Guaduas

Guaduas lies in a warm valley on the road between the Magdalena River and the Bogotá highland. The colonial settlement was established in the sixteenth century and became a stopping place on the royal road from the river port of Honda to Santafé. Travellers and goods climbing from the river crossed the surrounding mountains, making the town a link between the Caribbean waterway and the interior. In the early nineteenth century Guaduas was associated with Policarpa Salavarrieta, who carried messages and gathered information for the independence movement. Spanish authorities executed her in Santafé in 1817. The town’s houses and roads recall an era when the difficult journey between the Magdalena and the highland capital passed through this valley.