Where's the Ice Machine?

Bogota is not the world’s largest city. It’s not even close to the largest cities in the world, being barely within the top 30 in population size for its metro. But when you arrive in Bogota it will feel like the biggest city on Earth. Indeed, it’s larger than some of the world’s most visited megacities like Bangkok, Seoul, London and Chicago.

When I arrived in Bogota I was reminded of Chicago often. One city has a lake defining its eastern border and the other’s got a mountain range, but they’re very similar in the way they’re laid out. Downtown splits north and south at the eastern edge. The northern part of Bogota is its most desirable section. Dense apartments are intermixed with stately and historic houses. Fashionable retail, restaurants and parks abound. The south side (which to be fair I didn’t see at all) has a reputation as being a much tougher part of town, where life is harder for the people living there. And the west side is just one large and mostly flavorless urban mishmash that’s neither inspiring to the people living there nor of much interest to a visitor.

Starting from Calle 1 and going to the northern edge of Bogota covers 200 city blocks. There’s more than enough to see and discover just on the north side. It’s like going from the Battery to Washington Heights in New York City.

If you’re planning a trip to South America you might be wondering if Bogota is worth adding to your itinerary or if your time might be better spent somewhere else. Let’s take a closer look.

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Should You Fly Into Bogota?

While Bogota is the largest and main airport in Colombia, there are lots of options both for arriving in Colombia and traveling onward to other South American countries. If your international flight from another Colombian city includes routing through Bogota it’s just a short flight to make the connection. All the airlines will have plenty of routing choices available. But Colombia’s other airports are large and busy enough that a trip to Bogota is not a necessary part of a visit to Colombia. Flying to or from Bogota is unlikely to save you significant money on a ticket.

So should you bother with it? Is it worth seeing Bogota for its own sake? That’s a question every traveler has to answer for themselves. It’s my opinion that most tourists will have a better experience visiting Medellín instead. It’s similar in many ways but the tourism sector is a little more developed and the city overall feels much healthier and more culturally Colombian than Bogota, which is a bit more international by virtue of being the capital.

It was my impression that a large share of Bogota is a very pleasant and interesting place to live, but that to really put your finger on the pulse of life here requires more time and effort than is possible to extend in a few days or a week. It’s clear that this city is more for locals. If you do want to come and check it off your list, a full day or two is really enough to get a sense of Bogota and see part of the city (because let’s face it, you’re not going to see it all).

Latam or avianca?

Wherever you fly in Colombia, you’re going to find better service and more comfortable aircraft on Latam than on avianca. Prices are similar on both airlines but the in-flight experience on avianca is as poor as it can be, with customers being nickel and dimed at every step of the process.

Where to Stay in Bogota

A good trick when searching for a hotel in an unfamiliar city is to seek out the Four Seasons or the JW Marriott and then find a more modestly priced hotel near that location. In my case that led me to the Holiday Inn Express Zona Financiera. There’s a full review in this post for that stay.

Zona T and Zona G are uptown areas roughly between Calle 65 and Calle 85. They’re fairly upscale and at many times when walking around in the area visitors will be reminded of strolling around European cities with fashionable cafes and stately mansions. Staying even further north around Usaquen or Chico Norte will be a similar pleasant experience. Bogota offers a lot of hotels priced under $100 per night including from some very nice brands like Radisson, DoubleTree and Dann Carlton.

While the uptown areas are a bit fancier and more comfortable, guests on a shorter stay of 2-3 days should strongly consider staying downtown, closer to Plaza Bolivar, the museums and Monserrat, which are likely to be on most visitors’ lists of things to do.

Getting Around in Bogota

Like the rest of Colombia, Uber is very inexpensive. Unfortunately it was a bit hit-or-miss for me in Bogota. While Uber is my preference I was forced to take cabs a few times. The taxis were pretty straightforward and good in my experience. There wasn’t any haggling or trying to play games with tourists. Rates are posted in the back seat and even the highest rates are not very expensive. All of the rides I took were the same price Uber would have charged. I’ve heard of some people having bad experiences in Bogota cabs but I thought they were fine.

At any rate, cabs might be your only real option. I love transit and was interested in riding the TransMilenio bus system. There’s one main avenue that runs the entire length of the north side and into the south. You can easily pick it out on the map above. You would think it’s as easy as going to a station and getting on a bus to go north or south. But there’s about 40,000 different bus lines all running on this avenue. It would be fairly difficult to discern the one you want and be sure you’re going the right way and paying the right fare. Visitors are better off sticking with cars.

