Detailed Photo Review of 3/14/16 Celebrity Equinox 11 Night Cruise

For what it's worth, we paid $15 (for three people) into the old city and then $15 back to the ship the first day. On the second day, friends who live in Cartagena told us to pay no more than $5. We did, but the guy was not happy. It was a scary ride -- but then all of them were!

 

 

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Wow, $5 is a great deal! I have a feeling we could have bargained our driver down to $7 or $8, but it really wasn't worth the time or effort to save another $2 or $3. Maybe if it wasn't such a hot and humid morning...? Interesting to know that it was possible to get the ride for $5 though!

Loving your review!!!

Loving your review!!!

Thanks!! :D

I am really enjoying your review and all the pics. What days were the "formals" as we'll probably follow the same schedule? (I still call them formals and also looking forward to them)

OMG! I can't believe the bird bit your husband!! That's too funny that they were attacking the men... my fiance was in there with me and I don't think he had any trouble, but I was paying more attention to my camera screen than to his feet so maybe he just didn't tell me about it!

Besides the two times that parrot bit my husband, I also saw the toucans attack other men in the aviary and even the deer that had small nubs would ram into the men from behind. Guess it saves them from boredom. We even had feces thrown at us by the monkeys in the jungle. One of our table mates (a man) was attacked so viciously that he wouldn't go back into that zoo area. We all laughed, of course, but think they broke through the skin on his toe. I ran up to get him some of my Neosporin. They were crazy birds....but it was hot so I can totally feel their pain. hahaha!

Sounds like you had quite an ordeal with the taxis! It's a shame they are so hard to deal with because it really puts a damper on the day, and may make people avoid getting off the ship if word gets out about these negative experiences. Once we safely reached the old city, we had a wonderful day... unfortunately it wasn't such a wonderful process to get there!!

We've actually spent quite a bit of time in Mexico and other Caribbean islands so not really a huge deal. The worst of it was when that one guide tried to convince us he was our guide. My Spanish is so rusty after being out of school for so many years.....otherwise I might have done a little better.

The only reason I insisted on $10 vs $20 is because you posted this was possible. Of note, we went to the excursion staff lecture about the history of Cartagena prior to docking there. The girl who spoke stated the ride should be around $20 but the guy from Columbia that was on the ship's staff stated it was around $4. I don't think they caught the inconsistency in their estimates. This is what makes me think that maybe that $5 is more reasonable. Did you happen to catch their prices in that little shop by the zoo? They were crazy ... $39 for a t-shirt! There were leather purses (small) that they sold for over $40 in port -- they were $5 in the old city. The port is just crazy expensive but so appreciated the little zoo area being free of charge so really no complaints from me. I also thought it was a beautiful and interesting city ... just way to hot for this bay area girl.

PS -- loving your review and especially your pictures, by the way!!

[quote name=deladane;49852320

We had originally requested he take us to the Juan Valdez Cafe' date=' but he told us we had to exit here. I'm still not sure why, as there were plenty of cars driving through the city center, but I guess this was just easier for them to find their next fare, even if it wasn't what we thought we were paying for. [/quote]

That's because taxis are charged to enter city center.

I am really enjoying your review and all the pics. What days were the "formals" as we'll probably follow the same schedule? (I still call them formals and also looking forward to them)

Thank you! The Elegant Chic/Formal nights were both Tuesdays (day 2 and day 9) and both on sea days.

Besides the two times that parrot bit my husband, I also saw the toucans attack other men in the aviary and even the deer that had small nubs would ram into the men from behind. Guess it saves them from boredom. We even had feces thrown at us by the monkeys in the jungle. One of our table mates (a man) was attacked so viciously that he wouldn't go back into that zoo area. We all laughed, of course, but think they broke through the skin on his toe. I ran up to get him some of my Neosporin. They were crazy birds....but it was hot so I can totally feel their pain. hahaha!

 

 

 

We've actually spent quite a bit of time in Mexico and other Caribbean islands so not really a huge deal. The worst of it was when that one guide tried to convince us he was our guide. My Spanish is so rusty after being out of school for so many years.....otherwise I might have done a little better.

The only reason I insisted on $10 vs $20 is because you posted this was possible. Of note, we went to the excursion staff lecture about the history of Cartagena prior to docking there. The girl who spoke stated the ride should be around $20 but the guy from Columbia that was on the ship's staff stated it was around $4. I don't think they caught the inconsistency in their estimates. This is what makes me think that maybe that $5 is more reasonable. Did you happen to catch their prices in that little shop by the zoo? They were crazy ... $39 for a t-shirt! There were leather purses (small) that they sold for over $40 in port -- they were $5 in the old city. The port is just crazy expensive but so appreciated the little zoo area being free of charge so really no complaints from me. I also thought it was a beautiful and interesting city ... just way to hot for this bay area girl.

