Colombia · Caribbean Coast
Cartagena
The best-preserved walled city in the Americas, and the Caribbean at its most operatic - ramparts, cathedral bells and champeta on the corner after dark.
Cartagena de Indias is the Spanish Caribbean preserved whole: a walled old city of ochre and lime-washed houses, bougainvillea over wooden balconies and horse carts on the cobbles, with the Castillo San Felipe de Barajas glowering down from the hill behind it. This was the empire's treasure port and its largest slave market, fortified against pirates for two centuries, and the money and the cruelty are both still legible in the stone. Outside the walls it is a hot, loud, modern Colombian city with high-rises on the beach.
Suggested stay
3–4 days
Language
Spanish
Currency
COP
Timezone
UTC-5
Why you'll love Cartagena
The walls a ring of 17th-century rampart you can walk right around the old town, best at dusk when the stone is still giving back the day's heat
The colour ochre, indigo and lime facades, bougainvillea spilling off carved balconies, and heavy bronze knockers on doors built for carriages
Street life champeta and vallenato out of open doorways, plazas that fill after dark, and palenquera fruit sellers in ruffled skirts
The water coral cays an hour offshore with the clear turquoise the city's own brown-sand beaches never had
Best time to visit
Dec-Apr
Dry & sunny · 31-32° days
10.427° N, 75.544° W
UTC-5 · America/Bogota
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Weather & when to go to Cartagena
Month by month: typical highs and lows, rainfall and rain days.
✓ Best Dec-Apr
Conditions Jan Dry & sunny · Feb-Mar Dry · Apr Warming, wet · May Wet starts · Jun Wet · Jul Brief showers · Aug-Sep Wet · Oct Wettest · Nov Wet easing · Dec Dry returns
Watch for Jun-Nov cyclones & hurricanes risk
Cards tinted by verified verdict · big number = typical daily high, small = low · hover for conditions
When to avoid Cartagena
Oct is the wettest month by a distance, when downpours flood the old city's streets, and Sep and Nov are not far behind; the whole Jun-Nov stretch carries some tropical-storm risk. It is hot and humid in every month, with no cool season at all. Late Dec and Jan bring the finest weather and the heaviest crowds.
Top things to do in Cartagena
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Castillo San Felipe de Barajas - the fortress over the city
history 👍 PopularThe largest fort Spain built anywhere in the Americas, raised and re-raised over more than a century on the Cerro de San Lazaro, with sloped batteries angled to bounce cannon shot and a warren of tunnels cut for moving powder and listening for sappers. There is almost no shade, so go early or late.
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The city walls and Las Bovedas - the rampart walk at sunset
history scenic ⭐ Highly recommendedThe walls circle the old town past bastions and cannon, sea on one side and rooftops on the other, and the whole city comes up to walk them as the light goes. The circuit ends at Las Bovedas, a row of vaulted arches built as storerooms, later used as cells, now souvenir stalls.
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Plaza Santo Domingo and the old town squares - the evening ritual
culture arts history 👍 PopularBotero's vast reclining Gertrudis lies in bronze outside the city's oldest church, whose tower is visibly crooked, and the square around her fills with tables, buskers and cigar sellers. Wander on through Plaza de los Coches, Plaza Fernandez de Madrid and Plaza de San Diego and you have seen the old city.
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Getsemani - murals, doorway champeta and Plaza de la Trinidad
culture arts nightlife music ⭐ Highly recommendedThe old artisans' and dockworkers' quarter just outside the walls, painted end to end with murals and strung overhead with flags and umbrellas. After dark the square in front of the Trinidad church becomes an open-air party of street food, beer, drummers and break dancers.
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Palacio de la Inquisicion - the tribunal on Plaza de Bolivar
history culture artsThe Holy Office ran one of only three inquisition tribunals in Spanish America out of this baroque palace. The museum keeps the instruments, the denunciation window set into the outside wall, and a clear-eyed account of who was accused and what was done to them.
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Iglesia de San Pedro Claver - the saint of the enslaved
history culture artsThe church and Jesuit convent where Pedro Claver met slave ships at the dock for nearly forty years. His bones lie in a glass casket beneath the altar, and the two-storey cloister of palms and stone arches is among the quietest corners inside the walls.
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Convento de la Popa - the view from the only hill
scenic historyA 17th-century Augustinian monastery on the ridge above the city, with a flowered courtyard, a chapel to the Virgen de la Candelaria and a lookout that takes in the walls, the bay and the Bocagrande towers at once. Take a taxi up rather than walking the approach.
