Cartagena

Cartagena...
The city truly is amazing - all that the guide books say, and more.  Truly is Colombia's jewel. The first (non-local) settlers and construction date to the early 1500's.  Mostly Spanish.



It's a walled city, with several miles of walls 10-ish feet thick, and up to 20' feet tall, with forts at strategic places; the most gigantic Spanish fortress ever constructed stands at the mouth of the key inlet (pictures below). 




  

To the right and below are some examples of the wall.  Cartagena is built on a peninsula, and the wall makes a long narrow u-shape as it runs along both sides/one end of the peninsula, enclosing the old city.  





 The Spanish resorted to the walls/forts/fortress because during their years of looting the country's gold and other treasures (which they amassed and stored in Cartagena prior to shipment to Spain),  they kept getting attacked (successfully) by pirates (the most successful and famous was Frances Drake).   





 



After the walls and fortress, the city never fell again.  Easy to see why!

                                                              If you look closely at these two pictures of the fort, you'll see people walking on the ramparts.  Hopefully they convey a sense of the massive scale of this structure.

 




 
      
  Couldn't resist including one with me...


 

Beneath the fort's surface there's  a maze of tunnels that connect the living quarters, mess halls, supply rooms, medical facilities, etc., and also provide shortcuts for fast transitions to/from any part of the structure.  The tunnels are cool with a constant breeze - I'm sure they provided  welcome relief from the hot temperatures on the all-rock surfaces above.
 The architecture here is as beautiful as the books say.  Many of the early buildings, churches and fortresses are still intact. Lots of narrow cobblestone streets with lovely old multi-storied Spanish homes complete with ivy/bougainvilla-covered balconies. Think medieval Europe/New Orleans. 



 If you look closely at the church door on the left, you'll see one of the utilitarian doors. 

                                  Cartagena  is actually 3 cities:  the lovely old walled city; the new city of skyscrapers and haciendas; boutiques and gourmet restaurants; casinos and other toys for the mega-wealthy; and the "underbelly" where the local and indigenous people live in abject squalor.  The city is advertised as safe, and it is - in large part because each and every day (and night) there are 2,000+ armed police patrolling the streets.  Outside of the city, it is definitely not safe - even for the police.                                                                    

              

This lovely parque is directly across from the Inquisition Palace.

 

 

Lots of art in the plazas and parques.

 

 

 The ocean is awesome - always a breeze blowing.  It would be quite intolerable here if that weren't the case, as it's pretty hot, but with the breeze, seems moderate.  The beaches are a mixed bag - they're beautiful, but - the good news here is that they're all public - the businesses and condos are set back, across the road.   But the fact that they're all public is the bad news, too - they're public to every vendor wanting to hawk some wares. Time on the beach requires one constant "no, gracias" to an endless parade of vendors.  It truly ruins an otherwise fabulous experience, because you can't ignore them, not even by closing your eyes and drifting off to sleep, because each vendor is armed with some sort of bell/whistle/tinkler to keep you alert. A partial list of stuff I declined, within a half-hour one morning: beach towels, hats, kites, drinks of all kinds, t-shirts, sandals, jewelry of all types, massages, foods/fruits, boat rides, ice-creams, photos, raw oysters, bathing suits/sarongs, sunglasses, beach chairs and cell phone calls. 

 

The two main beaches within walking distance of the old city are Bocagrande (above - ocean-side) and Castillogrande, (below - bay-side).  The day I took the beach pictures it was morning and overcast.  When the haze burns off, the water is tropical turquoise.

 

 It takes me a day or two in a new place to find my "level" - it was harder in Caartgena  than in most places because it's one of the wealthiest cities in the world, and the shops and restaurants reflect that. But I did find my favorite street vendors, a great book store, an unbelievable restaurant with 5-course dinners for $6, a decent grocery store, and a quiet park.  Those finds, combined with my hostel (large room with kitchen privileges) made for a great time.  Even so, I was more than ready to leave - 6 days on a budget in this type of place is about 2 too many.   

One Cartagena story: one morning in the hostel I met a neat woman from Israel (Anet) – a musician. She'd studied afro-caribbean percussion across Africa and Cuba, and was in Cartagena to find and record some unique musicians she'd heard of, in a nearby village. She invited me to join, and the day was on. A long, local (hot/crowded/dusty) bus ride and a hike – and by asking various villagers (thatched adobe huts – honest) as we went, we found them. We were really lucky – not only did we find them, but it was a fiesta day and they were playing (and drinking) at 11:00 in the morning in a tiny thatched beach hut.  We stayed there quite a while, and when we got hungry they suggested a great local eating place “a ways” down the beach (Uncle Zack's). A couple miles later we hadn't found it yet, and it was clear we were not in a good area – crowded, ramshackle huts and garbage piled everywhere. We were debating how much further to go before giving up when two policemen pulled up on a motorcycle, asked what (in the world) we were doing out there, and explained clearly they intended to escort us back. We convinced them to escort us to Uncle Zack's instead – they knew where it was – another mile or so. Glad we did - the environment got worse and worse – from a road to a trail to a path through gutted, abandoned structures - so we invited them to lunch, if they'd then escort us back. They were about to go on break, so agreed. Anet and one policeman rode the cycle back; I walked, and talked, with the other – a wonderful young man (22-ish) named Caesar. My heart went out to him – young/intelligent/motivated/hopeful...he'd become a policeman because he couldn't afford college, and our immigration office had refused his visa to join his older sister in New Jersey. He'd only been on the job 2 months, had never been in this area, and was quite afraid for his life – already one team mate had been killed and another was in the hospital with massive brain damage after taking a knife in the head. He hoped to save enough money during his 2-year stint to go to some small college and then work to help coffee farmers improve crop production and profitability - he'd grown up on a coffee plantation and had experienced how impossible it had been for his father to support the family.  His story is one I won't soon forget.

