Published on 03/08/2026
El Dorado was never a city of gold. It was a man covered in gold, and this is the lake he submerged himself in.
Lake Guatavita lies about 75 kilometres north-east of Bogotá, in a near-perfect crater surrounded by high moorland. It is one of the most important sites of Muisca culture and, although today you reach it in a little over ninety minutes by road, for centuries it was the object of one of the most expensive obsessions in European history.
The Muisca, the people who lived on this high plateau, held the investiture of a new chief here.
The heir spent days fasting in isolation. He was then covered in resin and blown over with gold dust until his whole body shone. He boarded a raft with his priests, moved out to the centre of the lake, and submerged himself while the people threw offerings of gold and emeralds into the water.
That scene, described to the Spanish by local indigenous people, is the literal origin of the phrase El Dorado — "the golden one". The famous Muisca raft on display at Bogotá's Gold Museum depicts exactly this moment.
For almost four centuries, various groups tried to get the gold off the bottom.
In 1580 the merchant Antonio de Sepúlveda put hundreds of indigenous labourers to work cutting a notch into the crater rim to lower the water level. That notch is still visible today, and it's the first thing guides point out when you reach the viewpoint. He managed to drop the lake by some twenty metres and recover a few pieces, but the cut collapsed and he died ruined.
In the early twentieth century a British company drained it almost completely. The mud at the bottom baked in the sun and set like cement before they could dig it out. They left with very little.
Today the lake is protected and swimming is not allowed. It remains a sacred site for indigenous communities, and that status is respected.
The visit is guided and compulsory, lasting between an hour and a half and two hours. It isn't a demanding walk, but bear in mind you're at around 3,000 metres: take it slowly.
The route climbs a maintained path to several viewpoints over the crater. Guides explain the Muisca worldview, the meaning of water in their culture, and the history of the looting. It's a visit built on context: without the explanations you'd see a pretty lake and little more.
Prices are indicative and may change.
That last-entry detail matters: plenty of people leave Bogotá late, hit traffic on the northern exit, and arrive just after they've stopped letting visitors in. If you're going independently, set off early.
By car it's an hour and a half to two hours depending on traffic. By public transport you need to combine an intercity bus to the village of Guatavita with local transport to the park entrance, which makes for a considerably longer day.
This is one of the trips where an organised tour makes the clearest difference: transport runs direct, you arrive within opening hours, and the guide covers both the journey and the walk.
Don't confuse the two: today's Guatavita village is not the original. The old one went under water in the 1960s when the Tominé reservoir was built, and a new colonial-style town was raised on the shore.
It has a pleasant square, craft shops and restaurants overlooking the reservoir. It's a natural stop for lunch before heading back.
Yes, and it's the combination we recommend most. Both lie north of Bogotá and fit comfortably into a single day.
They work well together because they complement each other: the Salt Cathedral is the most impressive human structure on the plateau, and Guatavita is the landscape and the myth that explain why the Spanish came here in the first place. One without the other tells half the story.
