We came to Bogota for a single reason: to see the best gold museum in the world. The Museo De Oro is full of gold panned from streams around Colombia, hammered and cast into amazing shapes. One of the fascinating parts of this history is that several regions of Colombia made gold objects in clearly recognizable styles. One of the first exhibits you see takes you through these areas. This could exhaust anyone.
The Sinu style of gold-working used a lot of wire to make detailed shapes and poses, including the coolest gold artifact in the Americas, the golden raft.
Quimbaya work was thicker than the others because they had more productive sources of gold. Pieces were made with exquisite detail. The museum has so many different artifacts that hundreds of them are shown in a very short light show. It’s difficult to take in how many pieces there are. There are a few chunks of Colombian emerald, too.
This is a sample of what is in the museum. It’s worth a trip to Bogota. Our hotel in Bogota, in the historic Candelaria neighborhood, was lovely. Decorated with furniture from an elegant private home, The Orchids also served the best arepas we’ve eaten in Colombia.
Llywindatravels 2022 