Escape to Cartagena

Cartagena harbour and the tail of a whale!

The engine saga continues. It took a long frustrating month for it to arrive in Spain. Surely nothing else could hold us up now? Wrong again. Having just taken delivery of the engine, Volvo Spain told us they would not be able to install it for another two weeks as the technicians were now all on holiday! With steam coming out of every orifice it was time to leave the boat and have a mini break. We had hoped we would be in southern Spain by now and heading off on a road tour. It was too far to do it from Valencia so we opted for a few days in Cartagena instead.

The Modernista Town Hall

The Roman Theatre discovered by chance in 1987

Isaac Peral's submarine

The Military Museum - housing the largest collection
of artillery in Spain

We hopped on a bus for the 4.5 hour journey south, temporarily saying goodbye to our problems and checked into a nice hotel just inside the old city walls. Cartagena, surrounded by five hills with its fabulous natural harbour the third deepest in the world, was founded in 227 BC by the Carthaginian Hasdrubal, the brother of the more famous Hannibal. It is one of Spain's most historically fascinating places and to this day archeologists are continuing to find long buried Roman and Carthaginian ruins. It is not all ancient ruins though and the rise of mining activities in the early twentieth century attracted the bourgeousie and with them some wonderful art nouveau buildings. It is still an important naval port to this day and we had fun on our one wet day exploring the fascinating Naval Museum with Isaac Peral's prototype for the first electric battery powered submarine on display and some beautiful scale models of ships old and new. For a relatively small town there were a lot of museums to keep us busy. We also managed to fit in a visit to the Military Museum, the brand new Arqva or Museum of Underwater Archeology and the fascinating Roman Theatre Museum which tunnels under the modern day buildings.

The old artillery headquarters, now the Military Museum

A crowd of decorative flagpoles on Concepcion hill

View over Cartagena from Concepcion hill

Another empty shell

The old bullring

Cartagena, also a cruise ship port, has seen a lot of money in recent years spent on tarting up the town and making it a worthwhile stop. It is also a work in progress as wandering the streets many parts resemble a film set where only the frontage of the Modernista buildings remain standing. The bustling pedestrianised calle Mayor was great for tapas and people watching. For a wonderful panoramic view of the harbour from above we climbed the zig zagging path through Torres Park, accompanied by ducks and the occasional peacock, up to the 13th century Concepcion castle. It also afforded a great view of the old bullring, another restoration work in progress. With so much to see and do our mini break worked a treat. We didn't think about engines for the whole time we were away!

Cartagena harbour front