After five weeks in Medellin we moved away from the mountains and decided to check out some of Colombia’s beautiful beaches. Our first stop was an island called San Andres. San Andres is a two hour flight from Medellin and is actually off the coast of Nicaragua, although it is part of Colombia. It’s is a pretty small island (only ten square miles) and has many beautiful beaches with bright blue water. We spent a long weekend in San Andres which coincided (purposefully) with our anniversary.
We stayed at a medium-sized resort that we picked almost entirely based on the fact that it was right on the beach. Most of our time was spent relaxing on this beach or at the beach right next door.
View from our room 
Not a bad breakfast spot 
Sorry for petting the stray dogs, Mom! 
Our amigo Scrappy
Davy decided to take kitesurfing lessons, so he did this in the morning while Shari relaxed and read on the beach. We were hoping to go snorkeling at least once but the snorkeling areas were unfortunately closed everyday due to rough conditions.
Ready for action 
Shari’s version of extreme water sports 
(This is Davy)
While we ate a decent amount of mediocre food at the resort, we went out to a nice seafood dinner at a restaurant on the water in downtown San Andres for our anniversary.
Happy three year anniversary to us!
After our long weekend in San Andres, we spent two weeks in a city called Santa Marta on Colombia’s Caribbean coast. Our Airbnb was right on a very popular (crowded) beach in an area called Gaira that is actually right outside of Santa Marta . We enjoyed being able to go for sunset walks on the beach right by our Airbnb and at another nearby beach that was less crowded.
Views from our Airbnb 
Although we were about a twenty minute drive from downtown Santa Marta, we did not feel like we were missing out on much. Santa Marta itself is not the nicest city but has lots to do near it and is close to many beautiful beaches. That being said, we still did enjoy a few excursions to downtown Santa Marta and particularly enjoyed the waterfront area.
Downtown Santa Marta 
A nice waterfront bar that we went to a few times 
Sunset in Santa Marta
On our first weekend in Santa Marta we headed to the nearby town of Taganga, a small fishing inlet that apparently used to be quite popular but has lost some of its allure recently. We enjoyed sitting on the beach and people watching, particularly once we got away from the initial onslaught of people trying to sell us tour packages, necklaces, and tropical drinks. We then had a nice lunch with a view of the water and ended up spending some time talking with the chef/owner. He recommended a nearby beach called Belo Horizonte that was less crowded, so we spent the rest of the afternoon there.
View of Taganga 
Hiding from the necklace salespeople 
Belo Horizonte
In the evening we posted up at a nice outdoor bar near a lively main street in Gaira and enjoyed some more people watching.
Fun fact: corn on the cob in Colombia is actually very weird/no bueno 
Davy’s first (and last) coco loco
The following day we drove around two hours along the coast to the town of Palomino. Downtown Palomino itself was not the nicest and was somewhat busy and overwhelming, but our main purpose for driving to Palomino was not to explore the downtown but to go tubing. The town is filled with people selling tubing tours, so we basically picked a random tour which provided the tubes and took us on a very bumpy motorbike ride to a jungle path. After a very hot 20 minute walk through the jungle, we arrived at a beautiful river and started tubing! The tour also included a tubing guide which certainly made it our most first class tubing experience. We tubed for about two hours before eventually arriving at a popular local beach, but it was not a great swimming beach due to rough conditions. Unfortunately we do not have many pictures of this tubing extravaganza given that we were trying not to drop our phones in the river (we had read that you could buy a dry bag in Palomino, but when we asked our guide about this he took us to a nearby bodega so we could buy a small plastic shopping bag).
Jungle stroll 
Demonstrating our international dedication to tubing 
Davy is actually much happier than he looks in this picture (he takes tubing very seriously)
After Palomino we went on a short hike to a beautiful series of waterfalls called Quebrada Valencia. We went swimming in some of the natural pools and walked around the different waterfalls. Afterwards we stopped for dinner at a beachfront hostel/surf school and then headed home.
Crazy tree on the path to the waterfalls 
Beachfront dinner
The following Saturday we woke up bright and early to head to Tayrona National Park, probably the most popular attraction in the area. Tayrona is a giant beachfront park that also has beautiful hills and hiking paths. Although it’s filled with beaches, very few of them are swimmable due to rough conditions and rip tides. Our plan was to hike to the swimming beaches, but we didn’t quite understand how far away they were and definitely took the wrong path which also made it longer. We were expecting to be casually hiking for around an hour each way but ended up hiking for five hours round trip. The hike was certainly beautiful, and in the beginning we had the path almost completely to ourselves (probably should have realized we were going the wrong way at this point). However (as you may guess given that it’s tropical Colombia), it was extremely hot and humid.
Davy saved Shari from a falling rock 
Thumbs up because we don’t know how far we’re hiking/aren’t over-heating yet! 
Beautiful views along the hike 
Starting to toast up… 
….roasting…. 
….toasted.
By the time we finally got to the swimming beach we were quite happy and ready for a refreshing dip. The beach was beautiful and had bright blue water, but there were a lot of people given that there are so few swimmable beaches. Despite the crowds, we still enjoyed swimming and taking in the beautiful scenery before starting the long trek back.
Well deserved sandy
The following day we were initially planning on going hiking in a nearby town but weren’t feeling too well, so we decided to have a relaxing day at home instead (we’re sure feeling sick had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that we ate steak from the mall food court the night before). We watched a movie, bought some cheap pool floaties, and relaxed at the pool at our Airbnb.
Chose this picture to capture the day rather than a picture of us watching Paul Blart: Mall Cop
The following morning we woke up early to drive four hours to Cartagena, our last stop in Colombia!
SPICY BONUS PICS
Scenes from downtown Gaira 
Derp 
Tayrona proved to be very thought provoking 
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