The threat of a morning bus trip, never seems to phase drinking me, so once again I was hoodwinked into a hangover and a disorganized packing rush before the bus. The trip took almost four and a half hours as we detoured through Barranquilla, but on the plus side it was door to door service. Our hostel in Cartagena, Casa Vienna, seemed decent enough, though it was back to the eight bed dorm after the relative luxury of a private room in Santa Marta. Not in much of a mood to explore, we wandered close by the hostel and were instantly introduced to Super Mario who could get us ‘anything we wanted’. Turns out there are a lot of street guys in Cartagena that would offer to get anything we want, though they never seem to realise they’ve already approached us a hundred times. I briefly toyed with the idea of requesting something ridiculous like an African elephant but wasn’t sure they’d see the funny side.
As with any new town or city, it always seemed that little bit more sketchy and dangerous than the last place, but although there was certainly a lot more in your face poverty in Cartagena, I think it just takes time to feel comfortable in any new place.

We had some dinner near the hostel with a couple of Belgian guys, watched the third place ice hockey game with some Finnish guys and then crashed out again pretty early, experiencing the inevitable 3am, 4am, 6am interruptions in an eight bedder dorm.
The following day we walked around the old town, with its imposing walls and fortifications encircling it. From the top of the walls we could look out over the ocean, and saw a game of soccer with referee and all, being played on a terrible rock strewn, dirt pitch below the city wall. After walking around past some nice old churches and statues, and walking around the northern perimeter of the wall, we got thoroughly lost looking for some lunch, stumbled across a supermarket, and headed back to the hostel to watch Canada win the gold medal in the Men’s Ice Hockey final.

For dinner we found ourselves in Plaza Santo Domingo, in front of an outdoor cinema showing movies from the local film festival. The square was packed with atmosphere and outdoor diners, and is also notable for the big Botero statue at the top corner. It was blowing a gale through the square and we had to hold onto our beers as we watched two films, one no longer than 10 minutes, and the second that dragged on for over an hour. We were hooked into wanting to know the ending but prayed that the ending would come as soon as possible.