Things to Do in Cartagena at Night: How We'd Run the Evening
By Townhouse Cartagena ·
Quick answer
Cartagena's night has three stages and they don't overlap much. Early evening belongs to Las Murallas and Plaza de San Diego, while there's still light on the water. From dark until midnight it's rooftops: ours opens at 8am and runs till midnight seven days a week, with two plunge pools and happy hour every day. On Friday and Saturday our lobby turns into Members Only from 8pm, with live jazz, DJs and burlesque by local artists, and entry limited so you need to book. After midnight the night moves to Getsemani, outside the walls, which goes later than anything inside them.
Members Only, off our lobby: Friday and Saturday, 8pm till midnight.
People ask us what there is to do in Cartagena at night as if the answer were one place. It's a sequence. The evening here has stages, and the mistake most visitors make is arriving at the good part too early or leaving before it starts.
We're on Carrera 7 in San Diego, inside the walls, which means we watch this happen every night from the top floor. Early evening is for being outside on foot: the walls, the square, the streets while they're still warm and there's light on the water. From dark until midnight it's rooftops, ours included, and ours gets loud after dark, which is the point. If you want quiet and colonial hush, we're probably not your spot. Then around midnight the old town starts folding up and the night walks out of the gates into Getsemani, which keeps going.
Here's the order we'd do it in, with the things we can tell you for certain: our own hours, our own prices, and the places we actually send guests. Live Cartagena the way we do.
Las Murallas, before the light goes
· The sea edge of the old town, a walk from San Diego · Free
Start on the walls, because it costs nothing and it's the part you'll describe to people at home. Las Murallas are the stone fortifications ringing the old town, and you can climb up onto them and keep walking along the top: no ticket, no gate, no queue. Do this before dinner rather than after. There's still colour on the water, the vendors are out, and the stone is still holding the day's heat under your feet. We'd rather you walked a short stretch slowly than tried to do the whole ring; our own walls-at-sunset guide says where to get on and where to stop.
Plaza de San Diego, the hinge of the evening
· The square our street opens onto, San Diego · Free to sit in
Sit in the square when you don't want a plan. Plaza de San Diego is the small plaza in our neighbourhood, the one our street runs into, and it's the place an evening pivots on: you eat outside, you watch the square work, then you decide whether the night goes up to a rooftop or out through the gates. This is where we send guests who say they want to be out but can't face a reservation. It's also the shortest walk home of anything on this page, which matters more at 1am than it does now.
Our rooftop, open till midnight
· Top floor, Carrera 7, San Diego · Happy hour every day; pool day pass 25 euros for two
Come up here between dark and midnight. We were the first hotel in the city to open our rooftop to the public, so this isn't a residents-only balcony: cocktail bar, all-day diner, two little plunge pools, open from 8am until midnight, every day. Happy hour runs daily, and sunset is when the seats go. Ask for whatever Chef Pedro is doing with the catch that day. Book a table though, no one likes to be disappointed. One honest warning: it gets loud after dark, and plenty of the people up here are locals rather than hotel guests, so this is a bar with a view, not a hushed hotel terrace.
Members Only, Friday and Saturday
· Off our lobby, ground floor · Reservation required
Cartagena is all about the salsa, and we got a bit sick of it, and we missed our jazz, so we built a bar in our own lobby for it. Members Only opens at 8pm on Fridays and Saturdays and runs to midnight: live jazz, DJs and burlesque, all local artists, lights down low on purpose. We cap the number of people we let in so the room stays the size it's supposed to be, which means the booking isn't a formality. An art hotel, but not the stuffy, silent, white-walls kind. If you're only out for one night in Cartagena and it's a Friday, this is the one we'd argue for.
Getsemani, after we close
· The barrio just outside the walls · Varies
When our midnight is too early, the rest of the night is in Getsemani. It's the barrio immediately outside the walls, murals on the walls, doors open, music coming out of them, and it runs later and louder than anything inside the old town does. Go when we close rather than at nine, when the good part hasn't started. Go with somewhere in mind too, because wandering in Getsemani at 1am is how you end up in whichever bar has the loudest speaker. Our Getsemani guide is the list we actually give guests at the desk.