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Islas del Rosario - snorkelling the coral cays
nature wildlife adventure 👍 PopularA protected archipelago of low coral islands and mangrove lagoons off the Baru peninsula, and the reason to get out on the water at all: the visibility, the reef fish and the colour of the sea are nothing like the city shoreline.
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Museo del Oro Zenu - goldwork of the delta cultures
culture arts historyA small, beautifully made room off Plaza de Bolivar showing the woven filigree gold and pottery of the Zenu, who engineered a vast canal system across the San Jorge floodplain centuries before the Spanish arrived. Cool, quiet and quick.
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Mercado de Bazurto - the market the city actually shops at
food off beaten pathSprawling, deafening and wet underfoot, this is where the coast's fish, fruit and offcuts land each morning, with cooks serving mote de queso and fried fish in the middle of it. Nothing here is tidied for visitors; go with a guide and carry little.
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Eat the Caribbean coast - arepa de huevo, ceviche and coconut rice
foodFried arepa de huevo and carimanola from a street cart, posta cartagenera in its dark sweet sauce, ceviche eaten from a cup, and arroz con coco alongside whole fried mojarra. Cold juices of lulo, corozo and tamarind do the rest.
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Bocagrande and La Boquilla - swimming in the city
nature wildlifeThe high-rise strip has warm water, grey-brown sand and a constant procession of vendors; it is where Cartagena swims rather than somewhere you would fly to swim. La Boquilla, north past the airport, is calmer, with canoe trips through the mangrove channels behind it.
Best areas to stay in Cartagena
$ Budget $$ Mid-range $$$ Premium
Centro Historico
First-time visitors $$$Walled colonial core, plazas and balconies
Explore hotels in Centro Historico →
San Diego
Quiet & central $$$Quieter walled quarter, small hotels
Explore hotels in San Diego →
Getsemani
Music & better value $$Painted streets, hostels, nightly plaza scene
Explore hotels in Getsemani →
Bocagrande
Beach & families $$High-rise beach strip, malls, families
Explore hotels in Bocagrande →
Live nightly prices from Booking.com, Agoda and others, centred on Cartagena
Getting to & around Cartagena
Getting there
Fly into CTG at Crespo, a few minutes up the coast from the walled city
Flight
Rafael Nunez International (CTG)
The runway sits in the Crespo neighbourhood barely 3 km north of the walls, which makes this one of the shortest airport runs anywhere: 10-20 min by taxi to the old city or Bocagrande, depending on traffic. Official taxis queue outside arrivals and app rides pick up nearby.
Coach
Terminal de Transportes
Long-distance buses from Santa Marta, Barranquilla, Medellin and Bogota use the terminal well east of the city, half an hour out by taxi or Transcaribe
Cruise
Sociedad Portuaria cruise terminal
A regular Caribbean cruise call; the terminal is on Manga, a short taxi from the walls, and its grounds hold a small aviary passengers walk through on the way out
Ferry
Muelle de la Bodeguita
Backpacker sailboats run between Panama and Cartagena via the San Blas islands over several days; there is no scheduled car ferry
Drive
The coastal highway comes in from Barranquilla and Santa Marta in a few hours; the road south to Medellin is long, mountainous and best flown
Getting around
Walking
The walled city and Getsemani are small enough to cross on foot; the heat sets the pace, not the distance
Free
Taxis
Unmetered, so agree the fare before you get in or you will be quoted a tourist one afterwards
TBC
App rides
Uber, Didi and inDrive all work here and quote up front; drivers often ask you to ride in the front seat
TBC
Transcaribe
Articulated buses run a trunk line from the edge of the old city out east, handy for the bus terminal and little else
TBC
Boats
Day boats to Baru and the Rosario islands leave from the Bodeguita pier, mostly in the morning
TBC
Day trips from Cartagena
Islas del Rosario
Full dayCoral island archipelago
A national park of low coral islands and mangrove lagoons with the clear turquoise water the city lacks. Day boats bundle snorkelling with a beach-club lunch and can feel like a conveyor; a night on Isla Grande is the quieter version.
Getting there
ferry | tour
45-60 min by fast boat from the Bodeguita pier
Playa Blanca, Baru
Full dayWhite-sand beach
The stretch of genuinely white sand and shallow blue water people picture when they picture Cartagena. It is also hawked relentlessly and packed by mid-morning, so arrive early, walk well away from the boat landing, or stay the night once the day boats go.
Getting there
car | bus | ferry | tour
1 hr by road over the Baru bridge, or by boat
Volcan del Totumo
Half dayMud volcano bathing
A low cone filled with warm grey mud dense enough to float in, shared shoulder to shoulder with everyone else, then rinsed off in the lagoon below. Silly and memorable, and worked hard by attendants offering massages, photos and a wash.
