Travel advice for Colombia
From travel safety to visa requirements, discover the best tips for traveling to Colombia
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Colombia’s generally reliable and numerous buses are your best bet for intercity travel, though increased competition between domestic airlines means that air travel is frequently only slightly more expensive than travel by bus and far faster and more comfortable.
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Best Machu Picchu and Galapagos Islands Tour Package
Explore a trio of UNESCO World Heritage Sites in this Machu Picchu and Galapagos tour package! Your journey begins in Quito, home to the Middle of the World. Afterward, fly on over to the Galapagos Islands the best biodiversity hotspot and following with the sublime Machu Picchu in Peru.
customize ⤍Galapagos Cruise and Scuba Diving Adventure
The Galapagos Islands rank as one of the world’s top dive sites, famous for its incredible underwater wonders, and huge quantities of marine life. This package offers a full-day SCUBA diving tour for guests that wish to experience the impressive diving in Galapagos, all in a safe and fun environment
customize ⤍The Best of the Mashpi Rainforest and Galapagos
Begin this journey in one of the first cities to be given the title of UNESCO World Heritage Site – Quito, Ecuador! Afterward, just a few hours away, you’ll head down into the lush cloud forests that surround Quito to experience Mashpi Lodge. You’ll finish this journey with the the Galapagos Islands
customize ⤍For shorter trips, you’re better off sacrificing comfort and price for speed by buying a ticket on a buseta, colectivo or any similarly sized minibus or minivan that departs when full. If you don’t want to be waiting around for ages, don’t hand over your luggage or pay unless you can see that a bus is nearly full and ready to depart.
In the coffee-growing areas in particular, the most common mode of transport is the hardy Willy jeeps, with two rows of seats in the covered interior and more passengers clinging to the back. These tend to be inexpensive, but the ride can be bumpy and you are squeezed in with mounds of luggage.
Budget carrier EasyFly (easyfly.com.co) serves Bogotá, Barranquilla, Cartagena, Cúcuta, Medellín and Santa Marta; Lan (lan.com) flies to all the major cities as well as smaller regional destinations, while new VivaColombia (vivacolombia.co) is the only one to connect Medellín directly to Santa Marta.
Booking in advance doesn’t necessarily guarantee a low fare (except during Semana Santa). A one-way fare between Santa Marta and Bogotá purchased a day – or a month – in advance costs about COP$120,000–155,000 (in high season).
From travel safety to visa requirements, discover the best tips for traveling to Colombia
written by Rough Guides Editors
updated 26.04.2021
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