Cartagena's location on the caribbean sea is due south of Cuba and Florida and due east of the Panama Canal as shown here. Click here for a city map of Cartagena points of interest. To give you a feeling for the distances involved in getting there from where you are the nonstop flying time from Miami Florida is 2 hours 30 minutes. From Santiago, Chile via Bogotá the total flight time is 6 hours 30 minutes and from New York via Miami it takes 5 hours 30 minutes. From London you can make connections either through Miami or Bogotá with a total flying time on the order of 12 hours. Air access to Cartagena when there is not a direct flight is primarily through the connecting cities of Bogotá, Colombia, Miami, Florida USA, Panama City, Republic of Panamá, and Caracas, Venezuela.

Cruise ships that call in Cartagena are generally on Caribbean itineraries that include the Panama Canal as well as southern Caribbean ports such as Puerto Limón, Costa Rica, Aruba and Curacao, Netherland Antilles and the Jamaican and Mexican ports. Yachts, whether sail or power boats, most often are on passages that include the Dutch West Indies the Panama Canal and the central American anchorages in Honduras and Guatemala. There is no overland connection between Panama and Colombia. The Pan American highway that runs down central America and the west side of South America is interrupted between southern Panama and northwestern Colombia by a dense stretch of nearly impassable jungle known as the Darien Gap.