 Next blog - Otavalo (where I am now)!

Giradot in the Rear View Mirror

March 6 ~ I can't believe how fast time passes and how impossible it's proving to be to keep this blog anywhere near current! I'm writing from Cartagena, Colombia, where I'll be for just 2 more days. It's every bit as wonderful as the travel guides promise – more on that later. First, I want to wrap up Giradot:

1. Security: I knew that security in this town is taken very seriously, but was still taken aback one morning on my way to the gym. It was very early, no people around, and a Brinks truck was in front of a bank, transferring money – the truck was just like the ones back home, but that's where all similarity ended. There were 8 armed guards protecting the transaction – one at each corner of the vehicle, facing out, with assault rifles drawn and scanning, two outside the bank door, assault rifles drawn and scanning, and two more inside the bank door, assault rifles drawn and scanning! I went over to the other side of the street and still felt uneasy walking past 8 drawn assault rifles. The home I'm in also takes security very seriously – the entrance door is thick, heavy metal, with 2 sets of deadbolts, each of which has 2 independent bolts with different keys and each of the 4 bolts must be turned through 3 different settings to lock and/or unlock the door. And after that, there's an electronic alarm! It's always set at night, and a few weeks ago, in the middle of the night, when I was here alone, it went off. Scared the living daylights out of me...in order to turn it off, I had to be prepared to deal with whatever might be outside my door when opened it, so I grabbed my mace canister. Just before opening the door I wondered if the canister was in the on or off position, so without thinking, I 'discreetly' depressed the button just a little. Not one of my better ideas. It was on, and sprayed into the fan. I have renewed respect for the disabling effects of mace. I'll never know what set the the alarm off, but thankfully, it wasn't a person!

2. The last week in Giradot, I finally got a real bike in. Did 48 kilometers on a rolling valley road out of Giradot – good pavement, and breathtakingly beautiful. Mountains on both sides – steep, verdant close mountains with misted higher peaks beyond, and beyond, and beyond. It was wonderful to finally be out in the beauty I'd only seen from a car window. Very frustrating to live so near to gorgeous countryside, and be unable to get out and freely enjoy it.

3. Blouses update – I don't have a picture of the blouses – will try to have at least one for the next blog. They all fit; two turned out well, and one is really beautiful. She does some “shortcut” sewing, but on the one I really cared about, she did some wonderful pin tucking for the front, and the short-sleeve design is lovely. You may recall that I had the blouses made because the stores here don't carry clothes for women so big as I. This is a picture of one of my tutors (and me) – you can see what I mean – her size is petty typical of the women here.

4. Giradot's Main Plaza and library are just a block from where I live. These are pictures from early in the morning, when few folks are up and about. It's really a beautifully designed plaza – the problem is that the plaza is a solid city block of bricks/tiles/stone. With days here never below 85 degrees, and usually much higher, it's impossible to enjoy it after about 11:30 am – and those stones hold their heat well after dark. The library steps open into the plaza – very beautiful. Libraries in Colombia are a unique partnership between banks (mostly Bancolombia), and the state. The bank constructs and owns the building, and the state staffs the library, any programs, and buys the books. Many of the books I looked at date back to the 80's. One impact of the state being responsible for ongoing operations (and poor economy) is that even here, there's no toilet paper or soap in the bathrooms...not even in the kids area! Again, we take SO much for granted...

5. A few pictures I took on my way to the gym one morning. I really prefered going out early in the morning, because the streets are so clean. The way garbage was handled herewas perplexing. There are no refuse baskets or containers, and people throw everything – bags, wrappers, food, newspapers, everything – on the sidewalk or into the street. By evening it's filthy, and smells bad. Then every morning around 6:00 the street cleaners – mostly women, in bright orange city uniforms– come through with brooms and shovels and bag everything up. The trucks come along shortly after, and by 7:00 things are pretty tidy again. When the stores open, each one scrubs their front sidewalk and gutter (soap and water)...and the cycle begins again. Maybe they don't put out garbage cans because that would take away work from people who desperately need it...? One thing that's always in the streets are mangy, half-starved dogs – and their poop. Yuck! And they sleep anywhere – even on busy street corners during the day – people just step over/walk by them. Couldn't resist taking a picture of a couple.

6. Water - People here don't have water heaters – no need, really. By noon the water is wonderfully warm. So evening showers are great – but morning showers? When that water first hits, it takes a few involuntary gasps to get breathing started again. I've come to really like them, tho – wonderfully refreshing. 

 7.  The Streets - At first, the streets here seem just chaotic - but nothing could be further from the truth - every square inch of sidewalk is "owned" by some one for some purpose - usually street sellers of one type or another.  I saw a pretty ugly fight one day when one cart-vendor was infringing on another's space.  The picture on the right is Fernando - my favorite pan de yuca man - he would set up each morning at 6:00 and was sold out and gone by 8:30. 

8.  Deliveries - One morning I was having coffee in a little cafe, waiting for the gym to open and the gas delivery man came...with the tank of gas on the back of his motorcycle! 

Most morning deliveries are by some form of bicycle or hand cart - I tried to edit this picture so you could see the man better, but my software isnt cooperating right now.          
     So I'm going to call it quits for now - I doubt if I'll get the Cartagena piece done before I leave here...you'll probably hear from me next after I reach Otavalo, Ecuador...Love to All - Karen