Colombia

Restaurants:

• Restaurante 1621 (fine dining) -

  • In Short: Absolutely delicious! Fine dining and worth every penny.

  • At Length: This restaurant is superb! Every course is a delectable treat, with nice portion sizes. The salad was AMAZING. The ambiance is wonderful, and unique. Service is excellent. We highly recommend this place.

• Don Juan (chic casual) -

  • In Short: Can do private cooking lessons with the head chef

  • At Length: We didn't dine here, but we had a 3 hour private cooking lesson with the chef and ate what we cooked, which was delicious. The fish was excellent, as well as the dessert.

• Peru Fusion (casual) -

  • In Short: Delicious sushi and ceviche

  • At Length: This place is the best. We were in town for 5 days, and ate 3 meals here. We just kept coming back and it was so consistently good. There are tons of ceviche options here to try, and every one we tried was delicious. The chocolate dessert is also delicious. Decent drinks too. What's not to like?!

• La Cocina de Pepina (casual) -

  • In Short: Delicious ceviche, small restaurant, avoid peak hours

  • At Length: This place is outstanding. We came twice in 5 days. Can be a bit tricky to find, but totally worth it. The food is consistently good, and has delicious ceviche. It is very small though, so come prepared to wait. It definitely lives up to the hype.

• El Boliche Cebicheria (casual) -

  • In Short: Delicious ceviche, small restaurant avoid peak hours

  • At Length: This place is around the corner from la cevicheria and is so much better. The ceviche is packed with flavor. It's a small restaurant so you may have to wait, but it's worth it. They use a lot of different seafood, so if you only like one kind then this place may not be for you. If you do though, it's delicious.

• La Mulata (very casual) - Delicious Caribbean-style food

​

Read more reviews here: TripAdvisor Gourmet Girlfriends in Cartagena

​

Hotels:

• San Pedro Hotel & Spa - Boutique hotel in a large, old house - great character, really good service in a convenient location. Don't be surprised to find your room tidied every single time you leave the hotel. Nice rooftop too. Skip the chocolate massage.

​

Activities:

• Walking Tour with Marelvy Pena-Hall -

  • In Short: Informative and great overview

  • At Length: We went on a 2-3 hour walking tour with Marelvy, and it was excellent. She took us to places we definitely would not have found on our own. One was a really cool art/cafe space. She also clearly explained the history of Cartegena and how it has changed over the years. We had a great time, and it set us up well for the next few days of exploring.

• Crazy Salsa -

  • In Short: Salsa classes, and turns into a salsa bar with dancing at night

• ChocoMuseo -

  • In Short: Chocolate making is fact-packed, but takes 2hrs, and isn't that tasty

  • At Length: We had a great time here. If you are a chocolate lover, this is absolutely the place for you. And it comes with lots of samples! We did the chocolate workshop, which taught us so much about the chocolate making process. Our leader/teacher was excellent, great at breaking the ice, and funny. The only critique we had is that the workshop is really long, and part of that is because it takes a while to grind the chocolate - by hand. It was fun, but got a little boring. The chocolate you make is not super tasty (it's not bad, just not great), but the chocolate for sale is excellent, so if you are wanting to eat it, it's better to buy it than make it.​

​

Skip:

• La Cevicheria (casual) -

  • In Short: Touristy, not as good as Cocina de Pepina or El Boliche

  • At Length: This restaurant was not that great. There is always a line, and it's not worth the wait. There were lots of better cevicherias in the area - la cocina de pepina, peru fusion, and el boliche, for example. The food here is very average - skip it.

• Carmen (fine dining) -

  • In Short: Not as good as you want it to be

  • At Length: We were excited to try this restaurant after reading the rave reviews, but were left wanting. The food was average, which was disappointing for the price. But our real complaint was with the hostess. When we made a reservation, they asked for the occasion and we told them it was our honeymoon - they indicated they would do something nice, and we were really looking forward to our evening. When we arrived however, they confirmed our name, reservation, etc. and then sat us next to the table with all the rose petals. We can only assume this is because we are two women. While we are not self righteous, and didn't make a fuss, it was a disappointing experience in a country that accepts gay marriage.