Caving

Location:
San Gil, Colombia

Other Activity Types:
Caving, spelunking

By Lorraine Caputo

Delving into the bowels of the earth (a.k.a caving) is another adventure you can undertake while in San Gil. You can only visit a few of the many caves that gouge the landscape.

Cueva del Indio— This cave out in Páramo is the easiest to spelunk, suitable for the whole family. A special feature is ziplining or jumping 5 meters (16.4 feet) into a pool, then swimming out along a rope.

Cueva la Antigua— This cave is more demanding and hands-on, calling for a lot of crawling through mud. This is not for the claustrophobic.

Ojo de Pájaros— This 100-meter (328-foot) deep and 20-meter (65.5-foot) wide cave near Mogotes earns its name from the thousands of oil birds that reside in it.

Other caverns of interest include Cueva del Yeso and Cueva de la Vaca.

Getting There
Contact the tour operators in town to go caving.

Travel Tips: All caves are on private property and each has only one tour company authorized to lead expeditions. It is illegal to go on your own. Check the quality of safety equipment.

Price Description: Prices depend on which cave and are set by the municipality; they begin at about $13.

Relative price: Mid-Range

Travel Skills: beginner/easy.

You Need to Bring: Wear old clothes, sandals or tennis shoes, shorts, t-shirt, swim gear, camera and sunscreen. Do not wear flip-flops.

Other extreme sports, like torrentismo (rappelling in waterfalls), hydrospeeding, paragliding and rafting; visiting colonial towns Barichara, Guane and Curití; Parque Natural El Gallineral, Parque Nacional Chicamocha

Currencies accepted
Colombian Peso