Salento

Population: 3,500
Elevation: 1,900 meters

Salento was founded in 1850 and is one of the oldest (and possibly the smallest) towns of Quindio. The town is 24 kilometers east of Armenia and today survives on coffee production and trout farming.

Aside from the nearby Valle de Cocora and Don Elias and his coffee plantation, Salento can be charming in its own right.

Upon arriving, I was immediately favorably impressed when this fantastic cat came out to greet us in our hostel:

Street scenes of Salento:

Below is the main street in Salento – Calle Real. At the end of the street are stairs leading up to Alto de la Cruz, a hill topped with a cross.

If you go, do me a favor and give some food to the dogs along the street – particularly a very friendly, but very skinny black female or a white and red, even skinnier, bloodhound male. They really need it and we were, obviously, only able to feed them for the few days we spent in Salento:

Have you ever seen a coffee machine like this? It looks like a steam engine:

Salento is tame, but there are guerrillas present in the nearby Parque Nacional Natural Los Nevados and the police fortify accordingly: