Cartagena, Colombia

[tlynk]

I have a question for those who have done the Panama Canal cruises....When in Cartagena Colombia, what excursions did you enjoy and which ones should be avoided? Did you do book through DCL?

Any input or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

 

[sweetpee_1993]

Did not book thru the cruise line. We took a private tour with Dora. Highly rated on Trip Advisor. We had a fabulous time. Truly fascinating. No problems recommending.

http://cartagenatour.com/english.html

 

[OKW Lover]

We booked a city tour through the ship. Very interesting city and the view from the mountain top is spectacular. Learn to say "no gracias". You'll need it frequently because the street vendors are relentless.

 

[DISNEY FANTASY]

We have been three times, lovely city, did the city tour and up high to the LA Popa Monastery.

 

[braysmommy]

Did not book thru the cruise line. We took a private tour with Dora. Highly rated on Trip Advisor. We had a fabulous time. Truly fascinating. No problems recommending.

http://cartagenatour.com/english.html

We also booked with Dora and had a great day, highly recommend her.

 

[mom4fun]

This is the port I researched the most and had the hardest time trying to decide what to do. My dh thought he would not do an excursion with my ds and I but just stay on the ship and do some work. Based on the fact that I didn't feel I would be back to Cartagena any time soon, if ever, I decided to do a city tour with some others from our cruise. It was the #1 rated tour on trip advisor with Marelvy pena - Hall. She was a very good tour guide and I got a lot of fabulous pictures. I felt it was a pretty thorough tour. Now that being said, I didn't love it. It was probably my own problem because I was miserably hot and I'm just not a huge history buff. I started to tune out and just wanted to get back on the ship. My dh decided the night before that he did want to go on a tour but it was too late to go with us. The tour he went on was Disney's deluxe tour with folkloric show. I think his tour was just as good, cheaper and had some extras we did not do. They went up in the fortress and walked through cavern type halls. The folkloric show looked pretty cool and I believe his shopping experience was better than ours. Now, if I had to do it all over again, I would probably do the resort with lunch and a show. Others pictures I saw, looked like it would have been really fun. On a side note, I was super worried about being harassed on the streets but it really wasn't that bad and my dh felt the same on his excursion.

 

[tlynk]

Thank you all for your replies! Great information!

 

[shelbell77]

Definitely do not recommend the Las Americas resort. Not remotely worth the price tag.

 

[mom4fun]

Definitely do not recommend the Las Americas resort. Not remotely worth the price tag.

Well maybe, rosario islands would have been better then but also very pricey. All I know is that I would have rather had a short tour and been in water to stay cool. I didn't want to stay on the ship with so few opportunities to stay on land. I really wish they would have had some active family options for this port.

 

[GooniesAndy]

We did a private street foods tour and it was amazing! My kids pooped out a little bit early because it was too hot for them, but the tour and our guide were amazing. I absolutely loved Cartagena and was very glad we didn't do one of the big tours in the same touristy areas as all the rest. Our tour started inside the walled city for ease of finding each other, and immediately ventured out into the "real" city. I wrote about the tour and posted some pictures in my trip report, if that is at all helpful. It's spread across a couple of posts, but it's at http://www.disboards.com/threads/i-...-trip-report-completed-6-14-15.3412433/page-3 (slightly more than halfway down the page, day six).

 

[MunFam]

Did not book thru the cruise line. We took a private tour with Dora. Highly rated on Trip Advisor. We had a fabulous time. Truly fascinating. No problems recommending.

http://cartagenatour.com/english.html

We also booked with Dora and had a great day, highly recommend her.

We also booked through Dora. She was our actual guide as I was the one that arranged the largest tour for that day, so our group got her. There were 22 of us I believe. It was an amazing tour. She bought us fruit from a street vendor and also paid for admissions to a few places as well. We got up to the Monastery before the crowds, so we all got amazing pictures! We skipped the "New City" portion of the tour in favor of an extended tour of the old city. I would hire her again in a heartbeat.

Also, I researched all of the tours DCL offered and realized that if we got a large enough group together, for the same price as DCL's single tour, we could accomplish what two of the DCL tours covered in the same amount of time. We had time to shop...and we also got awesome coffees (on our own) at the port when we returned. I highly recommend the coffee place there!!! I actually got back off the ship and ran to get a second one before all aboard. It was that good!!

