Weekend: Bogotá

In February 2023, we made our first-ever trip to Colombia. Inspired by stories from Colombian-American friends and others who recently traveled there, we were eager to check out its cities and coastal regions and look forward to going back to see more.

Be sure to check out notes on Cartagena and Barranquilla and Medellin (because obviously you should go), but here are the highlights of our first stop: Bogotá. Colombia had some surprises too. Check those out HERE.

Know Before You Go

In addition to the information and advice found in other city guides and tour books (such as: yes, Colombia is safe and welcoming to visitors), I found a few things worth emphasizing:

• Bogota sits above 8000’ elevation and the trek to Monserrate whisks you to an elevation over 10,000’ in just a few minutes. Being a little short of breath is one thing, but altitude sickness is no joke. Plan accordingly and give yourself time to take it easy.
• Increased elevation also means increased UV exposure. Bring good sunscreen and use it generously, or risk getting a sunburn more quickly than you expected (in other words: learn from my mistakes. Oops).
• Even in a city the size of Bogotá, a lot of businesses—including bars and restaurants—close, or close early on Sunday. Keep this in mind in order to avoid unfortunate surprises as you’re planning your activities and meals.
• Bogotá’s TransMilenio is the world’s largest Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system. Busses are frequent and cheap, although it’s consistently busy and some busses can get crowded. Payment is entirely electronic—the TuLlave fare cards are available at kiosks and staffed booths at the BRT platforms. In my experience, directions in Google Maps were spot on for using the system. Interestingly, whenever I asked guides or hotel staff about taking the bus, they consistently recommended taxis instead, but we disregarded their recommendations a few times and it worked out just fine.

Sightseeing Highlights

Bogotá is a huge city. Population-wise, it’s one of the largest cities in the world and it occupies a significant area of land. As a tourist, it’s pretty much impossible to see and do everything, so figuring out your priorities before you go will minimize time traversing the city so you can focus on enjoying the sights.

The notes below are a few of my highlights. They aren’t intended to replace other guides or guidebooks. Rather, feel free to take bits and pieces of my adventures as a glimpse into the neighborhoods I visited and/or a slightly different perspective on the spots which may or may not have been mentioned elsewhere.

La Candelaria is the 470 year-old city center of Bogotá. The Plaza de Bolivar (pictured above), surrounded by government buildings, served as somewhat of an anchor of our exploration of the area, as well as a meeting spot. The square itself was sufficiently photogenic, but at least while we were there wasn’t a place to dedicate too much time.

Museo Botero is just a couple blocks away from the plaza. I enjoyed exploring this museum, filled with works donated by one of Colombia’s best known artists, Fernando Botero. The museum features the iconic works of his own creation as well as works of others which he collected. The museum is also free, which makes it ideal for folks who want to spend 30 minutes or folks who enjoy dedicating the entire day there. Just don’t go too late in the afternoon: the museum closes at 4pm (and earlier on Sunday), so it’s not a late-day activity.

Monserrate is the mountaintop shrine, church, marketplace, and viewpoint overlooking most of Bogotá. It takes a bit to get there, both because the base of the mountain is a ways from many other places in town, and because you may find a line for the teleférico (cable car or gondola) or funicular—plus a line to get tickets so you can get in the line to get up the mountain. But both the funicular and teleférico have great views on a clear day and round trip tickets allow you to choose one method of transit up the hill and the other (if you wish) on the way down. And the views are even better at the top of the mountain.

Chapinero is another of Bogotá’s major neighborhoods, home to a wide variety of restaurants, parks, and nightlife, as well as being a hub of financial and other businesses. In addition to finding a great hotel here, it was a great area to call home base for our time in Bogotá: safe and pretty easy to explore a lot of by foot or via transit (though locals will likely encourage you take a taxi versus the bus). As well, I found it to be a great neighborhood to explore many of Bogotá’s breweries and brew pubs, creative and interesting restaurants, as well as the majority of Bogotá’s gay nightlife.

