Cali

Cali is the Colombian destination where Fabián Martínez and Pilar Talavera arrive after a multi-stage journey under false identities. The city becomes a temporary refuge in their flight and is also placed within a broader Colombian landscape shaped by the movement of people and cocaine.

Route to Colombia

After leaving Culiacán, the party flies first to Guadalajara to refuel, then to Mexico City, where they change from a private plane to a tourist flight to Belize. From there they continue to San José, Costa Rica, and check in for a flight to Caracas, which they do not board. Instead, they take another commercial flight to Cali. The succession of transfers makes the destination part of a deliberately indirect route rather than a straightforward journey.

The travelers use different passports and false names along the way. That concealment continues when Fabián arranges accommodation in Cali under yet more assumed names, carrying the secrecy of the journey into the city itself.

The stay at the Hotel Internacional

On arrival, Fabián and the others take a taxi to the Hotel Internacional. He books two adjoining rooms under different names and tells Pilar that they will stay for a few days. The children remain with them in one room until they fall asleep; Fabián then leads Pilar into his room. The hotel stay gives the group a short pause after repeated travel, but its false names and adjoining rooms keep their movement covert.

Cali in the Colombian geography

The novel also places Cali in relation to the Río Magdalena, which passes near, but not through, the city on its course across much of central Colombia toward the Caribbean. The river’s course connects the city’s setting to the wider geography through which the story’s characters and drug networks move.

At the Santa Ysabel Bridge, Adán Barrera considers the Orejuela brothers’ choice of an isolated meeting place and the danger of entering their territory. His immediate concern is strategic: without a cocaine source from the brothers, he cannot hope to win the war against Güero Méndez and the rest of the Federación. Cali’s mention in the river’s geography therefore accompanies a larger Colombian context of cartel supply and conflict, even though the bridge scene itself is distinct from Fabián and Pilar’s stay in the city.