Santa Marta, Colombia, 18-21st July

Santa Marta, Colombia, 18-21st July

We left Cartagena for Santa Marta, north east along the coast. We arranged a pick up van with the hostel for 37,000 (about 10 pounds) each which would take about 4 hours. The drive is relatively straightforward and its direct, so no wasting time!

When we arrived at Santa Marta, we drove past a screen showing 39 degrees!! It was boiling hot, the hottest temperature we had both experienced since we started travelling! We were dropped off on the main street Carrera 11, so much for door-to-door service, as we had been told by the hostel. We had booked a hostel which wasnt far, so we walked there. The main street was packed with people, and stalls selling fruit, and lemonade, but most sold flipflops!

We found our hostel, Hostel La Galeria, which is 2 seconds away from the beach. For 26,000 (about 8 pounds) for the both of us we were given a big room with bunk beds and also a single bed with a private bathroom, bargain! But the heat was unbearable. It was like walking into a sauna, The room only had 2 small ceiling fans which did nothing except blow hot air around. The rooms in Colombia dont seem to come with air conditioning. The mattresses were made of sponge, the worst kind, so for the next few days I had backache and didnt sleep very much.

Santa Marta is a nice town, small, but the beach seems to be its main attraction. But its such a thin strip of beach that I couldnt understand why. Its about 750ft long with the harbour at on end. People usually dont stay here for long, they head to the next small town along the bay. So we didnt see many tourists. There isnt loads to do either. One night we wanted to go for a walk along the coast, which was over before it had begun, because the beach is so tiny. So instead we went for a few laps up and down the beach! The beach has a stone made pier at one end, so we went and sat on them, teasing the craps below!

We have een saving for the states, as it will be extremely expensive in comparison to south america, so we decided that we would keep entertainment to a minimum. And we treat ourselves to just one meal a day, the rest of the time its crackers and fruit.

Restaurants face the beach, but we skipped most of them and tried some street food. They sell huge slices of pizza so we had some of those, which were surprisingly filling. As we were eating a homeless man approached us dragging his family behind them, saying this is my wife she has nothing to eat, we are hungry and have no money.. and the wife was carrying a new born baby in her arms! It annoys me the amount of homeless on the street sat with 2 or 3 kids and usually a newborn which they cant afford to feed.

After a couple of lazy days around Santa Marta, keeping spending down, we thought we would go to Taganga, the next small town along the bay. We had found it really difficult to find any accomodation there so we had left our backpacks at the hostel. From carerra 11 we took the bus to Taganga which took just 15 minutes. The views as the bus snaked down were gorgeous, but upon closer inspection it looked less like a paradise beach and more like a construction site occupied with hippies. It was a small fishing village and the roads were just made of mud, it was very underdeveloped altough it looked like they were trying to change that as there were breeze block walls and piles of cement all over. The beach was nothing more than a square with black sand and the sea didnt look very clean either. I wondered what all the fuss about this place was. After 10 minutes we jumped back on the bus to santa marta after deciding there was little point in paying more for a hostel in a so-called touristy place when we had such a cheap deal where we were.

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