Getting there
car | tour
1 hr by road north, almost always as a tour
San Basilio de Palenque
Full dayFirst free town
The village founded by escaped slaves and recognised as the first free town in the Americas, still speaking its own Spanish-Kikongo creole and known for drumming, boxing champions and the palenqueras who sell fruit in Cartagena. Go with a community guide rather than turning up.
Getting there
car | bus | tour
1 hr by road southeast, usually with a guide
Santa Marta and Tayrona
1-2 daysOld port and jungle coast
The coast's other base: a scruffy old port where Simon Bolivar died, with Tayrona national park's jungle-backed coves and boulder beaches an hour beyond it. Too far and too good to squeeze into a single day.
Getting there
bus | car
4-5 hr by road east
A little history of Cartagena
Pedro de Heredia founded Cartagena de Indias in 1533 on the site of an indigenous village, and geography did the rest: a deep, sheltered bay with narrow entrances, positioned where the treasure fleets could gather. Silver from Potosi and gold from the interior passed through here on its way to Seville, and so did hundreds of thousands of enslaved Africans, making Cartagena both the richest port and the largest slave market of Spanish America. Pirates came for the same reason, Francis Drake among them, and Spain answered with the most expensive fortifications it ever built: a ring of walls and a chain of forts that took engineers the better part of two centuries.
They worked. A vast British fleet under Admiral Vernon was beaten off in 1741 by a garrison led by the one-eyed, one-legged Blas de Lezo. Independence cost more: the city declared it in 1811 and was starved into surrender by a royalist siege in 1815, earning the name La Heroica. Trade then drifted to Barranquilla and the river, and Cartagena spent a poor century, which is precisely why so little was knocked down. World Heritage listing in 1984 and the end of Colombia's worst years turned the preserved shell into the country's tourist capital.
Pedro de Heredia founds Cartagena de Indias on the bay
Francis Drake sacks the city and is bought off with a ransom
The Holy Office opens an Inquisition tribunal, one of three in Spanish America
Pedro Claver dies after four decades ministering to arriving slave ships
Blas de Lezo repels Admiral Vernon's huge British invasion fleet
Cartagena declares absolute independence from Spain
Morillo's royalist siege starves the city, which becomes La Heroica
Barranquilla takes the river trade and Cartagena slides into a long decline
UNESCO lists the port, fortresses and monuments as World Heritage
Know before you go
Payment
Cash preferred
English
Limited
Wifi
Workable
Power
Type A / B
110 V, 60 Hz
Dialing
+57
Cyclones & hurricanes risk in this window; check current conditions before you go.
The months our climate read flags to avoid: the wettest, lowest-rated weather of the year.
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FAQs about Cartagena
▸ When is the best time to visit Cartagena?
Dec-Apr is the dry season and the pick, sunny with very little rain; Jan and Feb are driest and busiest. Oct is the wettest month and the one to avoid, with Sep and Nov close behind. The temperature barely moves all year, so plan around rain and crowds rather than heat.
▸ How many days do you need in Cartagena?
Two unhurried days cover the walled city, Getsemani and San Felipe. A third and fourth buy an island day at the Rosarios or Baru and time to eat properly. The old town is small and easy to exhaust, so most people pair Cartagena with Santa Marta, Medellin or Bogota.
▸ Is Cartagena safe for visitors?
The walled city, San Diego, Getsemani and Bocagrande are heavily policed and fine on foot at night. The real risks are drink-spiking robberies around the nightlife and scams built on friendliness. Use app rides after dark, keep off unlit streets outside the walls, and treat street offers of drugs or company as a setup.
▸ Do you have to haggle in Cartagena?
Almost everywhere outside a shop with a till. Beach vendors, boat touts, unmetered taxis and the palenquera fruit sellers who pose for photos all open high and expect the back-and-forth. Settle the price before you accept anything at all, including a hat, a massage or a photograph.
▸ Are Cartagena's beaches any good?
The city beaches at Bocagrande and Marbella are brown-sand, busy and fine for a swim, but they are not the Caribbean of the brochures. For clear water you take a boat to the Rosario Islands or drive down to Playa Blanca on Baru, each about an hour away.
▸ How bad is the heat, and is the old city walkable?
The old city is compact and best seen on foot, but it is hot and humid in every month, hardest from late morning to mid-afternoon. Do what locals do: start early, spend the middle of the day indoors or by water, and come back out when the walls cool down.