Top 5 Favorite Hotels 2010-2020: #4: Casa del Arzobispado Hotel, Cartagena, Colombia

The job of the Archbishop in Cartagena, Colombia, must've been a cushy gig, because I stayed at his house and it was awesome.

The Casa del Arzobispado (House of the Archbishop) was a small boutique hotel within the Old City walls of Cartagena, which, if you are going to stay overnight or three in Colombia's #1 international tourism destination, you really ought to stay in the Old City (rather than the high rise corridors of the Miami Beach knock-off Bocagrande neighborhood) (your other option). It doesn't look like much from the outside:

But inside those doors:

The hotel is a two-story, with only a few rooms, all around a central plaza with large pool:

The room also was quite large and quite comfortable:

I'm obsessive about picking the right hotel when I travel internationally (much less so domestically, when I'm more price-driven). I pick a neighborhood. Then I look for a hotel at a fair price in that neighborhood. I avoid American chains (again, the polar opposite of my domestic hotel search which is very chain-driven) (I love you, La Quinta). Boy did I luck out here. Great location. Spotlessly clean. Delicious breakfast. Reasonable price.

And if you climbed the ladder to the roof, the view was awesome (given that there are no high rises within the Old City walls):

I don't see me going back to Cartagena. I enjoyed the place, but it's a little too "romantic" for my tastes. And it's a Caribbean city. It's not South American in personality. But if I circumstances steer my toward Cartagena in the future, the first I will do is see if the Archbishop has a spare room available for me.