New case of tourist abuse: $250,000 charged for sitting on a beach in Cartagena

On Monday, July 5, a new case of tourist abuse on the beaches of the Colombian Caribbean was revealed, after a Twitter user, identified as Phoebe Lopez, denounced that she had to do so. Pay $250,000 in “services” to sit down and enjoy a few drinks on one of the most famous beaches in Cartagena.

Lopez shared through the social network the story of this new case of abuse against travelers that has become frequent in some of the favorite destinations of national and foreign tourists off the coast of the Caribbean, in northern Colombia.

The Twitter user said that during her visit to Playa Blanca, one of the most famous in the walled city, she and a group of her buddies negotiated some chairs and drinks to enjoy on the beach,

However, he was surprised when they gave him the receipt representing one Piña Colada, Coconut Water, Bottled Water, and Chairs For: $336,000, because the people serving were charging $250,000 for the “services” provided.

TheUbiz emphasized that the extra fee they are supposed to charge corresponds to the security service, a kind of “monitoring so no one robs them”; An amount to be paid to the person responsible for collecting garbage on the beach; And a job unknown to them.

“Guess what? If I don’t pay 250, they will hurt us.” Phoebe Lopez confirmed in her posts that they reached more than 6,740 likes and 3,083 retweets, which were mostly supported by users of this social network who expressed their disapproval of the abuse case and requested the authorities to accompany these spaces in those who did. Types of recurring scenes.

On June 21, the complaint of tourist Sophia Canyon, who claims that she was attacked last Tuesday, June 8 during her visit. Blowing hole in San Andres.

According to the young woman on her Instagram account, when she and a group of 16 other travelers arrived at the respective place He noticed that some men stood at the entrance, and said, “They are islanders who live on tourism and that we can help them by buying crazy coconuts that they made and sold for 20 thousand pesos.”

So, according to your story, “Some people decided to contribute to the purchase of the product (…) some of us did not have the money to make the purchase, but they told us we had to consume, which we ignored and we are still entering.”

Similarly, Sophia said that when they were already inside the site, they waited a few minutes and noticed that they had a queue of about 20 people ahead and that the time the hole was blowing had already passed, they decided to cancel the madness. Coconut, but at that moment the problems began:

“He got upset and started saying we couldn’t leave and that we had to pay (drinks weren’t ready yet). When we were all in the cars, the guy who was driving the last car started saying he took his keys. Those who attended Hoyo Soplador were stopping us.”

So the tourist confirmed that when her boyfriend realized the situation, he grabbed the man by the neck, and at that moment “Many islanders started arriving to beat up four of the group’s buddies, including me and some other women who were trying to stop the fight.”

Leave the fight with many people Serious bodily injuries, cracks and fractures in the faceBC, but also, according to Sophia, one of the men managed to pull out a knife while wounding a tourist.

When the fighting stopped, they began to extort money from us, asking us for 200,000 pesos to let us go and return our keys, even though the men who came with us were bloodied and wounded. A colleague paid a sum of money and the keys were returned to us. She was also beaten for throwing a crazy coconut on the ground.”

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