PS -- loving your review and especially your pictures, by the way!!

OMG! I hope that man didn't get an infection or anything from that bird bite! Maybe the birds in the cage don't like all these tourists stomping all over their house? Or at least they don't like the men! That's funny that you heard such a varied taxi fare quote from the 2 speakers, but I guess since it's not regulated, the fares can have a big range. I like the other Caribbean ports where there is a fixed rate to go to the various tourist spots from the cruise port so there's no need to haggle with the taxi drivers. We ended up shopping at the port store on our way back to the ship on Monday because we just didn't have a chance to shop while we were in the old city (mostly because we didn't want to carry our purchases with us all day). We just bought a few trinkets and some bags of coffee to give as souvenirs, so the prices were okay for us, but I'm not surprised there was a huge mark up.

Yo e .)h

We spent the next hour walking around the streets as we made our way towards the meeting spot for our walking tour.

One of the many plazas: Plaza de Santo Domingo

The “Fat Lady” statue by sculptor and artist Fernando Botero

There were lots of vendors set up along the sidewalks, and many sold these colorful bags. I was tempted to buy one but decided against it as I only like bags with zippers.

One of the fun things to do here is to walk along the top of the walls. This reminded me a lot of my day in Dubrovnik, Croatia. The views from the top of the walls were fantastic as we could see the ocean to one side and the city to the other side.

I always love to see the canons along the fort walls, protecting the city from invaders.

We even had a view of Bocagrande in the distance!

Our big plan for today was to take the free walking tour that I found online. Our confirmation said to meet the tour at the Plaza Santa Teresa at 3pm.

Before the tour started, we popped into the Hotel Charleston to use their restrooms. The lobby of this hotel is beautiful, with ornate flower displays and a fancy restaurant with seating in the open-air inner courtyard.

We met our guide in front of the Naval Museum (the blue sign in the picture above).

There were a lot of people at the meeting location, but the guides divided us into 2 groups for the Spanish and English tours. We had 25 people on our tour, and our guide Edgar took us over to a spot with some shade as he introduced himself and explained that our 2 hour walking tour would likely take closer to 2.5 hours.

Edgar originally founded this company because he loves to travel and enjoyed free walking tours in cities all over the world, but he realized that there was no such tour in his home city of Cartagena. You can tell he truly loves his city and he loves sharing his city with visitors. We spent the next 2.5 hours walking all over the walled city as Edgar explained the history of Cartagena and pointed out notable landmarks in perfect English.

This is Catalina- one of the main symbols of Cartagena

Saint Pedro Claver talking to a slave.

This lady is called La Palenquera. Edgar explained that many years ago, women dressed like this actually sold fruit. As Cartagena became a slowly-emerging city of tourism, visitors would approach these women and take photos of them, and then hand them a dollar or two to say thank you. The women were confused at first, as these visitors had no interest in the fruit they were selling. They soon realized that they could make more money getting tips from tourists for posing in photos than they could for just selling fruit. Today, you will see las palenqueras all over Cartagena, and while they all carry fruit in their head baskets, most are only looking for you to take their photo and pay them. This lady stayed with our tour group for at least 20 minutes, walking to multiple different sites on our tour, until she finally left.

I loved these little statues. They have different ones all over the city in the plazas, each depicting a different custom or cultural element.

The church of San Pedro Claver

Thank you so much for your wonderful review - so enjoying reliving out April cruise! I met a lovely fruit seller on the Sunday morning - bought some fruit (although I only ate a couple of pieces) and asked to take her photo - her pose was amazing!!

Thanks for all the photos and descriptions. Will have to look up free walking tours.

That's because taxis are charged to enter city center.

Ooooooh, that makes sense!

Thank you so much for your wonderful review - so enjoying reliving out April cruise! I met a lovely fruit seller on the Sunday morning - bought some fruit (although I only ate a couple of pieces) and asked to take her photo - her pose was amazing!!

I wish we had a chance to buy some fruit as it all looked so good! I thought about it on our walk to the Juan Valdez Cafe but didn't because we were about to eat lunch, and then I wasn't hungry for it after lunch. Oh well!

Thanks for all the photos and descriptions. Will have to look up free walking tours.

