4 Days in Cartagena: My Honest Journal from the Walled City to the Mud Volcano
Day 1: Arrival & The Walled City — "It's Hotter Than I Expected"
Flew into Rafael Nunez Airport (CTG). Small airport, easy immigration. Filled out the Check-Mig form online beforehand (required within 72 hours of arrival). Uber from the airport to my hotel in Getsemani — about COP 30,000 (~$8 USD).
Checked into a small boutique hotel on Calle de la Sierpe. The room had a ceiling fan and air conditioning, and I turned the AC to arctic immediately. is HOT. Not "oh it's warm" hot. I'm talking 32°C with humidity that makes it feel like 40°C. My clothes were soaked within 20 minutes of stepping outside.
Spent the afternoon walking the walled city. And look — the photos don't lie. The pastel colonial facades, the bougainvillea, the carved wooden balconies, the 16th-century stone walls — it's as beautiful as advertised. Plaza Santo Domingo, the Clock Tower gate, Calle de las Damas. I photographed everything like the tourist I am.
But by 2PM I was destroyed by the heat. Retreated to the hotel pool and stayed there until sunset.
Evening: walked the city walls from the Baluarte Santo Domingo toward the Clock Tower. The sun dropping behind the Caribbean, the walls lit golden, the old city below turning into a warm glow. I understood why people come here. Bought a beer from a corner store for COP 3,000 and sat on the walls until it was dark.
Dinner at a small restaurant in Getsemani — grilled fish, patacones, rice and beans for about COP 25,000. A third of what the same meal would cost inside the walled city.
Day 2: Getsemani & Castillo San Felipe — "The Real Cartagena"
Woke up early and walked Getsemani's streets before the heat. This neighborhood is covered in street art — not the polished commissioned murals you see in trendy cities, but raw, political, colorful walls that tell stories about Cartagena's African, Spanish, and indigenous heritage.
Breakfast from a street vendor: arepa de huevo (fried corn pocket with egg inside) for COP 4,000 and a fresh mango juice for COP 3,000. Standing on the sidewalk eating fried food at 8AM while the neighborhood woke up around me. This is what travel is supposed to feel like.
Morning at Castillo San Felipe de Barajas (~COP 33,000 entry). The fortress is massive — the largest Spanish colonial fortification in the Americas. But the tunnels underneath are the real experience. Built to amplify sound for detecting attackers, the acoustics are bizarre. You can whisper at one end and hear it echo through 50 meters of underground passageway.
Afternoon: pool. I'm not going to pretend I fought through the 2PM heat. I didn't. I read a book by the pool and drank a limonada de coco.
Evening at Cafe Havana. Live salsa band, COP 20,000 cover. The music started at 10PM but the dance floor didn't really fill until midnight. I don't dance salsa. I tried anyway. A Colombian woman spent about 5 minutes trying to teach me the basic step, laughed kindly at my inability, and then danced circles around me for the next hour.
I left Cafe Havana at 3AM. The streets of Getsemani were still alive — people sitting on stoops, music from open doorways, the smell of late-night empanadas from a cart on the corner.
Day 3: Rosario Islands — "The Boat Was Worth Every Peso"
Day trip to the Rosario Islands. Booked a small-group boat from Muelle de la Bodeguita — about COP 120,000 (~$30 USD) per person including lunch. 45 minutes across the Caribbean to a small island beach.
The water. I need to talk about the water. It's that crystalline Caribbean turquoise that doesn't look real. I snorkeled over coral reef with visibility of maybe 15 meters (snorkel gear rental ~COP 30,000) and saw parrotfish, angelfish, and a sea turtle that was completely unbothered by my presence.
Lunch was fried fish with coconut rice and patacones on the beach. Simple and perfect.
The cheap tour boats are apparently overcrowded and rushed. Our small-group boat had maybe 12 people and we had the island mostly to ourselves until around 1PM when the bigger tours arrived. Spent the afternoon snorkeling, floating, and reading on the sand.
Returned to Cartagena around 4PM with salt in my hair and sun on my face and that particular tiredness that comes from a day of swimming and doing nothing productive.
Dinner at La Cevicheria in the walled city — wait for it — because everyone told me to eat there. The ceviche was excellent (COP 35,000-45,000 for a plate). Is it worth the tourist prices? For ceviche this fresh, yes.
Day 4: Mud Volcano & Departure — "Why Did Nobody Warn Me About the Rinse?"
Morning trip to Volcan del Totumo. 45 minutes northeast by taxi (~COP 100,000 round trip with waiting time). The "volcano" is a 15-meter mound with a crater full of warm, thick, therapeutic mud.
I climbed the wooden steps, lowered myself in, and... floated. The mud is so dense you can't sink. A local mud masseur appeared and started working my shoulders while I bobbed around like a buoyant potato. Entry including massage: ~COP 35,000.
The weird part: afterward, local women rinse you off in a nearby lagoon. This is... an experience. They're thorough. You're standing in a lagoon in your swimsuit while a stranger scrubs mud out of places mud shouldn't be. It's bizarre and hilarious and oddly communal.
Bring a dark swimsuit. Mud stains.
Returned to Cartagena, cleaned up, grabbed one last arepa de huevo from my corner vendor (we'd become friends by this point — she now waved when she saw me), and headed to the airport.
The Verdict: Would I Go Back?
Without hesitation. But I'd do two things differently:
Stay in Getsemani, not the walled city. Better prices, better nightlife, better food value, more authentic energy. The walled city is a 5-minute walk.
Come in January or February. Still hot, but the trade winds keep the humidity down. December-April is dry season. I visited in March, which was borderline — a few humid days that made sightseeing before 10AM mandatory.
Cartagena is a city that rewards the early riser and the late-night dancer in equal measure. Set your alarm for 7AM to see the walled city without crowds. Take a nap at 2PM. And then stay out until 3AM in Getsemani because that's when this city is truly alive.
If you're planning a broader Latin American trip, Rio de Janeiro pairs beautifully with Cartagena — both are tropical, music-driven cities with world-class beaches. And for more things to do here, read our Cartagena top 10 guide.