No Metro

On a visit to Saigon earlier this year it was shocking that a city of that size doesn’t have a functioning metro system. Bogota is in the same category. It would be the most sensible thing in the world to get rid of all those buses and run a subway line along that avenue. Indeed it’s an idea that is working its way through the Colombian political process presently.

Saigon has solved its problem with an even bigger problem: too many motorbikes. Bogota is in a much better position because of the wide adoption of bicycles in the city. As a foreigner I found the bike share system difficult to sign up for online but many locals ride their own bikes and the bike infrastructure in Bogota is world class. Every Sunday many city streets are closed to traffic for most of the day and tens of thousands of bikes take part in ciclovias.

But again, if you’re just stopping in for a couple of days you’re probably better off just getting around on foot except for the long ride to and from the airport.

Downtown Bogota

If convenience is the benefit of staying downtown, the trade off is that it’s just really shabby. There are vacant spaces for sale and rent all over Bogota. There’s graffiti everywhere, as if it were Manhattan in 1982. Some large hotels and office towers downtown are completely empty if you look closely. The food and drink options are not the greatest. Most of your better restaurants are going to be on the north side. Overall there’s just a lot of signs that Bogota is not as healthy and efficient as a major capital should be.

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It’s not very different from downtown Medellín. It’s a similar vibe. The basics of good urbanism like pedestrianized streets are already there. The main and best attraction in both cities is a museum dedicated to the artist Fernando Botero, whose funeral procession I got a chance to see when visiting Bolivar Square.

There are other museums like the Gold Museum and the National Museum. But overall there’s not as much as you would expect a city of this size to offer tourists. Given that the downtown areas are so similar, I prefer and recommend spending all or most of your time in Medellín.

Monserrate is a Must See

A short walk from the city center downtown is the base station for Bogota’s Monserrate mountain. A ticket for the cable cars is inexpensive (Keep It! You need it for the round trip back to the ground!) and the ride up the mountain is interesting. But the views from the top are just phenomenal. The elevation at the top is some 10,400 feet so the view is comparable to flying a small plane over the city. The entire valley is visible and it will impress upon you just how big Bogota really is.

There’s a historic church at the top that’s open to the public, as well as a walking garden demonstrating the stations of the cross. Many visitors to Bogota want to see the Zipaquira Salt Cathedral. If you want to see that as well you should strongly consider booking a tour on Viator or Get Your Guide. It’s pretty far outside the city and the round trip transportation alone makes a tour worth it. I opted against seeing it because how many churches and stations of the cross can you look at in a single weekend? For me the answer is one.

There’s a long avenue of restaurants and food stalls behind the church at the top of Monserrate. There are plenty of souvenir stands as well as some more upscale restaurants if you’re bringing a date. Between the lines for the cable cars, time to enjoy the view, and stopping for a meal, visitors should plan for 4-6 hours to fully see Monserrat. The lines will be shorter at off peak times and the lines to get to the top after sunset are almost nothing.

Skip the Tolerance Zone

You may have heard of Bogota’s notorious Tolerance Zone, the Santa Fe area where prostitution and other vice is legal and thriving. It’s just a short walk from Bolivar Square and the museums. Being the curious and intrepid traveler I am I sallied over for a little look around.

Reader… it sucks. There’s nothing good or even a little interesting over there. If you want to see what it looks like there are many hidden camera videos on YouTube. Hiding a camera is a very prudent measure in an area like that. I took very few pictures. Not because I was very afraid of standing out or having my phone stolen, but because it’s an area full oof people who definitely do not want to be in strangers’ photos and the likelihood of some of those people hassling you for taking photos feels pretty high.

No one hassled me and as long as you’re minding your own business you should be fine. But don’t take that as encouragement. There are a lot of people here who are not attached to jobs or schools and are just making a living some way in the streets. It’s got a lot of potential to be dangerous and besides: it’s just very unpleasant. Similar to the Tenderloin in San Francisco.

There are piles of garbage all over the place. You might step in a pile of shit… and it might not be from a dog. Santa Fe is not receiving the attention or services from the city that other parts do and there’s nothing there to see, do, or entertain you. I got the hell out of there pretty quickly. You’re much better off booking one of these tours instead…