Final stop on this amazing expedition…a visit to one of the most critical parts of Colombia is the Port town of Cartagena. This slice of Caribbean paradise offers colonial charm and history, beautiful nearby beaches, fantastic restaurants and a vibrant culture!

Our Boutique hotel was in the perfect location…a few blocks from the entrance to the Old Walled City and a short walk to the best restaurants and the art street district. And, the pumpkin soup at our hotel restaurant was FABULOUS! The sad fact is that 60% of Cartagena people are Level 1 and 2…and there are many homeless. The good news is there are no racial issues …due to the hodgepodge of different ethnicities.

We took a short trip out of town today to a local beachfront fishing village where a local fisherman paddled us thru the mangroves in an OLD wooden canoe…No engine allowed ….to protect the environment.

This is the only country in South America that has coasts on 2 sides…the Caribbean Sea & the Pacific Ocean. That makes it the perfect place for mangroves to grow. The mangrove forest is often called a Tidal Forest because the plants can live both in salt and freshwater. It can survive in tidal regions as well. The water is often called brackish or black water.

Mangrove forests capture massive amounts of carbon dioxide emissions and other greenhouse gases from the atmosphere, and then trap and store them in their carbon-rich flooded soils for millennia. This is an important ecosystem service as we face climate change. This buried carbon is known as “blue carbon” because it is stored underwater in coastal ecosystems like mangrove forests, seagrass beds and salt marshes.

There are 3 types… Black mangroves absorb the salt keeps the PH of the water balanced. The White mangroves are for fertilizing the groves and the Red ones provide the stability for the oysters and crabs and serve as a haven for Wildlife. Since we were in a small wooden canoe, we immediately inquired about alligators…no worry…they don’t live in the mangroves. I did think it quite interesting that they loose their leaves once a month. The locals all swore the Crabs here are tastier than salty ocean ones…but I honestly couldn’t taste the difference.

One thing I found amazing was instead of using bricks to build a wall. they use plastic water bottles filled with rocks and/or sand and stack them on top of each other in layers to build a solid wall. I took a picture of one. Pretty damn smart way to recycle as well.

Finished off the day with a massage on the roof and Dinner at Misturo …enjoying a pisco sour ….my favorite Latin American drink. It’s simply Pisco (a type of brandy) mixed with fresh lime, simple syrup, and a frothy egg white for volume. Delicious.

Looking forward to a stroll thru the walled Old Town tomorrow