Parque Nacional del Cafe

The coffee region's biggest family attraction sits on a hillside near Montenegro and does two things at once. Half of it is a straightforward amusement park with a wooden roller coaster, a log flume, fairground rides and a cable car that crosses the valley; the other half is a coffee estate turned into a walk-through exhibition, with a museum, a plantation trail, a demonstration of processing from cherry to cup, and a show building used for staged performances. It is unapologetically commercial and aimed squarely at Colombian families, but the setting is genuine coffee country and the cable car crossing is worth the ticket on its own.

History

The idea came after Diego Arango Mora and his wife Margarita visited the Sugar Museum in Valle del Cauca, and Margarita remarked that if the country had a museum of sugar it should have one of its best-known export. Arango, of Quindío's coffee growers' committee, won over Jorge Cárdenas Gutiérrez, head of the National Federation of Coffee Growers, and proposed it to the national congress of coffee growers in 1982, but years passed, with banks unwilling to lend and other departments and towns competing for the site. The museum opened near Montenegro on 24 February 1995 and drew 250,000 visitors in its first year, and when surveys showed younger visitors would not return, Arango added an amusement park, starting with the gondola lift and a steam railway, then the roller coaster and other rides (Wikipedia, Parque del Café).

What to look for

• The cable car - a crossing over the valley between the two halves of the park.
• The coffee museum and trail - processing from cherry to roast, on a working slope.
• The rides - a wooden roller coaster, log flume and fairground attractions.
• The show building - staged music and dance of the coffee country.

When to go

Open most of the year but not every day of the week outside holidays, so check the calendar before driving out. Colombian school holidays in late June and July and again from December to January bring long queues for the rides. Arrive at opening and do the rides first, leaving the museum and plantation walk for the afternoon heat.

Practical notes

It is a theme park, and anyone expecting a quiet farm visit will be put off by the queues, the loudspeakers and the food court prices. The full pass costs several times the basic entry, and basic entry alone leaves you watching other people on the rides. Queues in holiday season are long, and much of the walking is up and down a steep hillside.

Nearby

Armenia, Filandia, Salento and the Quindio botanical garden are all within an hour.

Key facts