The Most Romantic Honeymoon Destinations to Book in Colombia

Right next to the sea on tiny San Andrés island, Casa Harb feels like a millionaire’s Caribbean escape turned boutique hotel. There are only six rooms – in light creams and beiges – decked out with Indonesian hardwood and rattan-weave furniture. The whole ensemble is gathered around a pool patio pink with bougainvillea. It’s all tailor-made for romantic intimacy, with huge step-down baths, or tubs for two inside the bedrooms. There’s a decent beach adjacent – or get the hotel to provide golf carts and explore the white-sand strands further north.

Set on a tiny Caribbean cay in the Rosario archipelago off Cartagena, the San Pedro de Majagua is reassuringly remote. Casitas are simple – with plain thatch-roofed bedrooms in whitewash and floor tiles with a few furnishings – and they open onto a hammock-festooned terrace as well as a pristine beach. Gentle turquoise waves lap the shore, and there’s a coral reef in swimming distance. Eating revolves around the hotel’s al fresco, toes-in-the-sand restaurant – and you’ll also find a few beach-shack options. Your honeymoon couldn’t be more serene, looking up at after-dark skies filled with stars.

What a checklist when you stay here: long, clean Caribbean beaches, the rainforest-swathed Sierra Nevada mountain range rising behind… Santa Marta, a hard-working city on Colombia’s Atlantic coast, is in a spectacular setting. With gurgling fountains, the mock-colonial Don Pepe is the most romantic boutique stay in town. It’s decked out with four-poster beds, lush marble bathrooms and jacuzzis for two on the balconies; it’s well situated, too, next to the main city beach, and the helpful staff can organize excursions to the wilds nearby.

The setting: a striking, balcony-fronted colonial mansion right in the heart of old Cartagena – with bell towers and cobbles all around. Yep, the Ananda feels Romancing the Stone Colombian. Rooms have heavy beams and polished floors, opening onto Juliet balconies. Beds are draped in quality cotton linens. There’s a spa, atrium pool surrounded by abundant foliage and a beautiful rooftop terrace with jacuzzis, a cocktail bar and views of the sun sinking over terracotta roof tiles. The location couldn’t be better – the city sights and scores of restaurants and bars are an easy stroll away.

Surrounded by tropical forest, on the banks of a limpid river with the snow-capped Sierra Nevada mountains hovering overhead… the Santuario is in a beautiful, isolated location. Luxurious, round, thatch-roof casitas are inspired by traditional circular designs used by the local Kogi indigenous people – one of Colombia’s last remaining extant pre-Colombian civilizations. Stays (with optional spa pampering and meditation) are your cue to relax, in peaceful surrounds where the loudest sounds are the trills of the jungle creatures and the murmur of the flowing river.

The Four Seasons in Bogotá is a relaxing sanctuary beyond the Colombian capital’s rattle and thrum. In the heart of the city, it occupies a stately 1940s former aristocrat’s mansion, exuding a rustic charm – expect leafy patios, living plant walls in the swish Sevilla-tile and brick restaurant-bar, and generous balconies and big windows. All this and the restaurants and bars of the city’s gourmet zone are on your doorstep. There’s a whole spectrum of rooms and suites – in warm whites, illuminated by sun through tall windows and attractive with heavy antique furnishings and expanses of luxurious leather.

In the old Candelaria district, the Ópera is redolent of Bogotá’s Bolivarian past. Rooms fill a tastefully restored 19th-century mansion. You can imagine El Libertador himself strolling through the colonnades of the central atrium or staring over Bogotá’s terracotta tiles and bell towers from the al fresco rooftop dining area. Rooms have a surgically clean chain-hotel sparkle, in contemporary light yellows, wood-laminates and poster art, especially those in the 1940s annex. Parliament, the Gold Museum and the cathedral are walkable without a sweat.

This double room inside a shared house on Providencia Island has the individual simplicity of an indie rental. The views from the balcony are five-star – look out over the little sandy beach and there it is, a turquoise sea speckled with reefs. The sitting room, kitchen and small pool (set right on the shore) are shared with other guests, together with a hammock-slung sundeck. The Maracaibo restaurant (which serves simple grilled fish) and Crab Cay islet (with some of Providencia’s best snorkeling) are close by, so romantic dinners are a cert.