The Coffee Triangle

Salento is a small colonial town, surrounded by the green valleys of the Coffee Triangle, and home to some of the best Colombian coffee farms. For a change, we didn't have to take a freezing cold overnight bus to get there. Instead we took a morning bus and arrived early afternoon. 

We stayed in Salento for three days and left on the Friday, but I kind of wished we had arrived on the weekend because the town was getting ready to party. It's one of Colombia's favourite destination spots, especially since it's so close to the cities of Pereira, Armenia and Bogota. With lots of restaurants and artisan craft shops near the central plaza, it's a good place to shop, relax and spend the weekend.

The Cocora Valley is the place to see near Salento. Jeeps leave from the central plaza in the morning, and take you to the beginning of the trail about 40 minutes outside of town. The hike isn't difficult at all until the very end and even that, you don't really have to do the final 800m of steep uphill to a lookout point. The trail begins by leading you through tropical cloudforest, then into lush green valleys with cows and horses sprinkled here and there. Throughout the valley, are these waxed palm trees, the largest in the world, that tower over the landscape and make for a really beautiful hike.

Friday morning, as we were walking towards the central plaza, we noticed a shop being renovated. We must have been staring because the owner noticed and invited us in for a tour. He had an animated personality and was excited to share with us his vision for the place-a bar and restaurant combined with a museum of vintage motorcycles. He had a small but diverse collection of bikes with several vintage Harleys and was even getting a Royal Enfield, a famous Indian motorcycle as I learned later. I know nothing about bikes but the set-up of his restaurant and the bikes on display really was a great idea. We even got to sit on a few of the bikes while he enthusiastically took photos of us. After saying our good-byes, we got ready for our next destination, Medellin, land of the world's most beautiful women.