What’s the antidote to the endless East Coast winter? Four nights in Cartagena, Colombia. Alert the senses because here, in one of the oldest colonial cities in South America, it’s all color and contrast. The city is walled, the history immense, the streets are cobblestoned, and the homes are rainbow-hued with balconies dripping with bougainvillea.
A five-hour, nonstop flight from New York deposited my husband and me into this sultry port city’s old-world charm, captured in the 1985 novel “Love in the Time of Cholera,” by the town’s resident author Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
We were thrilled to discover an affordable destination for sophisticated dining and local culinary fare. One favorite was Celele — ranked 16th of the 50 best Latin American restaurants, where everything —from the Caribbean flower salad to rice cakes with sea urchin — was fantastic. Over lunch at the famous La Cevicheria, we smacked our lips on the shrimp with coconut lime juice and local fish with avocado. The street food offerings were equally impressive: arepas (corn patties), carimanolas (stuffed yuca fritters), and paletas (fresh fruit ice pops). For tropical produce, las palenqueras, local Afro-Latinas in colorful frilled dresses, are everywhere balancing large baskets of fruit on their heads. If cocktails are your thing, try Alquimico, a three-story establishment named as one of the 10 best bars in the world.
Mapps Travel designed our itinerary, including walking tours and our stay at Casa Pestagua, a lovely hotel within the walled El Centro area. For longer trips, add a visit to nearby Rosario Islands, a national park of mangroves and coral reefs, food tours, and Caribbean white-sand beaches.
— Susan Kirshenbaum, co-founder, the Ryan Perry Foundation