It's Carnival season! And in the Western Hemisphere, the annual pre-Lenten Carnival of Barranquilla, an hour from Cartagena, is second only to Rio de Janeiro’s in terms of size and extravagance (more than a half mllion participants), but is still less glitzy, commercialized, and closer to its 19th-century folk roots, mixing European, African, and pre-Hispanic cultures (and for that reason has been declared a UNESCO World Heritage treasure). Parenthetically, it also tends to be less pricey... keep reading