Visiting Tayrona National Park with kids was one of the experiences we were most excited about during our 3 week trip to Colombia with kids. With jungle trails, Caribbean beaches and the Sierra Nevada mountains all in one place, Tayrona offers the kind of outdoor adventure our family loves. Of all the places we could visit in the park, the hike to Cabo San Juan appealed to us most.
We love hiking with our kids, who were 4 and 6 at the time, and the idea of hiking through the jungle to a tropical beach sounded like a perfect family day. But as we learned, visiting Cabo San Juan with kids is more involved than a simple family beach day. The hike is beautiful and well worth considering, but it is also a long day for younger kids, especially when you factor in the heat, trail time and limited time at the beach.
We visited Tayrona National Park as a day trip from Rodadero with kids, where we were staying near Santa Marta. Since we had already hired Magic Tour Colombia for our 6-day hike to the Lost City with kids, we felt comfortable booking with them again for their Cabo San Juan, Parque Tayrona day trip.
In this post, I’ll share our honest experience hiking to Cabo San Juan with kids, including what worked well, what didn’t, and what I’d want other families to know before deciding if this Tayrona day trip is right for them.
We received some of the products mentioned below on a promotional basis. This post contains compensated links.
Getting to Tayrona National Park with Kids
Magic Tour picked us up at our oceanfront vacation home rental in Rodadero, a fun beach resort suburb southwest of Santa Marta. We’re used to tour buses showing up really late, but Magic Tour showed up at 6:40 am, 5 minutes earlier than planned!
The journey to Parque Tayrona was scenic and comfortable. One guide gave an informative talk during the ride, while another collected our passports to help arrange admission to Tayrona National Park.
Arriving at the Zaino Entrance
We arrived at the main El Zaino Tayrona National Park entrance at 8:20 am. While our guides bought entrance tickets, we waited at a restaurant and shopping complex. During our short wait, we had a chance to use a toilet (for a small fee) and apply sunscreen. There’s also a store where you can buy supplies, such as water, snacks and sunscreen.
Tickets, Insurance and Park Entry
By 8:40 we were back on the bus driving deeper into the park. During this 10-minute drive, we got our passports back. We were given two wristbands, one for admission to the park and one for the mandatory insurance policy for the park.
Hiking to Cabo San Juan with Kids
Our bus dropped us off at the Cañaveral parking lot. At the trail entrance, our guides explained how to get to Playa del Cabo San Juan.
The instructions were simple: get on the trail and keep walking until you reach Cabo San Juan. In addition to these simple instructions, the hiking trail is well marked.
What the Cabo San Juan Trail Is Like
Tayrona National Park is one of Colombia’s special places, and the hike to Cabo San Juan is beautiful. The trail to Cabo San Juan winds its way through thick jungle while following the brilliant turquoise waters of the Caribbean coastline.
Most of the hike is through a dense, deep green jungle. You’ll be amazed at how thoroughly the vegetation can block the powerful equatorial sun. As always when dealing with nature, animal sightings will vary from day-to-day, but we encountered three groups of monkeys and many colonies of fascinating leaf-cutter ants.
Beaches and Viewpoints Along the Way
You’ll pass many beaches along the way, but the first two are off-limits for swimming due to dangerous water currents. There are scenic viewpoints for these off-limits beaches and their massive crashing waves. The sheer natural beauty of them will stoke your excitement to keep moving and get to Cabo San Juan.
How Long the Hike Took with Kids
The one-way distance of the hike from Cañaveral to Cabo San Juan is 3.2 miles (5.2 km). The trail follows the coast and is relatively flat with only five small hills to climb along the way. It should take a typical adult roughly 2 hours to make the one-way hike.
Facilities Along the Cabo San Juan Trail
Food, Drinks and Supplies
Given how many visitors enter Tayrona National Park, it’s no surprise there are plenty of places to buy food, drinks and basic supplies.
Respectful Photos and Local Vendors
Along the trail to Cabo San Juan, you’ll find a few Indigenous people selling coconut water and orange juice. The indigenous people will be dressed in their customary white clothing, but please be respectful when taking pictures.
On our Lost City trek, we learned that the respectful thing to do is ask before taking photos. Within Tayrona, some requested a small fee for photos, so ask first and respect the answer.
Also along the hiking route to Cabo San Juan you’ll find vendors selling cold drinks and ice cream treats. There are also restaurants, souvenir stands, hammocks for rent and a campground.
Once you arrive at Playa Cabo San Juan, you’ll find a large, very busy restaurant. There’s also a well-supplied convenience store with all kinds of drinks, snacks and basic tourist supplies.
What to Pack for Tayrona National Park with Kids
A long jungle hike to the beach makes packing a little tricky.
The Cabo San Juan trail surface varies quite a bit on the way to the beach. The most common trail surface is the natural dirt jungle floor with many tree roots jutting out.
