it never felt as ever-present ...

... and delicious hamburgers. We really got into the relaxed theme and headed out to a mud volcano for a relaxing plunge. Mud volcanos are crazy, you are suspended in mud and you basically just lie there whilst the rejuvenating properities work on your skin (and any part of you that isnt covered in mud gets a little sun burnt - note the red rings around Beks eyes). We finished off the perfect day with a ...

... down town just checking out the many pastel colored colonial buildings that Cartagena is known for. We also took a trip up to a massive castle that was built by the Spanish to protect the gold trade that used to run in and out of the city. The weather has been beautiful since we got here, although today it was probably at least 90, and is almost too hot at times (especially this morning when we attempted to go for a run). The sun ...

... you!<br><br><br>Navigation is proving a challenge. Reminding us of Argentina's policy of "no maps shall leave this country" policy, Ecuador seem to have gone 1 step further and declared that no maps shall be allowed in. With literally nothing available at any bookstore or gas station, our highway atlas for this leg of the trip is the 2 inches poking over the edges of our $3 Peru tourism map.<br><br><br>These difficulties compound on our final run to Banos, as the main road disappeared off ...

... yorker currently living and working in Iraq' obviously on vacation atm) and Paul (an irish guy who hasnt been in Ireland for 12 years- lucky ******* keeps travelling!) and went down to Santa Marta in a ¨door to door service¨. door to door apparently means to stop 15 times for no apparent reason, then move us into a smaller van where they try to cram way too many people in. Karrina is now known in Colombia as the angry Australian with the big mouth!! Oops!!

... half with the doorman, we ended up not going because a couple of the guys were still working on their beers and weren´t ready to go up just yet so the doorman changed his mind. Boo!! But it´s all good as we ended up hanging out outside the busy bar downstairs and I even salsa danced with a local who asked me! The crazy thing, however, was noticing people making drug transactions right next to us and using a bit of the white stuff...something I didn´t expect to see go ...