Serrania de la Lindosa, Colombia
February, 2025


Participants: 8 confirmed
  -
Trip Status: TRIP FULL

A couple of years ago the internet was full of sensationalist reports about "12 miles of ice age rock art" discovered in the Colombian jungle. While practically none of this is true, there is indeed a fascinating concentration of paintings along the Serrania de la Lindosa escarpment not far from the town of San José del Guaviare in the Amazon province, about 300 kilometres to the south east of Bogota. While this rock art is clearly more recent than claimed, it still represents one of the richest localities on the South American continent. This expedition will be organised in cooperation with GIPRI Colombia, the rock art research association who spent over a decade documenting these sites well before the sensationalist "discoveries".

 
 
 
 
The expedition is planned for 12 days, of which 3 full days will be spent in the Serrania de la Lindosa area to visit as many of the (accessible) sites as possible. There are three distinct groupings, we'll spend a day at each, the maximum distance to be walked is about two kilometres each way so the trip requires no special level of fitness. There are flights from Bogota to San José del Guaviare (a preferred alternative to the 8 hour drive), the planned dates coincide with the driest part of the year, when we can ecpect several days of dry spells instead of weeks of non-stop rain.
 
 
  
 
 

 

For those interested more deeply in the polemies surrounding the purported dating, here is the original claim by Iriarte et al. 2002. I have commented several times on Facebook countering these claims, the best summary is here. Our good friend Jeff La Fave also made an excellent presentation on the topic to ARARA, the full talk is available on YouTube.

 

 
 
    
 
Colombia has many more rock art and archaeological sites, as well as some spectacular landscapes. On the remainder of the trip we will spend two days visiting paintings and engravings (using Bogota as the base) with GIPRI, and have another five days (taking domestic flights to/from Popayán) to visit the archaeological sites of San Agustin and the Hypogeums of Tierradentro, as well as see some of the spectacular lanscapes of Colombia along the way.
 
 
  
 
 

 

 

For information on expected costs, planned dates and any further questions, please send me an email.

 

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