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The Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas is the largest fort in Cartagena, Colombia and is located just a short cannon ball’s throw outside of the historic walled city.
This Cartagena fort, a massive structure that encases an entire hill in stone, is hard to miss.
In fact, it was the largest fortification built by the Spanish on mainland South America, and it protected the wealthy colonial trade of Cartagena.
Today, the Castillo de San Felipe Fort is one of Cartagena’s most popular attractions and well worth a visit. As a history buff, I’ve visited it many times myself.
It’s so neat to explore this massive Cartagena fortress while taking in its centuries old stonework, walking through its eerie tunnels, and enjoying the gorgeous views of the city from atop its walls and battlements.
Read on for a complete visitor’s guide to the Castillo de San Felipe Bajaras fort in Cartagena, Colombia, including the history of the fort, what you can see, entrance fees, and everything else you need to know to plan a visit to this famous fort of Cartagena yourself.
Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas Cartagena Fort Overview
The Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas Fort is the largest Cartagena, Colombia fort, and part of the city’s UNESCO World Heritage Site Designation.
It is one of Cartagena’s most iconic and popular attractions. As a former history major who worked a summer job giving tours at Fort Sumter and Fort Moultrie in Charleston, SC, and got to see the impressive earlier colonial era fortresses in Havana when I studied abroad there and the massive fort in San Juan on a visit to Puerto Rico, I remember being really excited to see this fort in Cartagena.
I’ve since visited many other times, as it was always a popular spot to take friends or family visiting, and Susana and I have taken our niece and nephew a few times too.
It’s often called simply the Castillo San Felipe by locals, and it is also sometimes also called the Cartagena Castle or San Felipe Castle in English since the Spanish word castillo can be translated as castle, fort, or fortress. Castles were medieval fortresses, after all.
Cartagena amassed massive wealth as a key part of Spain’s prosperous network of colonial trade. That made it a frequent target of foreign powers and pirates.
So, it was only natural the Spanish thought it was necessary to invest in its defense with a network of city walls, forts around the bay, and eventually, this fort on a hill controlling the approaches to the city.
This Cartagena fortress was, in fact, site of a decisive final stand by Cartagena’s outnumbered defenders in the 1741 defeat of a huge British invasion force.
It was later expanded into the massive stone structure that covers nearly practically the entire hill today, making the Castle of San Felipe de Barajas translation seemingly more appropriate.
Tours That Include the Fort in Cartagena
Here are some tours that include a visit to the San Felipe Castle in Cartagena:
- Private City Tour (use code ExploreColombia20 for 20% off)
- Shared Group City Tour
- Shared Chiva Bus Daytime City Tour
General Visitor Information
- Hours: 7 am to 6 pm everyday
- Entrance Fees:
- Foreign Visitors: $33,000 Colombian Pesos (COP)
- Colombian Citizens & Residents with Cedula de Ciudadanía or Extranjería: $29,000 COP
- Children ages 6-13; Colombian students and teachers with ID: $14,000 COP
- Children under 6 and Colombian citizens over 62: free
*Prices last confirmed November 2024, consult official website here to double check.
There are free entry days on the last Sunday of most months, usually excluding December and January. The free entry only applies for Colombian nationals and residents though.
Sometimes, the fort operates on a different schedule for those days and around holidays. You can check the Fortificaciones de Cartagena Facebook page or Instagram to see if there are any special events or hours.
Practical Tips for Your Visit
- Go early to beat the heat and the crowds, especially if you’re going on a weekend or the free admission day.
- Take sunscreen and perhaps a hat.
- Take water. If you forget, there are tons of vendors selling bottles just outside. This is one time where their cheesy sales pitch that it is necessary is just about spot on.
- Wear comfortable shoes! You will be hiking up a hill and walking around on old, uneven stone and brick work.
Should I Do a Guided Cartagena Fortress Tour?
Doing a guided tour of the Cartagena fort or not really comes down to personal preference.
There are not a lot of historical signs and markers pointing out the features of the fort or telling its history.
So, unless you read up on these things before hand and know what you’re looking for, doing a guided Cartagena fort tour can be a really good way to help put everything into context.
By the way, if you do like to read up on history before you visit, I highly recommend Rodolfo Segovia’s The Fortifications of Cartagena de Indias, which I used to help me write the history section of this post below.
I also highly recommend a visit to the Museo Naval to complement a visit, whether you do a guided Castillo de San Felipe tour or not.
There are really neat and well done visual depictions of the fortifications, the surrounding geography, and the invasions by Drake and Vernon at the museum that help put what you see here into further context. In fact, visiting the museum first might help you appreciate what you see at the fort.
