Learning our Way Around Cartagena

We've been here 6 days now and are getting pretty well oriented. As usual, most of the cruisers we've met have been very friendly and very helpful.

• We've found the laundramat (and dropped 4 loads off to be washed!
• We have a 'frequent shopper' card at the local grocery story
• We've learned how to walk to downtown (El Centro)
• We've obtained cell phone sim cards and learned how to buy cell phone minutes on our prepaid phones
• We've figured out how to dial local and long distance
• We've figured out how to catch the cheap bus ($.62) or the airconditioned bus ($.85) in whichever direction we're going.
• We know how much a taxi should cost to most places we'd want to go
• We know where the 'Home Center' (like Home Depot or Lowes) is
• We know where the trash cans are and which one to use for what kind of trash
• We know when the water gets turned off in the marina
• We know where the air conditioned internet cafe is (when the marina internet isn't working, or when you want REAL high speed internet)
• We know which of the day labor guys in the marina are worth hiring, and have one guy right now working on polishing our stainless for $35/day
• We know where the machine shop, the re-chroming place, and the sewing machine repair place is
• We know where all the cell phone repair guys hang out
• We know a few places to eat (Pizza, Mexican, Colombian, Mid Eastern, Chinese) within walking distance of the marina
• We know when the weekly potluck is and when twofer night is at the bar
• We found a computer store that sells pieces parts

Some of this is made easier by a booklet given out by the marina, with the accumulated recommendations of cruisers past and present. But some things you just have to walk around and stumble onto.

We were looking for the sewing machine guy downtown when we walked past a small market that had 2 aisles of guys in small shops that did cell phone repair.

Our fancy Motorola Razor died on us 2 weeks after we bought it last fall on EBay. But when we tried to submit it for repair to Motorola, we found that they said it went out of warranty 6 months before we bought it. (even though we bought it as 'new in box'). Motorola wanted $75 to repair it, plus shipping. The guy we found in the 'cell phone repair' alley fixed it in half an hour (reflashing the software), for $17, while you wait. And he sold Dave a new sim card for $4, so now we have 2 phones and can call each other when we split up.

We found that the best sewing machine repair guy lives far away, but makes 'house calls'. He was camped out at the marina all morning today tweaking sewing machines.

We are still looking for a good map of Cartagena. When we're on a mission (looking for a specific place), it's much easier to have a map. The only one we've found is a free tourist map, and it doesn't cover everywhere we want to go.

For example, 3 of our 4 cameras aboard have developed some kind of a problem in the last year, and they're all out of warranty. I've researched 'camera repair' on the internet, and they all start at $75-$100, just to open it up and look at it. So we've been looking for a camera repair place here where the labor rate is cheaper and the overhead is less.

We asked at one camera store, got referred to a warranty repair place (that didn't handle our brands), and THEY referred us somewhere else, etc. After three places, we ran into a dead end. But Dave thinks he's found another little shop in a market somewhere--he walked past it when he went back to get the cell phone repaired.

My travel laptop (the one we plan to carry with us back to the States) had a memory problem, and we visited 3 places before we found someone who carried the memory we needed.

And remember... we are doing all this on foot... no car!

Our transportation options here are: on foot, cheap bus, air conditioned bus, taxi, or 'moto taxi'. If you are just one person, you can hire a motorcycle guy to carry you where you want to go.

The moto taxi's are all over the place, and the cost is about half the price of a regular taxi. We wouldn't even think of renting a car... between the crazy drivers, unfamiliar roads and road signs, and cheap public transportation, who wants to drive!?