Tierradentro, San Andres de Pisimbala-Santa Rosa, Columbia March 13-17, 1979

What luck!  While I was in San Augustin I met another American, Jeff, who had a car and was going up to San Andres, another archaeological site where there are some interesting caves.  He offered to give me a ride – as the drive would take around three hours, and the bus more like eight or ten, I jumped at the chance. 

So now I’m sitting in the sun in front of my hotel looking out at a large grassy square encircled by several bright white houses.  Along the groundline in front of each house is a painted strip, about 18” wide.  Most of the strips are pink or turquoise blue, and have the effect of making the houses look like they are floating.  Weird, but wonderful.  There are a half dozen horses in the square, several hens and chicks pecking about, lots of running, cycling and loitering kids, and a few adults, who like me, are sitting on the cement ledge in front of their home, just surveying the scene.  There are no cars here – no cars at all.  We are in a little valley, a crease in the fabulous Andean mountains, surrounded by those great green giants. 

 

“Buenas tardes!  Buenas tardes!  Buenas tardes!  Buenas tardes!  Buenas tardes! “ 

A family of five – a couple with three kids, a skinny dog and an over-laden horse – just passed by.  Each one greeted me with a ‘buenas tardes’, and a big smile.  I like this place already.

 

The next morning Jeff and I headed up to El Aguacate (Avocado Hill), where we were told there were lots of caves, and some that we could probably get into.  As in San Augustin, these are burial sites, and there are many of them located throughout the mountains around San Andres.  They haven’t been developed as a tourist site yet, and they’re not easy to find.  We set off up over a ridge and down into a valley filled with tall grasses, wildflowers, butterflies and birds.  Honey bees buzzing, and every now and then an enormous black bee, super-loud and awkward looking in its flight.  We continued on through banana groves, coffee plantations, and forests of sugar cane.  Bamboo stands where the new ‘shoots’ are some 20 feet high and 6 inches in diameter.  Massive things.  Everything is after-rain fresh and sweet-smelling.

We reached the top of another ridge and looking down could see endless ridges and valleys with growths of banana palms, coffee stands, yuccas and bamboo.  The landscape dotted with mud and wattle houses thatched with palm or grass, sometimes hidden in a growth of cane or bamboo, sometimes out in the open.  

 

We passed by several huts as we walked.  Super simple dwellings with dirt floors and walls.  No amenities.  A well or trough outside.  Enclosures for pigs, modest gardens.  An outside fire pit and kitchen, sometimes covered over with a thatch roof, but open on at least three sides.  Clothes hanging on the tops of bamboo or barbed wire fencing.  Chickens and children pecking and playing; parents and older children working in the fields nearby.  Hoeing, digging, planting.  They don’t stop their work as we pass, but respond quietly to our ‘buenas tardes’.  A few of the older, bolder kids run up to us and ask for money – ‘regalame un pesito, un pesito!’

 

On top of the ridge there was no one.  Walking along the narrow ridge-top trail I saw the green landscape cascading below me on either side, a sea of green.  Beautiful butterflies – orange, yellow, blue, black and brown – everywhere.  Little rainbows in the sky.  And birds, large and small, playing in the wind currents of the ridge.  Swifts whistle by us, wings curved like a high-speed plane, bulleting through the air, almost frighteningly fast.  Little humming-bird-sized birds, blue bodied, flitting about, dipping and swooping just over the ridge.  Such a place.

 

We found a cave we were able to enter.  Flashlights on, we wound our way down a stone spiral stairway and into a hollowed out rock chamber, maybe 15 or 20 feet in diameter.  It’s walls and ceiling were painted with geometric designs.  The chamber was empty, but apparently at one time was a tomb.  Was someone buried below the floor?  Or had the body been removed?  It felt a little eerie, other-worldly.  We climbed back out and looked for other caves.  We found two more that we could get into.  Similar spiral stairways down into one bigger and one smaller chamber, also with geometric designs.  

 

After visiting the caves we continued our walk through the countryside.  It’s so quiet here – there are no trucks or tractors.  Just the sound of birds singing, cows munching.  And so we sat for hours, overlooking several little valleys and enjoying the silence, the beautiful greens and oranges in the mountain scape (one of the types of trees is in full orange bloom), and watching the many birds and butterflies.  

 

When it was time to head ‘home’ we walked along a very old cobble-stone road which wound its way among hills and fields.  We met some kids on horseback returning from a jaunt to town.  ‘Buenas tardes!’ they all greeted us.  So friendly, so nice.

 

The next day we rented horses and went to explore more caves.  And the day after that we hiked to even more of them.  This is an incredibly rich archaeological area.  My head is spinning with the sights, and ideas they generate.  Who were these people?  When did they create these caves?  What do the geometric designs mean?

 

Note:  According to Wikipedia, the Tierradentro people flourished from 200 BC to about the 17^th century.  The site was made a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1995.  

For more information see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tierradentro   and

https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-americas/tierradentro-0012410