A visit with Juan and the birds in Cartagena, Columbia

Early morning arrival in Cartagena.

Awoke about 7 AM, sun shining brightly but with areas of overcast. Temperature is already 84 degrees and the humidity is 62%. The fueling boat had pulled up to the ship right below our stateroom and started the process of topping up our tanks. It was an all-day process, ending at about 12:30.

Fuel barge pulled up right below our room

Port views

Passengers were able to start leaving the ship at 7:30 and everyone must be back on board for 1:30, so not a very long day here, but after 3 sea days, everyone seems anxious to get there feet back on terra firma, if only for a couple of hours. We have decided to just walk to the port facilities and not do the Hop-On Hop-Off bus. We had breakfast in the extremely quiet buffet, it was lovely not having to dodge people as you tried to get to, the various food venues.

When we left the ship, there was a shuttle bus that took us up to the port office, so we didn’t even have to walk that distance. At the port, were an assortment of little souvenir and refreshment shops, as well as a small bird/animal habitat that was free to wander through.

You gotta watch out for the native fauna here

This fellow was guarding the gate to one of the enclosures

He had quite the hairdo - looked like he had just come from getting a fresh perm.

Who remembers Juan Valdez and his donkey from the Nabob coffee commercials – well we found his coffee shack!

Our ship at the dock

About 2 hours later we returned to the boat. The temp had already risen to 92 degrees and it is not even noon yet. By 2PM we were pulling away from the dock and moving on to our next destination which will be our transit through the Panama Canal starting tomorrow morning.

Some parting shots from Cartagena, Columbia.

The modern city