When the jungle gets especially dense, the dirt trail is replaced with long sections of elevated wooden walkways. Closer to the beaches, you’ll also walk through deep sand and navigate the occasional small boulder.
Best Shoes for the Cabo San Juan Hike
Based on the distance of the hike and the variety of surfaces encountered, we recommend you wear a good pair of hiking sandals. Tree roots, boulders and plenty of horse poop make flip-flops a bad choice. Closed-toe shoes may also feel too hot in the Colombian sun. We have used Keen hiking sandals for years and we highly recommend them.
Beach Gear, Sun Protection and Bug Spray
We visited Tayrona National Park with our kids in mid-December at the beginning of the dry season and did not encounter many mosquitos. That said, anytime you are in a jungle setting you should carry mosquito spray as you never know when they will be active.
Aside from that, just bring your beach essentials: sunscreen, sun hats and a compact beach blanket. Water, snacks and prepared meals are available along the trail. If your budget is tight, bring enough supplies to last the day, otherwise pack lightly, bring enough food and drink to supplement your purchases.
You may be interested in our family packing list for beach holidays.
Is Cabo San Juan Good for Kids?
We love hiking as a family, so we were drawn to Magic Tour’s Cabo San Juan day trip. Our kids were 4 and 6 at the time of this trip and based on our experience, here’s what anyone thinking of hiking to Cabo San Juan with kids should know:
What Our Kids Loved
There are plenty of things on this hike to keep kids happy and entertained.
Our kids were so excited each time we encountered a group of monkeys. We’ve been to many jungle settings with the kids before, but this was the first time they had seen monkeys in the wild. One little monkey treated us to an up-close look as he simply hung out on a tree branch a mere 10 feet from us.
There are many colonies of leaf-cutter ants along the way. It’s a little hard to get kids to stop and look at ants, but once you draw their attention to what the leaf-cutter ants are actually doing, they quickly become captivated. Kids love watching and following the trail of these amazing creatures.
The kids also loved walking on the wooden walkways. There’s just something about wooden walkways that makes kids want to run ahead and be crazy.
And of course, there’s Cabo San Juan beach. Kids love beaches and will have a ton of fun with some well-deserved time playing on the sand.
What Made the Day Harder
That said, there were a few challenges we encountered on this day-trip:
The walk to San Juan is supposed to take approximately 2 hours each way, which gives which gives most adults around three hours to enjoy Cabo San Juan beach. Our kids are great hikers; in fact, a few days prior they had just completed the legendary Lost City hike.
Despite their hiking skills, they were slower than a typical adult. It took us 3 hours each way, leaving us with just an hour at the beach. This meant we spent 6 hours hiking with only 1 hour at the beach. We had promised the kids a fun day at the beach and we felt a bit guilty that we didn’t fully deliver on our promise.
There’s no questioning the beauty of the Cabo San Juan beach. It’s a stunning, intimate cove surrounded by jungle and large rocks, but it’s not the best beach for small kids. Our kids carried their buckets and shovels the whole way to the beach, but the sand is actually just small pebbles, making it impossible to build sandcastles.
The other challenge was the ocean. The water got deep very quickly and the waves were quite large on the day we visited. The waves were large enough to knock our kids down and it wasn’t much fun for them in the water.
Would We Recommend Tayrona National Park with Kids?
Tayrona National Park is a special place and is a must-visit for most travellers visiting the Caribbean coast of Colombia. Had we not had kids with us, the Cabo San Juan day trip with Magic Tour would have been a truly excellent outing as we love hiking, we love jungles and we love beautiful Caribbean beaches.
In the end, despite how beautiful and fun the hike was, we felt that the ratio of six hours of hiking for one hour of beach time was not ideal for our kids.
Easier Tayrona Beach Alternatives for Families
We used Magic Tour Colombia for this day-trip as well as our 6-day trek to Ciudad Perdida and we have nothing but good things to say about them. If your kids are a bit older and faster than ours, we’d recommend the Cabo San Juan day trip without hesitation.
In hindsight, the Playa Cristal day trip from Magic Tour Colombia would have been much better for us. Playa Cristal offers a day on a white-sand beach with crystal-clear water. Since there’s no hiking involved, families can spend much more of the day enjoying the beach.
Follow Along on our Family Trip to Colombia
If you’d like to follow along on our family vacation to Columbia, our next stop after Rodadero was 3 days in Minca with kids. Minca is a small backpacker town nestled in the lush Santa Marta mountains. During our stay in Minca we enjoyed a few days of hiking, waterfalls and chocolate farms.
Our Travel Journal for Kids
Based on our family travels, our kids helped us design this Travel Journal for Active Kids! This engaging travel journal encourages kids to document their adventures, spark creativity, and stay entertained on the go – grab yours now on Amazon!
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