Bogotá is one of the cheapest capitals in the Americas: the Banco de la República museums cost nothing, a full market lunch runs COP 15.000, and a TransMilenio ride is COP 3.200. These three days stay in La Candelaria, the markets and the eastern hills.
Fernando Botero's 123 donated works plus Picasso, Dalí and Monet fill a colonial mansion on Calle 11, and entry has been free since it opened in 2000. Open 09:00–19:00 Mon and Wed–Sat, 10:00–17:00 Sun, closed Tuesdays.
The tiny plaza where Bogotá was founded in 1538, with the funnel-shaped alley behind it: muralled walls, buskers, and clay cups of chicha or sabajón for COP 3.000–6.000. Wandering costs nothing at any hour.
Tip-based walking tour of La Candelaria's street art, leaving daily at 10:00 and 14:00 from the Simón Bolívar kiosk. Two and a half hours past Guache, Toxicómano, Stinkfish and Lik Mi murals with the political backstory.
The 50-storey observation deck on Carrera 7 sweeps 360° from the Cerros Orientales across the sabana, 196m up, for around COP 8.000. Opening is limited to Friday to Sunday afternoons and early evening.
Bogotá's working wholesale market: roughly 3.000 stalls of flowers, butchery and Amazonian fruit. Entry is free and vendors slice open lulo, granadilla, mangostino and curuba to taste. Open 04:30–16:30 daily.
A 1930s neighbourhood market where the upstairs cooks serve corrientazo — soup, meat, rice, beans, salad and fresh juice — for COP 14.000–18.000. Ajiaco and lechona stalls run lunch service 11:30 to 16:00, cash only.
Colombia's oldest eatery, trading since 1816 from a two-storey shoebox beside the Palacio de Justicia. Tamal santafereño with chocolate completo lands at COP 20.000–28.000; a single almojábana is about COP 4.000.
Carrera 7 closes to traffic between Plaza de Bolívar and Calle 26 every evening: arepas de choclo with cheese around COP 5.000, obleas COP 4.000, mazorca and salchipapas under COP 12.000, plus buskers and pavement chess.
A free forest trail into the Cerros Orientales above Chapinero Alto, climbing roughly 4km round trip to a 30m waterfall near 3.000m. Rangers open the gate around 08:00 and require everyone out by mid-afternoon.
Bogotá's oldest large park, laid out in 1934 across 283 hectares between Calle 36 and the hills. Free all day: stone staircases into the woods, the disused cable-car pylon, skate bowls and lawns where locals picnic.
Around 20.000 plants arranged by Colombian ecosystem — páramo frailejones, cloud forest, Amazon glasshouse — plus the Tropicario domes. Adults pay roughly COP 6.500, students less; open Tuesday to Sunday, 08:00–17:00.
A free hilltop park at about 2.800m in Suba looking west over the sabana and the Río Bogotá; on clear evenings the snow line of the Cordillera Central appears on the horizon, which is where the name comes from.