Salento is a very beautiful small town set amid gorgeous green mountains and has a population of about 3500.  It survives on coffee production, trout farming and tourism.  It was founded in 1850 and is one of the oldest towns in Quindio. One of the two things that bring tourists to this area is to scout out coffee farming and actually hike into a coffee farm and learn all about its production. Hiking into the farm, doing the tour and hiking out takes about four hours so we set off mid morning as rain was called for later in the day. The other option was to go by horseback, which would have been beautiful, but we opted to hike as horses and I have never really bonded and no one else seemed keen either. The hike in was fabulous and the pictures below cannot capture the depth or the beauty. Once we arrived we took the forty five minute tour, followed by a cup of coffee, and I must admit I will never take coffee for granted again as there’s so much more to it than I realized. The ColOmbian coffee boom began in the 20th century but really hit it big when Juan Valdez, and his famous moustache and mule, became the poster boy for ColOmbian coffee. ColOmbia’s high-quality arabica-bean industry employs over 570,000 and brings the country US$1.6 billion annually. Unfortunately ColOmbia exports its best beans and what’s left is of inferior quality so coffee is not always good here……and although we’ve had that experience here we’ve also had some excellent coffee. There are some pictures below of our coffee tour but, once again, I’m disappointed as they just don’t capture the beauty……use your imagination.
After another great day we wandered around the square in Salento where all the activity seems to take place, relaxed for a little bit and went out for supper where we enjoyed one of the other touristy treats….trout which was fabulous! Crashed early not only because we were tired but because we have another longer hike ahead of us tomorrow and we need to be rested.