The free walking tours can be hit or miss as sometimes you do get what you pay for, but I have generally had great experiences with it. Most of the time, the guides volunteer their time to share something they love with people on the tour, so they are passionate about it and give a great tour. I usually try to find something similar in any city I visit if I have the time :)

The Customs House

The flag with the green is the flag of Cartagena. The other is the flag of Colombia. The yellow represents all the gold found on Colombian land, the blue represents Colombia's shores and rivers, and the red represents the blood shed for Colombia's independence.

Edgar explained that if any of us were traveling to other cities in Colombia (only about 8 of us were from the cruise ship), that we should not say we had just been in Cartagena. Instead, we should say we had been in "La Heroica" as that is the city's nickname in reference to their heroic battle against the Spanish to gain independence.

We ended up back at the plaza where we started our day as Edgar explained the history behind the clock tower.

Cartagena Cathedral (notice all the art vendors lined up along the street!)

I loved the intricate details of the church tower.

This is the Museum of the Torture. I wished we could have gone inside as I think it would have been interesting, but we didn't get to go inside any of the museums on this tour.

The hat Edgar is wearing is one of the symbols of Cartagena. They wanted to create something that everyone would know only came from their city, so they designed this unique hat. I loved how animated he was as he told each story with immense passion.

Edgar gave us a few minutes to walk around the Claustro de Santo Domingo- a Dominican monastery from the 1600's

Many of the doors around the city had these unique door knockers, which were used to identify the homeowner's profession and class.

Another popular tourist activity is to take a horse-drawn carriage ride around the city. I think Celebrity offered this as one of the excursions, although you can probably set it up on your own if you want.

This is one of the most popular bars in Cartagena. Notice the sign in the middle of the wall (for those who don't speak/read Spanish, it says "We don't have wifi- talk to eachother!")

The tour ended at 5:30pm several blocks north of where we started, in the San Diego neighborhood. Our plan was to have drinks and dinner and watch the sunset over the ocean at an outdoor restaurant up on the city walls called Cafe del Mar. It got great reviews on Trip Advisor for both the views and the atmosphere, although the food and drinks were said to be a bit pricey (I guess you are paying for the location!). Unfortunately, by the time we got there, there were no tables left. As great as the walking tour was, I wished it ended on time at 5pm as we probably would have found a table at that time. In the end, it wasn't a huge deal as we looked at the menu and it was extremely limited and while we probably would have stayed for a drink, we wouldn't have wanted to eat here anyway. We took advantage of the beautiful views and took a few photos before heading on in search of another dinner option.

We walked along the city walls until we reached the Plaza Santa Teresa, where we originally met to start the walking tour. There was another restaurant on top of the wall, also with a huge seating area and views of the ocean and the sunset, but it was 90% empty. I'm not sure why it was so much less crowded than Cafe del Mar, but we found the menu to be significantly better with tons of options and reasonable prices (and yes, they took US dollars). The restaurant was called Tascabar el Baluarte San Francisco Javier (maybe the fact that the name doesn't quite roll off the tongue contributed to the lack of a crowd here? haha), and it was located directly across from the Hotel Charleston. We took a table right along the edge of the wall with a beautiful view of the water. We each ordered grilled chicken, steak fries and veggies, and the total bill came to $37 USD.

One complaint about this place was that there was literally no lighting, so once the sun set, we were eating in the dark aside from the light from the moon. I couldn't even take a photo of our dinner plates! Also, as is typical in the Caribbean, service was verrrry slow. If you are looking for a leisurely place to eat dinner, I would definitely recommend this restaurant as the food and atmosphere can't be beat. They were even setting up a band on the stage as we left, so I assume there was going to be some live music later in the evening. Too bad we had other things planned for tonight and couldn't stick around to enjoy it!

By the time we finished dinner, it was totally dark and the plaza looked beautiful with all it's lights.

If you look in the bottom left corner of the photo, you can see some orange cones set up in the street. That was used as a taxi stand and there was a man standing there to hail us a taxi. We needed to get to Bocagrande to meet our evening activity (that's the section of the city with all the tall modern buildings from some of my other photos). The taxi cost $5 and took less than 10 minutes. We got there so quickly that we were now about an hour early for our pick-up time for the Chivas bus! We started to walk around and explore the area but soon realized that there wasn't much to see... just a lot of high rise condos and hotels. We decided to go back to the location where we needed to meet the bus and we would just sit there and wait for it to arrive, even though it was 7:45pm and our pick up time wasn't until 8:15.

