What's happening in Bogota this week?

Plan your week around Sunday. From 7am to 2pm the Ciclovía closes more than 120 km of avenues to cars: Carrera Séptima fills with cyclists, rollerbladers and dogs in tiny raincoats, and you'll hear the volunteer marshals' whistles at every crossing. Vendors along the Séptima sell fresh orange juice and cups of green mango with lime and salt. The Gold Museum on Parque Santander is free on Sundays, and that free entry brings a queue by late morning, so arrive when the doors open at 10am. Up north, the Usaquén flea market fills the lanes off Carrera 6A by mid-morning, with stalls of wool ruanas, leather goods and arepas on charcoal grills. The exception is Monserrate: Sunday brings the longest cable car lines of the week there, so save it for a weekday.

Monday is the day first-timers get wrong. The Gold Museum and the Colombian National Museum both close, so a visitor who lands Sunday night and plans La Candelaria for Monday finds shut doors. The Botero Museum on Calle 11 is the exception: it closes on Tuesday, stays open Monday, and charges nothing. Spend Monday on the Botero and Monserrate, then have lunch at La Puerta Falsa, a few steps from the Primary Cathedral. Order the ajiaco, a chicken and three-potato soup with guascas herb, capers and cream, which currently costs roughly 30,000 COP, about US$9.50 at today's rate of 3,177 pesos to the dollar. From Tuesday to Thursday the Monserrate cable car runs at its quietest, and Plaza de Bolívar empties of school groups by noon.

Bogotanos start the weekend on Thursday, calling it juernes, and by 9pm the bars around Zona T and Parque de la 93 are full, with the spots on Chapinero Alto's Carrera 5 staying loud until 2am or 3am. Friday night at Andrés Carne de Res in Chía, 45 minutes north by taxi, is the night out most visitors book, and Andrés DC in Zona T is the smaller, closer version, with the same smoky steak and the same aguardiente shots. The downside is real: Bogotá rates 4.2/10 for solo safety (see the TTDI Solo-Safety Index), and you feel that gap after dark in La Candelaria, whose streets empty by 8pm. Sleep in Chapinero or Usaquén, and order taxis through an app instead of flagging one on the street.

The weather sets the daily clock in Bogotá: two rainy seasons a year, each following the same pattern day after day. At 6am today it was 9.5°C with 98% humidity, the kind of damp cold that gets into your sleeves before you've stepped outside. Clouds build against the Eastern Hills by noon, and a heavy, chilly shower tends to fall between 2pm and 5pm, so do Monserrate, the Bogotá Botanical Garden, and the walk through La Candelaria before 1pm, then move indoors to the museums. The city sits at 2,640 metres, and the thin air can bring a headache on day one, so drink coca tea or water at breakfast and pack a waterproof shell plus a fleece for the afternoon rain.