 

[BigJon]

On our Disney Wonder Panama Canal cruise, we were going to take a taxi in to town (there were 4 of us), and the taxi driver said we should go to La Popa Monastery. He told us the places he would take us, and we agreed on the price per person ($20). The first stop was the monastery, and the views were incredible. We paid our own entrance fee to the monastery. We also stopped by the fort (San Felipe), to take some pictures from the outside. We didn't go inside. We also drove to the Bocogrande area. While we were there, he said he wanted to take us to an Emerald (or Diamond, I can't remember) museum. There was a small museum there, but it was really a business that sold these items. They had a clean restroom, and free WiFi, so it wasn't too bad. After that, we drove to the walled city and our guide gave us a tour. If I remember right, this trip took about 4 1/2 hours. I also gave him a tip at the end of the tour......jonathan

 

[tlynk]

We did a private street foods tour and it was amazing! My kids pooped out a little bit early because it was too hot for them, but the tour and our guide were amazing. I absolutely loved Cartagena and was very glad we didn't do one of the big tours in the same touristy areas as all the rest. Our tour started inside the walled city for ease of finding each other, and immediately ventured out into the "real" city. I wrote about the tour and posted some pictures in my trip report, if that is at all helpful. It's spread across a couple of posts, but it's at http://www.disboards.com/threads/i-...-trip-report-completed-6-14-15.3412433/page-3 (slightly more than halfway down the page, day six).

WOW! Great trip report! I think I may have read parts of it before, but I must have zoned out on the Cartagena portion.

 

[tlynk]

We also booked through Dora. She was our actual guide as I was the one that arranged the largest tour for that day, so our group got her. There were 22 of us I believe. It was an amazing tour. She bought us fruit from a street vendor and also paid for admissions to a few places as well. We got up to the Monastery before the crowds, so we all got amazing pictures! We skipped the "New City" portion of the tour in favor of an extended tour of the old city. I would hire her again in a heartbeat.

Also, I researched all of the tours DCL offered and realized that if we got a large enough group together, for the same price as DCL's single tour, we could accomplish what two of the DCL tours covered in the same amount of time. We had time to shop...and we also got awesome coffees (on our own) at the port when we returned. I highly recommend the coffee place there!!! I actually got back off the ship and ran to get a second one before all aboard. It was that good!!

I'm definitely going to try the coffee place!

 

[GooniesAndy]

WOW! Great trip report! I think I may have read parts of it before, but I must have zoned out on the Cartagena portion.

Thanks! Hopefully there's something useful in there. It is a great city!

 

[mom4fun]

We also booked through Dora. She was our actual guide as I was the one that arranged the largest tour for that day, so our group got her. There were 22 of us I believe. It was an amazing tour. She bought us fruit from a street vendor and also paid for admissions to a few places as well. We got up to the Monastery before the crowds, so we all got amazing pictures! We skipped the "New City" portion of the tour in favor of an extended tour of the old city. I would hire her again in a heartbeat.

Also, I researched all of the tours DCL offered and realized that if we got a large enough group together, for the same price as DCL's single tour, we could accomplish what two of the DCL tours covered in the same amount of time. We had time to shop...and we also got awesome coffees (on our own) at the port when we returned. I highly recommend the coffee place there!!! I actually got back off the ship and ran to get a second one before all aboard. It was that good!!

Sounds like we should have done Dora. We were told not to get coffee at the first stop because we would atop later but we never did because I was the only one that wanted it. Luckily on my dh's tour, he bought a lot.

 

[shelbell77]

Well maybe, rosario islands would have been better then but also very pricey. All I know is that I would have rather had a short tour and been in water to stay cool. I didn't want to stay on the ship with so few opportunities to stay on land. I really wish they would have had some active family options for this port.

We were treated like second class citizens at the resort. Plus the crazy aggressive vendors were there too by the beach. Pool was okay. Food was okay. Actual time at resort was incredibly short. Bus drive was a nightmare. We looked at it as a very very expensive way to get free wifi. Mom talked to the shore excursions folks when we got back about how bad the whole thing was.

 

[mom4fun]

Was this

We were treated like second class citizens at the resort. Plus the crazy aggressive vendors were there too by the beach. Pool was okay. Food was okay. Actual time at resort was incredibly short. Bus drive was a nightmare. We looked at it as a very very expensive way to get free wifi. Mom talked to the shore excursions folks when we got back about how bad the whole thing was.

Was this the Las americas resort or the resort on the rosario islands?

 

[GooniesAndy]

We were treated like second class citizens at the resort. Plus the crazy aggressive vendors were there too by the beach. Pool was okay. Food was okay. Actual time at resort was incredibly short. Bus drive was a nightmare. We looked at it as a very very expensive way to get free wifi. Mom talked to the shore excursions folks when we got back about how bad the whole thing was.

Aw, I wish you guys had come with us! It would have been fun!

 

[shelbell77]

Was this

Was this the Las americas resort or the resort on the rosario islands?

Las Americas. Hence why I did not recommend it.