Sailboats leaving port at Cartagena Columbia

These photos were all taken as we were leaving Cartagena Columbia.

They all looked like they were going to flip over at any second.

I was glad I was on the ship and not in one of these sailboats.

Crosses for Good Friday

I, like lots of other people photograph crosses.

It is one of the many things I seem to collect.

My daughter and daughter-in-law have cross collections in their homes.

I collect the photographs.

This first photo was taken in Cartagena, Columbia, February 2009,

it is high on the hill overlooking the city.Next is at a little church in Rhea County.

I never thought about the significance of this cross being in the foundation of the church until I was preparing this post. It just hit me, they were sending the message that their church's foundation was the cross. Nice message. The lawn of McCampbell United Methodist Church, close to Dandridge, Tennessee.

The next 3 photos were all taken at Lake Junaluska Conference and Retreat Center, May 2008. The first photo is a natural grown cross, donated to Lake Junaluska.

While there I knew I had to capture the famous Lake Junaluska cross at sunrise. Inside one of the lobbies at Lake Junaluska.

Laurel Valley Community Church in Virginia.

The August post on this church can be view here.

(Darla, it is 'your' church.)

Don't know the name of this church,

it was in the area of Marion, Viriginia.

St Augustine at sunset, seen from a boat, April 2008.

Hope you have enjoyed a small collection of my

photographs of crosses on this Good Friday.

Leaving the port at Cartagena Columbia

This is the Catholic Statue of the Virgin of Carmen.

The statue is to protect sailors traveling the ocean.

While in Cartagena we kept hearing reference to New Cartagena and Old Caragena. The skyline is obviously New Cartagena. You can still see the statue in the right side of the water.Columbia has a lot of walls.
They all look fort like, this is a different angle as the ship was leaving port. In the background you can still see the highrise buildings.

The tours have kind of run together, but if I remember correctly Columbia has their own oil. We saw these cargo ships as we left.

There is a beach!!

Another one person boat, no motor. There were a lot of these, and it surprised me how far out in the ocean they actually were.

There are 2 in this one, and they have a motor.

Getting closer to leaving the port area.

Streets of Cartagena Columbia - part 2

The Cathedral of Cartagena, taken from our tour bus.We made a stop and they took us in this courtyard and gave us a free bottled water.

The purpose of the stop was not known at this time,

other than just to pay these dancers for their photographs.
But it ends out the real reason for the stop was we were at the San Pedro Claver Church. We were waiting our turn to go into the chapel.

It was quiet at this chapel, like I expected at the monastery.

Back out on the cobble streets outside of the San Pedro Claver Church there was a lot of metal art.

I thought all the metal art was interesting, and took several photos,

but then I had to hurry to catch up with the rest of my group.

This woman was on the streets at one of the other locations we stopped to shop.

At one of the places a man started following me around trying to sell me a straw hat. His price started at $25, he got all the way down to $1. No I did not buy it. As we were getting on our tour bus the last time there were people following us with their goods, and saying "almost free" as they walked along beside us.

Streets of Cartagena Columbia - part 1

We set up our excursions for each port before we left Knoxville. In Cartagena, Columbia part of the excursion was to the La Popa Monastery. The monastery was built over 400 years ago. The monastery still has active monks, so I was expecting a very quiet place. It was overrun with tourist. It ends out the monks are on the upper floor, not on the grounds, at least not during visiting hours. The courtyard is beautiful.
The inside of the sanctuary is gorgeous.

Apparently it is THE PLACE for tourist to go. It sits on a 500 ft hill that overlooks all of the city. That is the main reason the tour goes there.

But you know me, I was also photographing the birds.
Just something that caught my eye as the tour bus went through the streets of Cartagena.
We did stop at 2 different places for shopping. I am not a big shopper so I was snapping photos. We were in Columbia, so I had to get one of the local police. This shopping location was where all the emeralds were sold, guess that was the reason for the police.

There is a wall around the city. The rest of the photos on this post are of the wall.

View as we approached Cartagena Columbia

As we approached the port at Cartagena, Columbia

I stepped out on our balcony and took these photographs.