🇨🇴 Walking Through Márquez's Literary City

📍 Cartagena, nestled along Colombia's northwestern Caribbean coast, is the nation's fifth-largest city. Founded in 1533 during the colonial era, it served as a vital port for shipping plundered gold and silver back to Spain—long before the Panama Canal existed. Its strategic importance made it a frequent target for Caribbean pirates, prompting the construction of formidable fortresses that still stand today. 🛬 Most visitors arrive by air. Domestic flights in Colombia are frequent and affordable (a far cry from 10+ hour bus rides!). Cartagena's airport also offers international routes, making it an ideal first stop in Colombia. Just 4 km from the Old Town, taxis provide easy transfers. 🏠 Wandering Cartagena's Old Town feels like stepping into a Márquez novel—where passersby and balcony-dwellers seem frozen in a century-old South America. Love in the Time of Cholera was his love letter to this city. His former home, tucked quietly in the northern quarter away from tourist crowds, whispers of the solitude where he likely penned his masterpieces to the sound of crashing waves. ⏳ The narrow streets reveal Afro-Colombians dressed in the national flag's colors, dancing for tips—a living legacy of the city's dark history as a slave trade hub. Their ancestors' resilience now weaves into Cartagena's multicultural tapestry, embodying South America's complex identity. #CulturalHeritage #Travel #WorldHeritageSite #Cartagena #Colombia #GarciaMarquez #Caribbean #SpanishColonial #LoveInTheTimeOfCholera