The Ultimate Guide to Bogota: Recommendations on First Day

So I’ve taken a little hiatus from blogging. And this is because I’ve been BUSY prepping for our little vacay in Colombia. When Kevin and I began researching possible places to visit, we realized Colombia is not only compact but incredibly cheap! From Los Angeles, we paid around $360 for a roundtrip ticket. We’ve (sadly) paid more for a ticket to San Francisco!

Also, with the exception of Cartagena in the North, every city was dirt cheap. I’m talking top-end hotels at $100. I’m sold! Plus, we recently started watching Narcos on Netflix, and were both intrigued by the country’s wild history.

Plaza de Bolivar, right by our hotel in Bogota and where some scenes from Narcos were shot. Though I don’t remember all the pigeons in their shots!

For anyone who knows our travel adventures, it doesn’t always go as smoothly as anticipated! Upon landing in Bogota, Kevin grabbed what seemed to be our backpack while I rushed off to the bathroom. To be fair, it was a new bag so we haven’t traveled much with it. Well, we get all the way to our hotel in Bogota and my heart sunk… When I had to break the news, that we grabbed the wrong one! Long story short, Kevin got to use his Spanish skills as he hunted down our bag until 3 AM. He eventually got it and returned the bag we snagged to the rightful owner (a Brazilian girl Kevin emailed and was much nicer about the situation than I would have been about someone taking my bag!).

Kevin realizes we took the wrong backpack. And gets ready to head back to the Bogota airport to hunt down ours!

Bogota is not high on most visitors lists. But one big reason I think is that many visitors are directed by travel guides like Lonely Planet to stay in the historic Candelaria District. We stayed here for the first few nights in one of the country’s best hotels called Hotel Des Arts. It was beautiful. But kind of felt like staying in a prison at night because Candelaria is considered one of the more dangerous parts of the city.

Phil thinks he’s Evita – the balcony at the Hotel Del Opera.

During the day, it’s completely fine. But at night, the place is dead and just has a real eerie feeling. So take my advice and stay in the Northern parts of the city like Zona Rosa which is incredibly safe and lively. The city is booming with boutique hotels, including the trendy Click Clack Hotel. The rooms were not as luxurious as The Hotel Des Opera. But the common areas are just stunning.

The trendy Click Clack Hotel in Zona Rosa – the best neighborhood in Bogota.

We loved Bogota – and spent many days here (even more than expected after our flight got turned around from coffee country, but that’s another blog post!).

Here is a rundown of all the places we’d recommend on your first day:

Monserrate – Monserrate is a mountain that dominates the city center of Bogota with a pretty cathedral at the top along with some food stalls. It’s really a nice way to start off the day. Take the funicular first thing in the morning to avoid the crowds (and any day but Sunday which is free and turns into a mad house!). Another option is to hike up to the top. But don’t do this in off hours. It’s best to go on busy weekends since the area is known for robberies. One of our guides told us that a group of friends got robbed while hiking and the robbers took their hiking boots! Though, the robbers did offer them less nice shoes to hike back down… at least they were (kind of) nice robbers.

Going up – straight up the mountain to Monserrate

Botero Museum – For all things love of the rotund! In 2000, Colombian artist Fernando Botero donated hundreds of art pieces and it’s housed in a colonial mansion in the historic Candelaria neighborhood. The museum is free and just really a nice place to walk around. My personal favorite? The fat Mona Lisa. I kind of just wanted to get my photo taken by her to make myself feel a lot skinnier!

Botero’s fat Mona Lisa!

Gold Museum – Get your Indiana Jones on here. The “Museo del Oro” sparkles in gold and houses 55,000 priceless archaeological and artistic treasures with a grand finale worthy of Disneyland. The door closes behind you and it’s a light and sound show to gold!

The glimmering Museo del Oro

Carne De Res – A restaurant with a show. The original restaurant is outside Bogota but avoid the hassle – where traffic in Bogota makes LA look like Mayberry! It’s 5 floors of madness – bands playing, merengue dancing, Mexican-masked wrestlers, and confetti. And the food is fantastic – we ordered several small plates including tamales, avocado salad, but the best was the salt-encrusted steak that came with baby potatoes.