Within 2 minutes, a man holding a clip board walked up to us and asked for us by name! We thought it was really weird that the bus was already there to pick us up considering we were 30 minutes early, but we weren't complaining as that was better than twiddling our thumbs for that whole time! We walked out to the street with the guy with the clip board, and we saw this coming down the street...

There were already a few people on the bus, and the guy directed us to sit in the third row. Since we had pre-paid our $18 each before the trip, we were good to go. We spent the next 45 minutes driving in circles around Bocagrande picking up other people for the bus. Now we knew why the bus came so early! Apparently they spend an hour before the official tour start time picking up the 50 people who are registered so we didn't have to waste that time during the real tour. They kept us very entertained for that hour as the 4 person band took up one of the rows in the bus and they played their accordions and guitars while singing Colombian songs very loudly. The bus had bright flashing lights, so between that and the noise of the band, and the cheers of the tourists onboard, we certainly drew a lot of attention from those walking on the sidewalks! haha We knew going into it that we'd be a bit of a spectacle, and we also knew the whole thing would be an interesting cultural experience, so we just went with it.

By 8:30pm, the bus was full and the guide came on the microphone to explain how the night would go.

But... we had a problem! When I booked this tour with Cartagena Connections, they said we would have an English speaking guide. Not only did this man not speak one word of English, he spoke the fastest Spanish I've ever heard! So much for all of those college Spanish classes as they did me no good on this bus. I couldn't understand a word he was saying. Of the 50 people on the bus, at least 40 people were native Spanish speakers and only a handful of us were American. Clearly we were in the minority and the guide made no effort to help us understand what was happening. Luckily, the girl sitting next to me was born and raised in Bogota, Colombia, but she goes to boarding school in Indiana so she spoke perfect English and could translate for us!! She was a lifesaver!

The bus pulled over to the side of the road and the guide jumped out for a few minutes. That gave us a few minutes to chat with the girl next to us and she filled us in on the plan for the night. We were going to drive to the Fortress for a 10-minute photo op, then we would drive to an area where all the other Chivas buses gathered together and we'd have a party in the streets for about an hour. Then they would call us back onto the bus for a little snack before we went to a club for the remainder of the night.

This little pit stop also gave every vendor in Cartagena the opportunity to descend on our bus! Maybe THAT'S the real reason for all the loud music and flashy lights? So the vendors know where to find us! They came right up to the side of the bus and shoved their goods in our faces (remember, there aren't any windows or doors on this bus so there was nothing to stop them!) They sold maracas, colorful flashing light sticks, noise makers, hats, cigarettes, basically anything you'd ever need to have a party on a moving bus. They were really persistent too! Unlike most vendors we had encountered thus far, these guys didn't take "no" for an answer. They did this every time we stopped at a red traffic light too, but this was way worse because we were parked here for a good 15 minutes.

Finally, the guide returned to the bus with lots of supplies. He handed each row on the bus a bottle of rum, a bottle of juice, a bucket of ice, and a stack of cups. This wasn't exactly Celebrity caliber bartending skills haha On second thought, maybe they were mimicking the mixology class?

Each row had built-in cup holders mounted to the row in front of them so we'd have a place to stash our supplies when the bus started moving again.

Once we had all the essentials, the band started up again as we drove towards the Fortress. Now is when the real fun started! As best as we could understand, the guide wanted each of the guys to stand up and dance (as the bus was driving down the road!) row by row, and we would vote for the best dancers. Then it would be the women's turn. People took their dancing very seriously! They stood up on the seats, shook their rear ends, and danced on the poles in the bus. The competition was fierce!

I wish I thought to take a video of when people were standing up and dancing because this doesn't come close to the loud party vibe we had later in the night, but this is all I have. Notice how everyone else knows all the words to the song?

[YOUTUBE]7e9JNP1Z-lA[/YOUTUBE]

After a few minutes, we pulled up at our first stop. We all piled out of the bus and tried to take a few photos in front of the fortress... too bad my dinky point-and-shoot camera isn't that good at low light shots!

Of course, all the vendors found us here too. There were 4 or 5 other Chivas buses here at the same time, so I have a feeling all the buses drive the same route and the vendors know where to go to find the tourists.

While we were here, we noticed the 4 girls sitting in front of us were trying to ask the guide how to get a taxi. They didn't speak one word of Spanish, and they were told they would have an English-speaking guide, and they didn't realize we were spending most of the tour riding around on the bus, so this whole evening just wasn't what they had in mind. I helped them explain to the guide that they wanted to leave early and he got a taxi for them.

