Journey:

We took a minibus straight from our hostel in Santa Marta to Barranquilla. We were told this was a door to door service, however it was more a door to middle of a road in the centre of the city service, so we had to get a taxi the last 10 minutes to our hostel. This journey was very straightforward, and was in an air conditioned bus with a ton of space for 25,000 COP per person. There was a slight issue with trying to fit the surfboards in the bus (when is there ever not a surfboard issue?) but for an extra 10,000 COP the bus driver was happy for them to come aboard.

Accommodation:

The Meeting Point Hostel. Good, clean room. Staff were great. Pizzeria right at the front of the hostel (although can’t comment on the pizzas as we thought we would be clever and cook our own food for a bit – which didn’t turn out as well as it could have.) Biggest positive about this hostel though was the adorable puppy with ears like dumbo. Biggest negative is there was no free breakfast, which we didn’t appreciate.

Sights:

El Bolstillo (Pradomar) Beach

The obsessive surfer was thrilled that Barranquilla provided some surf (although fairly limited surf) and so we spent a lot of time at this beach. A beach club was situated right at Pradomar so there were places to sit and get food/drink. It was very quiet when we were there but maybe it gets busier at weekends/holidays. The beach itself is nothing too special with kind of grey/brown sand. The beaches around Santa Marta had definitely been far prettier.

City centre

We thought we should venture into the centre before we left. There was no need. It was busy, smelly and hot. There was absolutely nothing to see of any interest. We stayed for approximately half an hour. Thus, all I have in the way of photos for Barranquilla is some surfing photos.

Food:

We had been spending a quita a large amount of our daily budget simply on just food every day. Therefore, we decided to make full use of the kitchen provided at the hostel.

Our trips to the supermarket were fairly confusing as we didn’t understand what anything was. Eventually, we settled on some spaghetti, chicken, eggs, ham, bananas and some bread. We were pretty confident with these choices. However, our breakfast of bread, ham and bananas was a complete fail. The bread was made from a sweet dough but had a savoury type sauce in the centre (maybe tomato?) which isn’t a great combo, and the banana tasted definitely not like banana (because it wasn’t – it was plantain.) Note to self: don’t buy the giant looking bananas, they’re not bananas.

Summary:

Basically the only thing guide books will tell you about Barranquilla is not to go (unless you’re going for the annual carnival.) Lonely Planet goes as far as to describe Barranquilla as ‘one long, intensely hot traffic jam hemmed in by heavy industry and Caribbean swamps.’ At first I thought it was kind of a harsh description but now I think it’s probably quite accurate. Barranquilla isn’t a massive tourist area for a reason, unless this is your home or you work here there’s nothing much for you. In short, Barranquilla is perhaps best avoided for the tourist.