Lowri Backpackers who travelling to Colombia will inevitably visit the popular city of Medellín which is also the gateway to Guatapé. This small resort town offers the perfect escape to the country!
Here, endless rolling hills were once flooded by the man-made Guatapé-Peñol reservoir which makes for some spectacular scenery.
Many travellers backpacking through Medellin may find themselves on a day trip to Guatapé, which is just a short two hours away.
However we decided that a few hours here wasn’t enough. So we decided to stay a couple of nights and soak up everything this beautiful town had to offer.
What to do backpacking in Guatapé
Climb La Piedra del Peñol
This gigantic structure is without a doubt the show-stealing attraction in Guatapé. A 220m (650ft) tall monolith that takes 740 steps to reach the top.
It looks pretty daunting. And so did the sound of 740 steps to be honest. Surprisingly though, it was not as bad as we thought, taking us around 15 minutes to get to the top.
What was off-putting however was the caution signs on the way up warning of dizziness and fainting due to exertion at altitude. It’s easy to forget here that you’re 2,100m above sea level here.
Making it to the top we definitely felt a sense of accomplishment. And the rewarding views were simply breathtaking. Although I’m sure part of that was courtesy of the trek up!
In no rush to get down we relaxed at a small cafe at the peak, relaxing and taking in those views. It has to be one of our favourite landscapes in Colombia.
The return journey down is made via an alternative internal staircase and was much more relaxing.
Tip: Make sure to check the weather before you go. It might not be much fun to make the climb and find yourself in a thick cloud. The benefit of staying a couple days is having this flexibility.
Wander around town
Backpacking in Guatapé means a visit to “Colombia’s Most Colourful Town”! We’d say it definitely earned the title with it’s vibrantly painted streets and multi-coloured buildings.
It doesn’t take long to walk the few streets that make up the town which are such a joy to explore!
As with any tourist town there are a host of souvenir shops and a good selection of bars and restaurants. Given it’s proximity to Medellín, Bandeja Paisa is a popular dish here and is always a great lunch option.
Visit Pablo Escobar’s mansion
Travellers to Colombia are no doubt more than well acquainted with the history of Pablo Escobar. For those backpacking to Guatapé, there is the option to visit a former holiday home of the notorious drug lord.
Named La Manuela after his daughter, only the shell of his formerly luxurious mansion remains. The whole site was ripped apart in 1993 by a bomb said to be planted by the vigilante group Los Pepes.
We paid a small entry fee of 12,000 COP ($4 USD) which included a booklet to do a self-guided tour.
Sprawled over eight hectares were tennis courts, a football field, stables, a pool and even guard towers. Crazier yet were the many holes in the double-layered walls which have been made since the blast. These are the marks left by locals who later raided the property in the hunt for hidden cash and drugs missed by the police.
None was reported to have been found.
We found it pretty surreal, exploring the charred remains of this once luxurious estate while learning more of it’s history. I mean, we were standing where the world’s biggest drug trafficker once stood!
La Manuela is best accessed via boat. Our hostel had they’re own boat so six of us going paid 10,000 COP ($3 USD) each for a ride into town and back via the mansion.
The mansion can also be visited on a day trip from Medellín where travellers can even paintball there! For those deciding that they want to paintball, note that this can only be done as part of a day trip from Medellín.
We were unaware of this until arriving in Guatapé but we were pumped to still explore the site. It is pretty cool.
Explore the lake
Backpacking in Guatapé should include a healthy dose of nature and relaxation. We think anyway.
The reservoir provides the opportunity to enjoy a variety of watersports such as kayaking and sailing, but there’s jet skiing and even fly-boarding if more adventure is preferred.
We were ecstatic to discover on check-in that our hostel had a couple of stand-up paddleboards which we then got to use for free! It was something we hadn’t considered before arriving but it’s a bonus if your hostel has water toys available.
Carrying the heavy boards down and back up the steep hill wasn’t much fun but our time on the lake was magical!
Even if you’re not a fan of watersports, or water in general, no one could say no to relaxing by the shores with this view.
Where to stay
As a resort town, there is no shortage of places to stay in Guatapé. We definitely recommend finding somewhere on the lake! This is part of the reason to visit.
If you would prefer to stay closer to town then Lake View Hostel is worth considering. It has decent reviews and includes an outdoor terrace, BBQ and bicycle hire.
In our instance, we went for seclusion. And a pool. Therefore we ended up staying at the Happy Buddha Hostel which was definitely secluded.
Note – It seems Happy Buddha may have closed down since our visit.
After disembarking our bus from Medellín in what seemed like – and was – the middle of nowhere, we then had a 15 minute horrendously bumpy car ride to get there. All part of the fun! We definitely felt like we were ‘getting away’!
When we stayed here the hostel had only been open for 2 weeks. This meant everything was clean and modern, although there were a few teething problems…
The owner had gone away and the car used for collecting supplies broke down. So the hostel ran out of food and beer, and the nearest shop was an hour round trip walk away!
The plus point was we got to drink the remaining spirits either for free or dirt cheap! The food ordered in was really good too.
This situation was in part due to a massive pool party that had happened the day before we arrived. Every Sunday the Happy Buddha Hostel run a bus from their sister hostel in Medellín bringing guests to Guatapé for the day.
It was like a ghost town the Monday we arrived but it was quite nice having paradise to ourselves.
Getting there
From our hostel in Poblado, Medellín it was a short walk to the metro and just a few stops to Caribe Station, the north bus terminal. Here we found a public bus to take us the 2 hours to Guatapé for 12,000 COP ($4 USD) each, one-way.
If you need to get around once in Guatapé, to La Piedra for example, there are plenty of tuk-tuks. The standard sat fee per person seemed to be 5,000 COP ($1.60 USD).
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