Our destination for the day, Campamento Paraíso, will be our last stop before our ascent to the Lost City the next morning. As we cross the Buritaca River, clambering over thick roots and fallen logs and past several indigenous houses-redolent woodsmoke seeping through their thatched roofs-we are fueled by a visceral sense of anticipation. Our third day on the trail brings five more hours of arduous hiking, with our shoes sinking deep into clay and mud, sweat pooling on our skin. Here in the heart of the Sierra Nevada, our journey is becoming as much a social voyage into the traditions of the Wiwa as it is a physical adventure. As we sip the sweet steaming liquid, the brothers demonstrate how the leaves are dried-as much for the tea as for the men’s coca-chewing ritual, an essential part of Wiwa culture. Later, she sits alone on their porch, weaving a mochilla from natural fique fibers.Īfter dinner, Juan and another of his six brothers, Vicente, prepare a traditional tea for us made from coca leaves, cinnamon, and panela, an unrefined sugarcane product common in Colombia and throughout Latin America. While Manuel’s three young sons play fútbol with members of our group, I hear his wife Maria washing clothes in a creek below the house, the thwap of wet fabric hitting rock resounding like thunder. He points out cacao trees, their maroon-colored pods gleaming in the sun, as well as a butterfly with striking sapphire wings, aptly named the Blue Morpho, that is native to the rain forests of Central and South America.īut the discoveries take a cultural turn at the home of Manuel, Juan’s older brother and a fellow guide, whose home will be our campsite for the night. When I’m not desperately trying to catch my breath on uphill sections or downing water to beat the intense heat, I ask Juan about the flora and fauna we’re sharing the trail with. Every step seems to bring a new discovery. It is hard to believe that just two hours earlier, we were in the bustling port of Santa Marta, one of the oldest cities in South America.Īs Juan leads us up steep muddy tracks and across swiftly flowing stream beds, I am cognizant that we are entering a world in which cars, electricity, and cell phones no longer exist-a world traversable only by foot or horse.īirdsong fills the humid morning air beside the path-and sometimes even directly on it-cows graze lazily, greeting us with unblinking gazes. Within minutes, the road narrows to a single path through the forest. Like all Wiwa men, Juan wears his jet-black hair long and well past his shoulders, yet has exchanged white pants for jeans tucked into rubber boots.
Our trek leader, 17-year-old Juan Daiza Gil, is to meet our group in the village of El Mamey. Though several operators take visitors to La Ciudad Perdida, Wiwa Tours, founded in 2008 by three brothers from the Wiwa community, is the only company that offers indigenous guides to the Lost City. Six years later, the site, which the Wiwa call Teyuna, was opened to the public.
Only in 1975 was the city discovered by the outside world-by looters, no less. Even as the jungle reclaimed its stone terraces and trails, the Lost City was never “lost” to the tribes themselves, who say they continued to make regular pilgrimages there. The archaeological site that remains is sacred to the four tribes, all of which descended from the Tairona, who for centuries inhabited the Lost City before the Spanish conquistadors forced them to flee. It is my first day in the tropical rain forests of northeast Colombia and, along with about a dozen other hikers, I am on the trail to La Ciudad Perdida, or the Lost City. The pre-Colombian city was built around 800 A.D., making it some 650 years older than its Inca Empire counterpart, Machu Picchu, in Peru.
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