Seven Wonders of the Coffee Triangle
Text: Iván Beltrán Castillo
Photos: Andrés Mayr y Margarita Navas
For one exciting and emotional week in late 2024, journalists from Colombia, México, Argentina, Chile, Nicaragua, the United States, Panama, and Costa Rica engaged with the folklore, inhabitants, and natural beauty of the Colombian Coffee Triangle.
As they toured the area on a Big Bus —common in major cities in the United States and Europe— the reporters realized that despite its popularity and renown, the region preserves that enduring air of mystery inherent to beautiful women. They discovered that the region is generously endowed with wonders.
Wondrous Location
To put it vividly, the Coffee Triangle sports an infinite palette of colors, shading from scarlet to emerald, meditative blue to nostalgic gray, and enigmatic white to reverential black. Everything there seems newly born, irreplaceable, and intensely lyrical.
The three capitals (Pereira, Armenia, and Manizales), the towns that already attract streams of tourists (like Filandia and Salento), and other quietly impressive towns not yet widely known (Calarcá, Salamina, Neira, La Tebaida, Circasia, Montenegro, and Quimbaya), are all radiantly wondrous.
Wondrous Snow
Nevado del Ruiz is a natural wonder wrapped in a protective mantle of names that allude to its magic: the nearly esoteric and entirely literary Valley of the Tombs, but also the pre-Colombian Kumanday, Tabuchía, and Tama.
Although it is not always cloaked with snow, the volcano —sentinel, accomplice, mute witness, and on occasion (as when it erased the town of Armero from the face of the earth in November of 1985) a deadly enemy— leaves its mark on every visitor.
Wondrous Water
Starting in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the folk wisdom surrounding what was then called “Viejo Caldas” has focused on the bowels of the earth and the natural waters with proven healing properties.
The procession of travelers, some seeking to improve their health, was not long in coming, and the hot springs became a symbol, a vacation destination, and a medical treatment. Santa Rosa de Cabal is the epicenter of this kind of healthy recreation, welcoming hundreds of bathers every year.
Wondrous Myths
Extravagantly rich in beautiful stories, legends, fables, popular verse, folklore, and ingenious wordsmithing, the coffee region assigns meaning to the objects and people who, owing to their value and steady presence through the years, have become icons, metaphors, and epic figures: mules, mule drivers, Willy jeeps, tango, and characters plucked from literature and TV, such as La Gaviota from the soap opera Café (Coffee), a histrionic icon of Latin American dramatic art.
Wondrous Skies
Churches resemble stone ships that ran aground on town plazas, and to attend mass is to become one with the rites of worship. As if this were not enough, the almost theatrical opulence of the churches is enhanced by the Coffee Triangle’s hauntingly beautiful skies that can evoke the mythological canon at noon, on a splendid afternoon, or at dusk. This highly symbolic feature did not go unnoticed by the journalists gathered here.
Wondrous Transportation
Getting around on day-to-day business used to leave the people of Pereira exhausted. Travel to certain neighborhoods and areas of the city took considerable time, earlier by mule, and later by bus, which made for extremely long days. But on August 30, 2021, the Megacable Pereira (aerial tramway) public transport system was launched, changing people’s lives by modifying their perception of the passage of time.
Wondrous Nature
Early on in the trip, travelers in the Coffee Triangle were stunned by the Cocora Valley, home to Colombia’s tallest stands of wax palms (the country’s national tree); the Coffee Park, in the heart of Quindío, which blends coffee plantations with an amusement park; Ukumari Park (Pereira), which is also a wildlife sanctuary; and Recuca (Calarcá), home to the “cultural coffee tour.” Soon to come was the extremely popular International Fruit Park.
Nature lives and thrives, providing another spectacular wonder of the Coffee Triangle.
The Leaders
The creator and promoter of this tour was Jose Fernando Ballesteros, director of the Enfoque del Cafe (Coffee, Perspectives) magazine, along with his wife, Lucia Rivera, and tourism promoters Luz Patricia Hurtado (Armenia), Juan Carlos Zuluaga Cardona (Manizales), and Andres Valencia (Pereira).
Panorama en el Eje Cafetero Colombiano
These are the tourist service providers that supported Panama’s visit to the coffee region.
Restaurants
Restaurante Bosque Lluvioso
Caldas, Colombia
Vía Manizales-Chinchiná, km 13
@restaurantebosquelluvioso
Restaurante Campo Alegre Bailador
Santa Rosa de Cabal, Quindío
@campoalegre.bailador
Restaurante El Roble
Vía Armenia-Pereira, km 12. Circasia
@r_de_roble
Restaurante Giovanni
Manizales, Caldas
giovannirestaurante.com
Restaurante Icónico Terraza
Armenia, Quindío
Carrera 14 n.° 30 N-1 a 30 Norte-121
@iconicoterraza
Restaurante José Fernando
Filandia
@josefernando.filandia
Restaurante O’Brasileiro Rodizio
Pereira, Risaralda
obrasileirorodizio.com
Restaurante San Isidro
Dosquebradas, Risaralda
@sanisidrorestobar
Hotels
Hotel Barranqueros Soledén
Quindío, Colombia
soleden.co/hotel
Hotel Casa Tuirak
Pereira, Colombia
@casatuirak
Sitios para Explorar
Parque del Café, Quindío
parquedelcafe.co
Parque Recuca, Calarcá
recuca.com
Termales San Vicente, Santa Rosa de Cabal
sanvicente.com.co
Termales El Otoño, Risaralda
termaleselotono.com
Touroperadores
Living Trips TOUR Operator
Colombia
BigBus Tours
Estados Unidos
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