South American Explorer

Writer Luke Armstrong heads off into one of Colombia’s most notorious regions to find the region’s forgotten ruins.

 

Our group grabs the packs from the top of our Jeep’s rusty roof and we set off for Colombia’s ‘Lost City’. Our guide, Tunyi, commences the six-day trek by telling us about eight tourists who were kidnapped in September^, 2003 by the National Liberation Army (ELN) on the very trail we are now on.

 

‘Three months they held them captive,’ he tells us. ‘They were lucky to be released alive.’

 

The three Australians in our group find this funny, while the two boisterous Russians become quiet and pensive, especially after I translate this bit of information for them. Perhaps Tunyi should have started by pointing out the names of some native fauna.

 

After this incident, tourist treks to the city closed until 2005.

 

Though an air of danger still lurks on the forbidding trail, Colombia’s army now have patrols that routinely pass along the path and the amount of robberies has taken a dive. Within the first hour, we pass a small group of soldiers wielding semi-automatic weapons. The Russians seem especially agitated by the troops.  

 

We venture into Colombia’s Sierra Nevada mountain range along narrow and seemingly impossible trails in saturated air. After a few hours, we have crossed the same river a dozen times, as it snakes along our difficult path.

 

The jungle canopy offers no relief from the heat and I am shocked at the volume of sweat pouring from my skin. I realize way too late that I’ve over packed by about thirty pounds. Dave Forester Wallace’s eleven-hundred-page novel, Infinite Jest, ranks at the top of my poor packing decisions.  

 

The trail is exhausting, but it is the exhaustion we have paid for.

 

We came to feel our shoulders ache, our feet blister and our sweat to pour. We came for that little voice in our head that says ‘you can do it’ to a skeptical body. Unlike other trails, there is no train or bus option here. Barring helicopters, the only way to get to the ‘Lost City’ is along an ancient trail once used by Tayrona Indians.

 

Teyuna, as the Tayrona originally called the city, was ‘discovered’ in 1972 by treasure hunters, but at the time, its location was already widely known to tribes living in the area. Founded possibly as far back as 800AD, it is believed to have been home to about 10,000 Tayrona at its peak.

 

The ‘Lost City’ is not just a story of what was once there, but in many ways the story of what still is.

 

Along the way, our trail leads us through small villages inhabited by the Kogis, the blood descendants of the city’s founders. They are still living in the same widely romantic way of their ancestors.

 

As cautious outsiders, we watch the inhabitants of these villages as they herd their children inside the huts while we pass, commanding them in one of the 100 dialects of their still-intact ancient language. It is a language they are reluctant to share with the eager anthropologists who come to study their way of life.

 

After eight hours, we reach the place where we will be spending our first night, under a thatch roof, hanging in hammocks. The Russians, who were initially worried that they might not be able to fall asleep in a hammock, quickly found out that after a day of trekking, sleep is inevitable and intensely restful.

 

Either the second day is easier than the first, or my body simply has given up on feeling its pain.

 

I learn from our guide that all the villages along the way are part of one tribe and once a year in February they have a month of celebration in which they all meet to drink fermented fruit juices and perform various rituals.

 

At one point our guide stops and shows me a coca plant. He points off into the jungle to where he says he knows of a cocaine factory several kilometers off the trail. United States drug aerial fumigation is banned in this area, making it an ideal place for such illegal activities.  

 

As we pass through another village he tells me that a Tayrona bride will spend her wedding night with the chief before having relations with her husband so that she can be taught how to love. It sounds like a good gig

 

In the afternoon on the third day, we cross the river for the last time and see moss covered stone steps tucked away under the foliage.

 

This is the beginning of a stairway of over 1,200 steep steps leading straight up the mountain to the ‘Lost City’. Before my foot falls on the first step a Kogi dressed in his traditional white garb emerges from the steps and disappears into the jungle. I look at the prints his bare feet have left in the mud and I see meaning spanning a thousands years.

 

With my pack weighing me down on the slippery stairs, I almost fall several times, a mistake that could have disastrous consequences in this remote area.

 

Heaving reached top, I feel exhausted. Surrounded by ancient stonewalls, I have attained the sky – the ancient stomping grounds of the Tayrona

 

Where did the inhabitants of the city go?

 

Unlike many other ancient cities, the Spanish never came here. As the conquistadors settled around the Caribbean coast, the people here simply left and were never heard from again. Some speculate that the direct descendants of the city’s inhabitants are still thriving somewhere in a distant, undiscovered jungle haven.

 

How the city was built is another mystery. From samples of the rocks, archeologists have concluded that some sort of acid was used to cut perfectly shaped blocks. Because of a potential commercial value, jungle plants have been collected in throngs to find the acid, but it, like the city’s inhabitants, seems to have disappeared into the jungle forever.

 

Our group spends the night in hammocks atop the city in quiet contemplation. We are alone to pass the night here, something unheard of in similar sites across Latin America. The ancient city seems to have given everyone a lot to think about. For all of us, it is much more than stacked stones on a mountainside. It has made us all nostalgic for a world we have never known. 

 

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

 

What to bring: A good pair of shoes, several pairs of socks, long pants, shorts, a t-shirt, a jacket or sweater, and a water bottle! The guides will carry the food for you and the river water is safe to drink. Even if it does not rain, expect your perspiration to soak your clothes within minutes. Hammocks are provided for you, but if you are sensitive to the cold, you will want to bring a blanket or sleeping bag.

 

How to get there: Going without a guide to the city is strictly prohibited and you must book a tour with one of the two companies authorized to bring groups: Turcol Travel Agency (turcol_24@hotmail.com) or Sierra Tours (www.sierratours-trekking.com). Both have offices in Santa Marta and Sierra Tours has a second office in the dive town of Taganga, but Sierra Tours is more sensitive to making the Trek eco-friendly and respecting the local tribes along the way. For the six day guided trek, both companies charge about US$240.00. Tours are conducted in Spanish.

 

 

In 2007 after finishing degrees in philosophy and English at La Pontificia Universidad de Valparaíso, Chile, Luke Armstrong did what any financially oblivious recent grad would do: took out a large student loan with the intention of hitchhiking from Southern Chile to Alaska. He was halted halfway and in April 2008 started working as director of Nuestros Ahijados, an education and development organization located in Antigua Guatemala. His writings have appeared in The Expeditioner, Perceptive Travel, Foliate Oak, and Ganeden Biotech. You can follow him on twitter at www.twitter.com/lukespartacus