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Published: January 2nd 2009
Is what the bus driver yelled on way there at every stop. It was quite amusing the first 50 times, then you just have to tune out, especially if you're sitting at the front of the bus. This was one of the places that we have booked in advance by getting an apartment. This is located in the neighbourhood of El Cabrero. We were promised a one bed and one pull out sofa bed, however upon arrival sure enough it was just a regular sofa. Now since I am not a midget and I don't feel like curling up like a pretzel every night just to fit on the couch, alternate arrangements have to be made at $80/night if memory serves right. So I ended up getting my own apartment. We looked at Bocagrande, but the accommodation there is a little steep. Since it is super high season, this is the best we could do. The apartment itself was not bad actually, quite modern as well. Now, certain people who I was traveling with arranged this accommodation through an "agency". The manager met us on the second day, to fix our air con unit. By that time, we already discovered that
the owner of that aparment had some nasty ass child porn on his computer. The moron just left the videos on his desktop. I won't get into this at all, since this could cover yet another blog.
Now the hamburger helpers for our stay spoke decent english and apparently me and Hanz were addressed as "brother" every time. I just don't know what kind of movies they learned their english from but sometimes I just don't feel like a BROTHER...even less so since I am white...hehe. The fools tried to con us into being our guides, but I speak enough spanish to get by. He was going to introduce us to some ladies (supposedly not whores but what do I know) and translate for us but I politely declined. He told us to check out their website...which we did and I must admit they had some smoking girls there. So we thought to ourselves, why not get to know these ladies? Somehow it would beat hanging out with the local sausages. So we each made our picks and told the BROTHER to set us up.
Meanwhile in the Batcave
In the meantime, we decided to check
Cartagena at Night
Bocagrande in the background.out the sites and beaches around. The weather was quite hot, around 32 degrees celsius. The beach in front of our apartment was quite ghetto......UGLY would be a safe description for it actually. Bocagrande was one of our first trips on the agenda. The neighbourhood is quite nice with some sweet shopping and a lot of the upscale Costenos go there. The beaches were ok at best and the vibe was not that great anyway. Not many people on the beach and an occasional activity here and there. Once you go to Rio, you really do get spoiled....However, I must point out that the tropical juices they sell all around....is simply put a "
Culinary Orgasm. I especially almost creamed my pants when trying the local fruit called LULO. It is yellow and you can see into the inside of the fruit which is kinda cool and it simply tastes amazing. I got hooked on it right away, especially served cold in that heat. Another one I tried was Tomate de Arbol but yaaaaaaaaaa.....about that. We found a really cool pizza joint which we visited frequently.
At night we decided to go check out El Centro, kinda like downtown without
Cartagena during Christmas
Decorations close to Torres De Reloj the downtown. The whole area is walled in which served a purpose in the 16th century but it just makes you feel special if you own a property there. Just for the record, I don't own a property there but I still felt semi-special. The main point of action there is Plaza Santo Domingo. They have all kinds of cool restaurants there and it's a good place to chill and people watch until you go to the clubs. The restaurants are not the cheapest I have ever seen, in fact some are quite a rip. Prices range in the $17-30 for a dish, and then let's not forget the wine since we're feeling smooth and suave. The food I ordered was delicious. I also love the competition for customers there. All the girls are out on the street trying to smile at you while getting ready to set the table for you as soon as they have you. I was surprised how many times I was dumb enough to fall for the bullsache. By the end of our stay, the servers might as well have been Angelina Jolies and it would not have made a difference since we found out
Mr. Babilla Nightclubs
Me and some local girls partying. where the food tastes like peppered anus and where it was actually amazing. (The food won by the way)
Volcan De Totumo One of the highlights of the trip was visiting the mud volcano that is close to Cartagena. It only takes about an hour to get to and it is the best feeling once you submerge yourself in the mud. We also got a massage in the crater which was cool. It is kinda of a weird feeling since you are floating and can't actually touch the bottom. It is virtually impossible to push yourself lower so you just float around there like a wiener in a pot. But it is supposedly theraputic so I won't argue with that.
Islas Del Rosario
A couple of days later we decided to visit Islas del Rosario which are a bunch of island close to Cartagena. We took the Catamaran there and I didn't get sea sick which is always a bonus. Our guide told us to bring like $25 each and that would be enough. Well with all these extra hidden costs involved we felt like homeless bums by the time we got there as we didn't
have enough money to buy what we wanted. Nothing like a local helping you out. 😊 = 😊 I ended up buying some souvenirs for what I thought was a fairly good price. I used Hans' brown-ness for good instead of evil. Since he looks like a local but doesn't speak any spanish...I told him to just shut up and answer yes or no. The locals didn't try to rip me off since they assumed that Hanz was one of them and he never directly talked to them. Good stuff eh? EH?? The island was very beautiful with parrots and hammocks and beautiful plants everywhere. YES, it it a girlfriend place for those who have one. After the whole day there I got a bit burned.
When we got home, we had to get ready cause we had our dates set up for that evening. Yes, Colombia REDEFINES the manana concept. The girls were like 2 hours late and we had to wait for them outside like so they could get in. And when they get there, no apology for being late at all, and for making us stand out there like hookers. Hmm, maybe that is life trying
Santo Domingo Square
And we have a winner for the best restaurant. to teach me a lesson or three. So the girls show up and obviously the "merchandise" was not exactly as shown....lol. They were totally different girls so I have no idea if they were his friends or what. But ya, we went out and I got the feeling that the whole culture is rather conservative when it comes to dating and I felt like the 1950's US era. I don't even know why I just said that since I wasn't around in those days...but I have seen the movies OK? Anyway, nobody was here to get married so the white boy tried his slickest moves (which doesn't really say much). Let's just say that the odds of winning the lottery are better than trying to get a kiss from these girls. Enough said.
We also managed to take a city tour which was quite nice and quite in spanish...hehe. We visited Castillo San Felipe and La Popa which is a cool monastery on top of the hill. Hanz just kept copying me and taking the same pictures as me. =) But is was a fun day other than the fact that when we were at the San Felipe castle,
Santo Domingo Square
The meal I ordered...yummy. we tried to recreate the situation of how people had to walk in the hallways during the 15th century, which means in the dark. So the fools turned off the lights and made us walk around. I ended up losing the group and banging my forehead in the doorway inside since people were midgets during those times and I got a painful reminder of that.
Oh ya, during our stay Hanz thought he would start learning spanish so he could communicate with the local populus. He got the "professional" teacher named Oscar. He wanted Hanz to pre pay for 15 lectures and I cautioned Hanzly here to pay per visit. Naturally, he didn't take my advice and got ripped off as he only received around 5 lectures if I am not mistaken. But that's ok, the guy was a professional after all.
Happy New Year Costenos!
As the New Year was slowly approaching, we had to start making plans as to where to go and what to do. So our dear brethren set us up on the last day in Plaza Santo Domingo. Tickets were $75 for the dinner which included live entertainment as well. It was
not too bad actually. After midnight, we...well mostly I decided for us to go check out the clubs. They were not bad but nothing special. I met this girl there and Hanz got bored and went home. I ended up going to an after party rave which was awesome. I had no idea where they were taking me but sometime you just have to be stupid. The rave was fairly small with rich locals only. However, I do regret not taking my camera because some of the specimens (girls) I saw there were absolute jaw droppers/stunners. I didn't hit on them cause I was with the girls from the club and I was getting false hoped...lol. I ended up coming back to the apartment at around 6am and I was so tired that I slept most of the next day. We also decided to visit Panama for the last 10 days so we booked a ticket there the next day.
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