Filandia sits on a ridge in the hills of Quindío, in the heart of Colombia's coffee country, and the first thing that strikes you is the colour. Houses on the main streets are painted in bright blues, reds and yellows, with carved wooden balconies and doors, and on a sunny afternoon the whole village glows. It is a town that takes pride in how it looks, and it is easy to see why it has become one of the favourites of the region.
The landscape around it is the Paisaje Cultural Cafetero, the coffee cultural landscape that UNESCO recognised as a World Heritage site in 2011. Steep green hills are covered in coffee bushes shaded by banana plants, with farmhouses scattered on the slopes and tall bamboo, known as guadua, growing along the streams. The bamboo is a local building material and a local craft, and in Filandia you will find baskets and furniture made from it, as well as woven goods in the shops around the square.
A lookout on the edge of the village, a tower on a hill, gives a wide view over the valleys toward the Cordillera Central, where on clear mornings the snow peaks stand above the haze. It is a favourite spot at sunrise, with coffee in hand. The cafes in town serve good local coffee, grown within sight, and it is a pleasure to taste what you have seen growing on the hills.
The riding is a mixture of narrow rural roads and better paved ones. The roads climb and drop through the hills with frequent bends, steep grades and sometimes patches of rough pavement, and in the rainy months landslides and potholes can appear. Traffic includes coffee trucks, the old Willys jeeps that ferry people and produce, and plenty of motorbikes, so keep alert and ride with care. Mist often rises from the valleys in the early morning, and the afternoon can bring a short downpour, so carry rain gear.
Fuel is available in Filandia, which has nearly seven thousand people, and in Circasia, a larger town nearby. The best seasons are the drier months, December to February and July to August, though the hills are green year round. A weekday morning gives the quietest roads and the clearest views.