If you do want to do a guided tour of the Castillo San Felipe, there are usually guides inside the fort that can be hired for a fee, and many city tours include a stop here where your guide should accompany you and explain the history.
Get 20% off this private Cartagena city tour that includes the fort, the convent of La Popa, and a walking tour of the Walled City, when you use the code ExploreColombia20.
You could also consider joining this shared group tour that includes all the same stops.
If you decide not to do an organized Castillo San Felipe tour and go on your own, I’d recommend taking a taxi and trying to get there early to beat the crowds and the heat. You can consult the legal taxi prices in Cartagena here.
It is a doable, approximately 20-30 minute walk from the Walled City or Getsemaní. Cross the bridge by the India Catalina monument and head for the big stone structure with the massive flag flying overhead.
If you do walk, use extra caution in the areas between the Walled City and the fort.
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History of the Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas Cartagena Fort
Cartagena was enormously important to Spanish colonial power.
It was a wealthy and prosperous center of trade, one of the principal trading ports of the Spanish empire in the Americas, including a designated port for the slave trade.
That made it a target of foreign powers and pirates throughout its history.
Sir Francis Drake sacked Cartagena in 1586, burning and looting much of the city during a month long occupation and only leaving after receiving a massive ransom payment.
Drake’s attack prompted the building of Cartagena’s walls around the colonial city. Both the Centro and neighboring Getsemaní were eventually entirely encased in walls meant to protect them from future foreign invaders.
However, there was still a potential problem.
Not far outside the walls stood the hill of San Lazaro.
This hill overlooked the main entrance to the colonial city at the Media Luna Gate (long gone to history) located at the end of the Calle de la Media Luna in Getsemaní.
This hill could, in theory, be used by an invading force to lay siege to the city.
Cannons emplaced on the hill could fire upon the walls from higher ground and effectively negate their defensive advantage. It was considered the weakest spot and potential fatal flaw in Cartagena’s defense.
For this reason, royal authorities approved building a fort here in 1647, after years of petitioning by Cartagena’s military officials.
If any invader succeeded in taking the outer defenses at the entrance to the bay and land infantry, a fort here would control the land approaches to the city, turning a position of weakness into one of strength.
However, construction of this new fort in Cartagena was delayed.
Renewed conflict between Britain and Spain in the Caribbean, including the 1655 British capture of Jamaica and the sacking of Riohacha just up the coast from Cartagena in 1656, raised concerns that it was only a matter of time before the British again targeted Cartagena.
According to one account, nerves in Cartagena were so rattled in this period that watchful citizens raised the alarm one night after mistaking a herd of goats that climbed the hill for British troops preparing to lay siege to the city.
So, finally a fort was built at the summit of the San Lazaro Hill in 1657.
This new Cartagena fort was named the San Felipe de Barajas Fort after King Philip IV and Cartagena’s governor Pedro Zapata de Mendoza’s bloodline as a second son to the Count of Barajas.
However, the original Fort San Felipe in Cartagena was much less imposing than the one that stands there today.
A triangular structure, it was shaped similar to and was about the same size as the very top section of the fort today. It housed only 8 guns and had a garrison of only 5 gunners and 25 infantrymen.
This fort proved not large enough, and it fell to the combined forces of French Benard Desjean, the Baron de Pointis, and a group of allied buccaneers in a 1697 raid.
Just as feared, De Pointis set up artillery on the hill after taking the fort from which he battered the Media Luna Gate into submission and entered the city, once again plundering it much as Drake had a century before. However, De Pointis cheated his buccaneer allies of their share of the loot, so they returned and futher looted the city.
Afterwards, the San Felipe de Barajas Fort was rebuilt with some modest improvements.
In the 1730s, it was expanded with a redoubt, or exterior wall, on the northeastern slope of the hill.
That expansion came in the nick of time as the Castle of San Felipe de Barajas would play the decisive role in the city’s final stand during the 1741 Battle of Cartagena de Indias when Edward Vernon led a massive invasion force against the city.
By this time, the outer defenses in Cartagena’s bay had also been improved, and the forts at Bocachica delayed Vernon’s forces while disease and sickness spread rampant among the British.
Still, they managed to break through and land an infantry force on the mainland.
However, the San Felipe Fortress still stood in their way.
A force of around 3,500 British infantry, including a detachment from the 13 colonies of North America, attempted to storm the fort in the early morning hours of April 20, 1741.
The attack, rushed by an overeager Vernon who knew his men couldn’t last much longer in the tropical climate and fearing the rainy season would arrive, was a disaster for the British.
Cartagena’s defenders miraculously held fast. A few days later, Vernon was forced to depart Cartagena when the rains began.
