Arcabuco is a small town in Boyacá at twenty-six hundred metres, on the road between Tunja and Villa de Leyva, and it is known above all for wool. The cold climate suits sheep, and for generations the local women have knitted and woven the woollen garments, ruanas, sweaters and blankets, that the town sells from shops along the main street. The market square is quiet and orderly, with a church and low white buildings, and the surrounding hills are farmed in small plots, with the typical Boyacá patchwork of green and gold.
The setting is as good as the town. Behind Arcabuco rises the Iguaque massif, a sanctuary of cloud forest and high páramo with several small lakes, and in Muisca belief it is the place from which humanity emerged, when the goddess Bachué rose from Lake Iguaque with a child in her arms. The forest holds spectacled bears, which are rarely seen, and a huge range of birds, with orchids and tree ferns in the damp pockets. Seen from the road, the mountain wears a ragged cap of cloud for much of the day.
The road to Villa de Leyva is the reason to pass through. It leaves Arcabuco, climbs through cool pasture, and then descends in a series of tight bends toward a drier, warmer basin, where the colonial town sits in sunshine among its stone streets and a plaza that is among the largest in the country. The change in climate over a few kilometres is striking: you leave in a jacket and arrive in a shirt. The surface is generally paved and decent, though fog can sit on the upper part, and heavy trucks make the bends slow.
Arcabuco is a good place to stop for a coffee and a bowl of something hot, such as the thick local soups, before riding on. The town is small, with a population of about fifteen hundred, so fuel is limited and it is better to fill up in Tunja or at the larger stations on the main road. Villa de Leyva, seventeen kilometres away, has plenty of services. Weekends and public holidays bring heavy traffic from Bogotá, so a midweek visit is a much calmer experience.