The Tatacoa Desert is the second largest arid zone in

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

after the Guajira Peninsula. It occupies more than 330 square kilometers. This region is located north of Huila Department, 38 km from the city of Neiva in Colombia and from Natagaima in Tolima. It is renowned as a rich deposit of fossils and a tourist destination. The Tatacoa Desert has two distinctive colors: ocher in the area of Cuzco and gray in the Los Hoyos area. The Tatacoa, or the Valley of Sorrows, as it was called in 1538 by the

conquistador Conquistadors (, ) or conquistadores (, ; meaning 'conquerors') were the explorer-soldiers of the Spanish and Portuguese Empires of the 15th and 16th centuries. During the Age of Discovery, conquistadors sailed beyond Europe to the Americas, O ...

Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada y Rivera, also spelled as Ximénez and De Quezada, (;1496 16 February 1579) was a Spanish explorer and conquistador in northern South America, territories currently known as Colombia. He explored the territory named ...

, is not a desert, but a tropical dry forest. The name "Tatacoa" also given by the Spanish, refers to its rattlesnakes. During the Tertiary Period, it was wetter, with thousands of flowers and trees, but has been gradually drying up to become an arid zone.

Geography

The Tatacoa covers 330 square kilometers around the town of Villavieja. The area is heavily eroded and crossed by dry canyons that develop transiently in the winter months. These shapes are created on clay surfaces, creating labyrinthine gullies in the landscape that can reach 20 meters deep.

Fauna and flora

There is relatively little runoff, and animal and plant life is adapted to the conditions of low humidity and high temperatures. The plants in this area are adapted to climatic conditions through the development of horizontal roots of up to 30 meters and vertical roots up to 15 meters deep that facilitate access to water. Wildlife includes turtles, rodents, snakes, spiders, scorpions,

eagle Eagle is the common name for many large birds of prey of the family Accipitridae. Eagles belong to several groups of genera, some of which are closely related. Most of the 68 species of eagle are from Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, just ...

s, alligators and wildcats, and

cacti A cactus (, or less commonly, cactus) is a member of the plant family Cactaceae, a family comprising about 127 genera with some 1750 known species of the order Caryophyllales. The word ''cactus'' derives, through Latin, from the Ancient Greek ...

reaching between four and five meters high. Desierto De La Tatacoa

Tourism

In addition to its geography, its atmospheric conditions are ideal for astronomy. Tatacoa has little pollution or noise, attracting tourists who stay there to enjoy the scenery and tranquility.

References

* Desert Tatacoa article in Wikipedia in Spanish.

External links

Desert Tatacoa: Official tourism site (in Spanish)

Tatacoa Desert: an astronomical observatory (in Spanish)

Photos

Backpacking In The Tatacoa Desert (in Spanish)
{{Authority control Deserts of Colombia Geography of Huila Department Tourist attractions in Huila Department