The 12 Best Places to Drink and Do in Colombia

Dense jungle presses to the edge of the sand at Cabo San Juan del Guía, inside Tayrona National Natural Park, so you arrive either by boat or on foot through the trees. A rocky outcrop divides two adjoining coves: one calmer and swimmable, one open to the sea. A small hut perches on the split between them. Named one of the World's 50 Best Beaches, the limited access keeps the crowds thin and the atmosphere unhurried.

The drinks list at this Bogotá cocktail bar is built around Territorio, a range of house-distilled spirits inspired by Colombia's ecosystems, each one mapped to a different landscape. Laura Espinosa, former sommelier at the celebrated Leo next door, runs the room and the project. The cocktails read deceptively simple on the menu, which is exactly the point. It holds a spot on the World's 50 Best Bars list.

A narrow, greenery-lined courtyard pulls you off a Chapinero street and into what feels less like a bar than a sun-warmed garden patio where no one is in a hurry. The cocktails lean approachable and cooling, built from familiar ingredients at a subway-tiled bar, which pairs well with the unhurried crowd lingering over desserts and conversation. A spot for a long, easy afternoon drink that somehow extends into evening.

The illustrated cocktail menu alone earns its place on the table, each drink built around Colombian regional ingredients the way the kitchen next door builds its plates. This is the bar inside Carmen, and the bar director treats it as seriously as anyone treats the food, leaning on native fruits, panela, and plantain vinegar to make cocktails that feel specific to one country and nowhere else.

Polished vintage wood, red and gold light, and low-key beats set the mood at this intimate cocktail bar tucked into Zona G, Chapinero's upscale dining corridor. The drinks lean creative in ways that reward curiosity, pairing rum with chocolate and bitter aperitif, or gin with kefir and shiitake, without making a big fuss about it. A neighborhood place that happens to have a neighborhood worth traveling across the city for.