A defense force estimated between 2,700 and 6,000 for the entire city had defeated British forces that numbered over 20,000, a massive victory, and the most famous engagement of the Castillo San Felipe’s history.
Still, worries of future British incursions persisted.
The outbreak of the Seven Years War (also known as the French and Indian War) and the capture of Havana by British forces in 1762 only heightened those fears.
Engineer Antonio de Arébalo, in charge of Cartagena’s defenses in this period and responsible for many upgrades to its defenses, planned a drastic expansion of the fort.
Arebélo’s planned expansion was completed in less than a year.
They included several new batteries along the slopes of the hill connected by bombproof passageways, effectively encasing the hill in stone.
These new batteries included over 50 cannons.
They not only covered all approaches to the fort, but also effectively flanked each other, meaning storming any one wall would be nearly impossible without taking the entire fort at the same time.
The new San Felipe de Barajas Castle was given the nickname of “El Inexpugnable” or “The Impregnable.”
Together with the rebuilt forts at the entrance to the bay at Bocachica, also planned and completed by Arébalo, the Castle of San Felipe de Barajas made Cartagena one of the most heavily fortified cities in the world.
Fortunately for Cartagena and the many tourists who visit today, this nickname was never tested, leaving the expanded fort well preserved.
By the way, the more adventurous history buffs should consider including a visit to the Bocachica forts. They are some of Cartagena’s best hidden gems and wonderfully preserved after being rebuilt following Vernon’s attack and never tested again either.
Features and Highlights at the San Felipe Fort in Cartagena
Whether you do a tour of the San Felipe Castle or not, there’s quite a bit to see, the highlights of which I’ll cover here.
One of the things that makes the Castillo San Felipe de Barajas unique is that it does not have the symmetrical square or rectangular shape most forts built in the colonial area have since its shape follows the geography of the hill.
If you look closely at the walls around the central highest section, you can see original stonework dating to the 1657 fort as well Arébalo’s expansions nearly a century later (and some more modern repairs and renovations).
The tunneled passageways that connect different sections of the fort are also fun to explore!
It’s a common myth that there were tunnels that connected the fort to the Walled City. That is false, although there was a network of tunnels surrounding the fort. These were not for safe passage though. Instead, they were were designed to be filled with explosives and detonated to destroy the ground from under forcing marching on the fort.
On the upper left hand side of the fort, you’ll find the hospital that today houses an animated video recounting the history of the fort, focused primarily on Vernon’s attack. The video is about 15-20 minutes long and has English subtitles.
You can also get wonderful photos of the city, bay, and the huge flag flying above the fort.
Depending on the day, you may find the Colombian flag flying here or the Cartagena flag.
Finally, you can enjoy even more great views from the very top and oldest section of the fort. Particularly neat is the contrast of the Walled City and the modern skyscrapers of Bocagrande across the bay. You can get nice views of the giant mural depicting a woman cleaning a fish from here too.
There is also a small gift shop up here. Look out for the replicas of the commemorative coins prematurely struck in honor of Vernon’s capture of Cartagena.
Also, after you head back down, you should take the few minutes it takes to walk around the outside the fort and check out the statue of Blas de Lezo, the admiral responsible for defeating Vernon.
Known as the half-man, this highly decorated Spanish naval officer who lost a leg, a hand, and an eye in battle, is thought to be the contradictory inspiration for the pop culture image of pirates today.
In a cruel twist of fate, he died of typhus only 4 months after such tropical diseases had played such a large role in his heroic defeat of Vernon.
In a perhaps even crueler twist, a feud over his tactics during the defense with Cartagena’s governor meant it was years before he even received proper recognition and honor for the genius strategy of a fighting retreat from the outer defenses with a final stand at the Castillo San Felipe he deployed during the defense.
Head further around the corner of the fort to find the Zapatos Viejos or Old Shoes Monument, inspired by a poem celebrating Cartagena.
Ready to Visit the Castillo San Felipe yourself?
The fort really is a near must see for anyone interested in military history during a visit to Cartagena. If you do go, I hope you found this guide helpful for planning your visit and that you learned a thing or two about its history.
Most importantly, I hope you enjoy your visit! I’d love to hear what you found most interesting in the comments below.
Cheers and Happy Exploring!
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Planning a trip to Cartagena?
Be sure to check out the rest of the site to help you plan!
In particular, you might want to check out my complete guide to planning a trip to Cartagena, my guide to the best areas to stay, my list of over 75 things to do, my picks for the best Cartagena tours, the best day trips from Cartagena, my suggested packing list, my guide to the Rosario Islands, and my guide to all the beaches of Cartagena.
