6 Days Horseback Riding And Local Culture

We pick you up in your hotel in the morning and we will travel by car for around 3 hours to a hotel outside of Villa de Leyva town where we will sleep all the nights. During this travel, we will tell you about how the local people live in this area and we will eat some typical goodies. We will take lunch and then we will have a hike during one or two hours.

After a good breakfast and a 30 minutes ride by car we get the place where the horse ride will begin.

We are going to explore the mountainous area of the Raquira Region, located between 2300-2800 meters above sea level, with temperatures between 14 and 24 centigrade during the day, normally dry weather, with rainy weather on some days.

There are many small and adventure trail going up to the top of those mountains. We will pass through oak forest and brooks. The length of the horse ride is around 4-5 hours.

We will visit a typical rural small town (San Miguel de Sema). We can visit the church (if it is open) and the typical construction and we can eat some goodies. After the arrival we will have a tardy and succulent lunch.

After a good breakfast and a 30 minutes ride by car we get the place where the ride will begin.

Today we are going to go up to the mountains range, taking different dirty roads or trails. We will pass through oak forest and brooks. Close to the top of the mountains we can see behind and watch beautiful landscapes. After we cross the mountain range, a new valley is open to our view to observe from the top of the mountain the Fúquene Lake.

Until the 1970’s Laguna de Fúquene was Colombia’s largest lake. Today only 3,000 hectares are left from the originally 10,000 hectares because the flat lagoon was dried or filled with land to gain acreage for agriculture and stock farming. We will stop here to enjoy the landscapes, eat snacks and to rest a little bid. After the arrival we will have a tardy and succulent lunch. The length of the horse ride is around 4-5 hours.

The rides are in the mountains going up and down and we can canter in the flat parts of the trail. So, after two days of riding the horses, they will be tired and they need to rest for one day. We need to do other plans on this day.

In the morning, we will visit a beautiful waterfall called "La Periquera". It is a 1-2 hours hike.

After have lunch, we will drive in to the Candelaria desert. In this desert, there is a monastery, which was built in 1604 by the Agustinos religious organization called “recoletos”. There is a museum for the tourist but it maintain its operation as a monastery. A guide will show us around through the chapel (note the 16th-century painting of the Virgen de la Candelaria), a stunning courtyard with a collection of 17th-century canvases, and the cave where the monks originally lived.

Due to a vast ceramics tradition dating back to pre-Hispanic times, Ráquira is the handicrafts capital of Colombia. In addition to pots, pitchers, coffee cups, and kitchen utensils, there are anthropomorphic and zoomorphic figurines, pieces for Nativity scenes, piggy banks, etc. Perhaps for this ability of Ráquira inhabitants, the name of the town in the “Chibcha” language is “City of Pots”. These indigenous peoples used them to store their food, and prepare their meals. Artisans work with black, white, yellow, and red clay.

After a good breakfast and a 30 minutes ride by car we get the place where the ride will begin.

We will take an unpaved small rural road and some trails, in order to arrive to a big and clean waterfall called “La Chorrera” where will be able to swim and eat a snack. On the way you will see nice views of the Candelaria Desert. The length of horse ride is around 4-5 hours.

It is the day we come back to Bogota. We have 1 hour before to leave to Bogota. You can do shopping or to do something else that you could not do the others days.

After that, we will start the travel to Bogota and we will stop in the middle of car drive for lunch in a restaurant with a beatiful view. Also we will have the option to visit the place where take place the battle of independence of of our Country in 1819. We will come to Bogota before 3 pm.