The heat and humidity was something we’d noticed while standing outside on the ship as we approached Cartagena but we’d subsequently been able to largely dismiss it as we’d spent time inside the ship then time on an air-conditioned bus as we headed towards the first stop on our day’s excursion in the Colombian city. That heat and humidity returned with a bang once we got out at the base of Castillo San Felipe de Barajas and waited around while our guide wandered off to secure the tickets we’d need to enter the fortifications.
“We’ll probably be very glad later that we’re doing this at the start of the day,” I told my wife while looking up at the long sloping paths and the people already walking up them to get to the top of the castle.
“It won’t feel like it at the time, though,” she replied. We would both turn out to be right.
While we were waiting for our guide to return to our group and trying not to think about the rivulets of sweat already starting to run down various parts of the body we also had to engage in numerous head shakes, hand waves, and abuses of Spanish pronunciation with our frequent “No, gracias” replies as purveyors of general tat descended upon us obvious tourists from all angles. There did at least seem to be some official vendor t-shirt that they all wore which lent the operations more of a sense that you weren’t going to get completely ripped off if you bought anything, and it also made it slightly easier to spot them approach from out of the corners of your eyes so you could veer away, or attempt to.
Our guide returned with tickets in hand and ushered us all through to start heading up the zig-zag slopes outside the walls of Castillo San Felipe de Barajas. It wasn’t a fast walk, thankfully, and it had a few stops along the way for the guide to point out distant sights of Cartagena or mention some of the history of this castle, but that didn’t stop it being incredibly uncomfortable for us. We really don’t cope with heat and humidity very well at all and we’re not natural hikers so quite why we often pick excursions that involve lots of walking upwards when we’re in hot climates must surely be evidence that all life is just a simulation and whoever’s configured us toggled the Brain Parasite setting to “on” just for a laugh.
Castillo San Felipe de Barajas stands over forty metres above sea level. The castle itself is triangular with its walls, parapets, and batteries designed to overlap and protect one another, making the taking of the fortress complex a difficult task to do without overwhelming force. The walls were noticeably wider at the base, tapering inwards as they reached the parapets, and this gave the defenders more range of fire down on any attacking force. The heavy slope on all the walls of this seventeenth century defensive structure was distinctly different from most of the other castles we’ve visited around the world.
The fortress fell to the French during the Nine Years War and attempts by the British to take it during the hilariously-named War of Jenkins’ Ear were repelled, but it has otherwise been a place either in local or Spanish hands for most of its history.
One interesting aspect of Castillo San Felipe de Barajas is its maze-like system of tunnels, some of which we were able to walk through and, of course, we did, but if we thought that this might give us some relief from the heat and humidity then we were mistaken as the fortress was a very popular location for many groups and individuals to visit on this day. It was crowded, it was noisy, it was dark, and the wind – which was admittedly only blowing warm air around – was suppressed completely. We couldn’t wait to get out and back into the unrelenting heat and humidity of the outside of the castle which tells you how unpleasant it was. You’ve still got to do it, though.
So, not a huge amount of history to report regarding Castillo San Felipe de Barajas but a very interesting design (built with slave labour from Africa, naturally) and despite our issues with comfort in the conditions it was a place we were very glad to visit. As we gathered to head down there was time to point out one other interesting defensive measure in the castle: gaps in the external walkways that were usually covered by boards that could be broken, removed, or burnt in the event of an attack to produce a deep drop that needed to be overcome. Nice.
In the next post in this cruise travelogue series we’ll continue our excursion in Colombia with a visit to the historic centre of Cartagena. The colour yellow will feature heavily.