Places I didn’t make it to, but had hoped to include:

• Plaza Del Mercado de Paloquemao is a Chapinero market with produce, flowers and street food I’m told is less-frequented by tourists. It closes around 4pm though, so go earlier than I did (technically I went there, just didn’t go in … since it was closed). Oh, and take cash.
• The Usaquen Flea Market is supposed to be great on Sunday, especially if it’s sunny
• Bogotá’s Distrito Graffiti would have been great to check out, especially considering how vibrant and rich the street art was throughout other areas of Colombia

Eating and Drinking

Bogotá has some great food (and some of the worst late-night pizza I’ve had, but I digress…). Most of my meals were centered in the Chapinero neighborhood – not just because of the proximity to my hotel, but also because the neighborhood has an great variety of good places to go. Some of my favorites included:

• Mini-Mal in Chapinero is a contemporary Colombian restaurant with creative takes on traditional and non-traditional dishes. It’s upstairs from an ice cream shop, so it can take a moment to find if you’re not looking above street level, but the food and cocktails were fresh and delicious, service was attentive, and the restaurant itself was refreshingly quaint and cute.
• El Mono Bandido has a couple locations in Bogotá. We visited their Chapinero location for evening snacks and drinks and I loved the modern, park-like decor inside (there’s also an outdoor patio). They were out of a few things when we were there (who runs out of nachos?), but drinks were great and the food we had was mostly good (dedos de queso were fair – skip those).
• Breweries and brew pubs abound in Bogota. We checked out Cervecería Gigante in Northern Bogota which had a nice variety of brews in a location adjacent to a handful of other bars and pubs. Afterwards, we walked to a nearby location of Bogota Beer Company (there are several in the city, as well as a few in other cities around Colombia). We didn’t get any food there, but others’ meals and snacks looked good, and the beer was solid, if not exceptional.
• And because you’re in Colombia, there’s coffee! Juan Valdez cafes are ubiquitous (Americans can picture the vibe as a Colombian Starbucks). It’s a fun instagram opportunity to send to the folks back home who remember the commercials featuring its namesake. Otherwise, the coffee and pastries there are fine. Just fine. For a more interesting experience with better coffee, Arte y Pasión Café near Plaza de Bolivar is a barista training school and coffee shop. Specialties like cafe latte or an afogato were delicious, but I found it particularly fun to try their four-coffee sampler showing off brews from a variety of beans from across the country.

Nightlife

To be honest, despite reading about a vibrant gay bar and club scene in Bogotá, we only sampled the city’s nightlife one night. We arrived on Friday evening after a day of connecting flights and laid low. And as described above, Bogota nightlife was surprisingly quiet on Sunday, so our Saturday outings were all we managed to take advantage of. That said, Saturday night is *busy* in Bogota (and Colombia in general).

In particular, we knew Theatron de Película was a massive club and an event in itself, but we still weren’t fully prepared for just how massive it is. It’s advertised as 13 distinct bars on five floors inside the club, but that doesn’t necessarily include the basement floor entry area or the rooftop mezzanine (above the top-floor outdoor theater). And you have to be there to fully appreciate how the music fully changes in four steps between one bar and the next—there’s barely a spot where you can hear two sets of music at once and it’s amazing. All the same, the celebration and joy everyone is exuding is amazing. Everyone—everyone—is having fun.

Bogota clearly has a vibrant gay nightlife scene. We only touched the surface, but the quantity of folks out and about and the lines outside the variety of bars and clubs are evidence that folks in Bogotá like to live it up.

Lodging

Our home base in Bogotá was HAB Hotel, which I’d recommend in a heartbeat. The location was on a quiet street, but was quite convenient. The staff were all exceptionally friendly and helpful, the room was very nice, and the restaurant and bar were great as well. Take note that your experience may depend on the particular room you have—the hubby and I had a room on an interior courtyard which was very quiet, but perpetually warm (Bogotá’s climate is generally mild, so it wasn’t a surprise that there was no AC). My parents had a street-side room which they were able to keep pretty cool by opening the windows and door, but which had a lot more street noise.