After about 10 minutes, the guide gathered us back up and told us to get on the bus so we could continue with the tour. Now that those girls left, J and I were the only non-Spanish speaking people left on the bus! We felt completely out of the loop, but agreed to stick it out a little longer, hoping the evening would get more fun when we got to the bars. We drove back into the city center, and J and I thought we were going to a bar now. We pulled into a parking lot with a bunch of other empty Chivas buses and the guide said to follow the crowd and to come back in 45 minutes for snack time.

When we got to where everyone else was going, we found out that instead of going to a bar in a building, we were going to a makeshift bar up on top of a section of the city wall. There were about 200 other people from the other Chivas buses already there, and they had a little push cart filled with liquor- I guess that was meant to be the bar?

The whole thing just seemed very fabricated and touristy. Instead of going to a bar as we expected, we were basically standing around on the sidewalk outside in the dark with a bunch of other tourists. It wasn't the authentic experience we were hoping for, and we were bored, so we debated our options. We could suck it up for another hour until we finally got to go to the last stop on the tour: a real bar! Or we could call it quits now, get a taxi, and go back to the ship early, knowing we had an early wake up call for tomorrow. Plan B ultimately won out, and we left the party.

Unsure of where to find a taxi, we started wondering through the streets until we saw a taxi coming down the street. I'm not sure if we had good timing or if it's typical to find empty taxis driving around at 9:30pm, but either way, this taxi was willing to take us back to the "barco" for $10 USD so we went with him. At first, I wasn't convinced that he knew which "barco" we were talking about, and I didn't know how to say "cruise ship port" in Spanish ("barco" means boat). I tried to say "barco grande" (big boat... lol), and after a little back and forth, we felt confident that he knew where to take us.

J and I were chatting about our evening in the back seat of the taxi when all of a sudden we heard a song on the radio that made us do a double take. Most of the songs were in Spanish so we kind of blocked it out since we didn't really understand the lyrics anyway, but then we heard the singer say "I'll never go back to Georgia!" What?!? Did I hear that right? "No, No , No, No, I'll never go back to Georgia!" Yup! They definitely said that! Then they went back to the verses in Spanish lol It was so random! No offense to those from Georgia, but it seemed baffling that people in Colombia had even heard of that state, let alone felt strongly enough about it to write a pop song! When we got home from the cruise, we looked it up on YouTube, and sure enough, it's a real song! Sooooo random!!

[YOUTUBE]oG4V24I3qkY[/YOUTUBE]

We still make jokes about this song, several weeks later! haha I dare you not to get it stuck in your head!! A few minutes later, the taxi driver said we arrived back at the port.... but where's the ship?? From where we were, we couldn't see the ship or any signs indicating that we were at the cruise ship port! No fellow passengers walking around. No Celebrity employees welcoming us back. No cruise ship photographers begging to take our photo. Granted it was nearly 10pm, but it seemed so empty and deserted that we weren't sure we were in the right place! We saw a few people sitting on the curb and one of them was wearing a somewhat official looking uniform, so we asked the taxi driver to back up to where he was sitting so we could ask if this was the right place. The man confirmed that this was the cruise port... I guess it looked different to us in the dark, and without all those crazy taxi drivers hounding us to get in their car! Since all the buildings at the port were closed, they directed us to walk around the outside of the building and to turn right towards the ship when we reached the water.

It was a welcome sight when we saw this..

It is a rare treat to be off the ship after dark and to see the ship lit up at night! It always makes me so happy as it's so beautiful with all the lights on, reflecting against the water.

Fingers crossed that those lines don't break free right this second and that the ship doesn't run me over! You can really feel the size of the ship from this angle...

Once we got back to the gangway, we saw more sings of life. A few members of the crew were getting off the ship as we got on, likely heading out to enjoy a night on the town. The crew member checking our seapass card confirmed that someone will be out there all night long so passengers are free to come and go through the whole night if they wanted to. By now, it was 10pm and we were ready for a snack so we ran up to the Oceanview Cafe for some pizza. Not quite ready to call it a night, we grabbed a few beers at the Gastrobar (or rather, I had a cider since I much prefer that over beer!)

A little before midnight, we got back to our cabin to pack up our bags for tomorrow and put out the room service breakfast tag before going to sleep.

Up Next: a unique cultural experience for day 2 in Colombia

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hahaha I remember that statue from my Summit cruise!! I totally forgot about that though! I just looked through my photos from that cruise and I didn't get a photo of it, but there is a striking resemblance to the statue in Cartagena!