Tayrona National Park and staying in a bit of paradise nearby
Summary
Yeah the National Park is nice – you can walk through the jungle areas to get to the beautiful beaches, and don’t get me wrong it is indeed nice – but it gets pretty crowded. My tip would be to stay in one of the chilled out beach hotels in the fantastic area just past the eastern end of the park, where the river meets the sea
The hotels themselves are lovely, and the nearby beach between the sea and the lake is gorgeous. We ended up extending our stay for 4 nights because we liked it so much and headed over to the park for two of the days, avoiding the rush of a day trip from Santa Marta. Search for Maloka Barlovento for the right spot. We stayed there and would recommend
Nearby you also have two super things to do – firstly, and easiest, is Cartagena’s wonderful Old Town that ranks as one of the best in Latin America and see more tips at the travel entry Soaking up the Cartagena Old Town. But the highlight is the 4days / 3 nights Hiking the Lost City Trek where you trek through the jungle to the mystical Lost City. And have a look at how it can all come together in a itinerary for 3 weeks in Colombia
One last tip – “Cayman Aguja” is a sign you’ll see put up all along the shore. It isn’t a type of cayman, its an American Crocodile!
highlights
#1 Soaking up the beautiful beaches surrounded by jungle in this nice spot of paradise
#2 Wandering through and exploring the jungle as it meets the beaches of the national park
#3 Wandering along the quieter coastline to the west of the park and seeing the beautiful combination of lagoons and open ocean
#4 Checking out the pretty beaches that sit within Tayrona National Park
#5 Lazing away the days in the beachside cabins that sit just outside of the national park, with a far more chilled out vibe
Experiences nearby
The below map shows experiences nearby with a colour that reflect the Overall Score of those experiences
Other beautiful beach and jungle experiences
Score Detail
Background - how many times have you asked someone what a travel experience was like and the response was "amazing" or "awesome"? That response is nice to know, but it makes it hard to differentiate that experience compared to others. That is exactly what these scores are trying to do - differentiate the experience by giving a score out of 10 based on 6 categories and then giving an overall experience score
This overall experience score is calculated by: take the highest of the "Culture" or "Nature" score (1-10) + "Fun factor" (1-10) + "Avoiding the crowds" (1-10) + highest of the "Unique" or "World Famous score" (1-10). Then convert into a score out of 100
Extra detail - the logic being that I find all of the 6 individual scores important, but I don't want to mark an experience down just because it doesn't cover both "Culture" and "Nature", or because it isn't both "World Famous" and "Unique". Take the examples of Safari in The Serengeti and walking through Rome - they both appeal at opposite ends of the nature / culture spectrum, and you can have a fantastic time without needing to appeal to both sides. So, their overall scores aren't penalized for their lack of one or the other, and I've done the same for "World Famous" vs "Unique". But . . . I do think that the "Fun factor" of an experience is important, irrelevant of other factors, and so is "Avoiding the Crowds" (or where there are crowds that add to the experience). So, both of these scores are standalone