"Bucaramanga" Bucaramanga by lucitaquinonez

Bucaramanga is a small city ubicated on a platoe, nine hours car trip from Bogota the capital of Colombia, has an excelent weather and really nice people. If you are planning a trip to the andes, you are going to the right place.
You will arrive to Palonegro Airport which is located just half hour from Bucaramanga on another platoe, as you go down heading to the city you will see the metropolitan aerea, a very nice sight specially night time, that's why the best discos are located on this route between the airport and the city.
What to do while you stay at the city.
I hope you have choose a nice hotel to stay at, like Dann Carlton Hotel, or Hotel Club Campestre, there are some other nice hotels to stay at, you should check at this site: www.bucaramanga.com, from there you can get all kind of information.
You should be able to get your hotel to get you a taxi that will take you to look around the city. The first place you got to go is Giron, a colonial small town meant to look the way it looked more than 500 years ago.
After you are done, it will be worth to go the place in the city call the comercial part of Cabecera, i don't know where you come from but I'm sure you'll see the most excelent quality and prices in all sort of articles.
Feeling hungry? well there are many place around cabecera and all over the place, where you should be able to go an taste the typical food of the bumangues people, you can go to a fine restaurant or choose fast food such as empanadas, flautas, pinchos, papa chorriada, perros calientes, sandwiches de cordero, pollo asado, pollo a la broster and bumangues pizza (at the amazing price of 1200 pesos per slice = US$0.40). Fine restaurants are usually more expensive but you will be delighted.
If you are staying at a hotel with swimming pool you, try to get a caribean tan. Bucaramanga is most of the time in temperatures between the 70F and 80F and it is very sunny specially during the morning.
Now you are at Bucaramanga but you want to get more into the andes, one of the places the people from the city go the most is called MESA DE LOS SANTOS. You will need transportation to this place. Ubicated a little bit more farther away than an hour from Bucaramanga. Try going to Acuarela or Casa de Campo, you might need assistance if you don't speak spanish to get in, because at Acuarela they need to know if you are a social member or a visitor paying to stay and at Casa de Campo sometimes there are guardians that will ask for social member ID but will let you get in if you explain you are just a visitor. They are usually very friendly and will let you in. Mesa de Los Santos is an enchanting place, the wheather is cooler than in Bucaramanga because is ubicated on a higher platoe, it has a lot of vegetation and andes pure clean air. I will advice to try to go to both places, acuarela to stay at and casa de campo to go and visit. You will be able to take great pictures of the andes from the golf campus. Those two places have restaurants, the only two reliable restaurants at mesa de los santos. I have great memories from these two places, people usually go up there and spend the night over, to get away from the noisy city, and take friends along, at night they party and during the day they play under the sun and cook BarBQs. If you stay at Acuarela, you will be able to make friends and have fun along with everybody else, ask at your hotel to make reservations and get transportation for you.
Finally you can't leave without a taste of night life in Bucaramanga, people there are party people like most latinos. Last time I was there the best place to go and have fun were called Afrika and Candelaria, they take place on the route Bucaramanga-Airport.
There are also a lot of parks to visit and look around and many other places to go and have fun but if I try to mention them all, I won't be able to finish, as I said before, ask at your hotel, Bumagues people are very friendly and willing to help all the time. I really hope you'll have fun and get the best vacations ever.