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4-Day Lost City Trek Colombia: Climb 1,200 Stone Steps

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Duration4d

GroupUp to 12

LanguagesEN · DE +2

PickupAt your hotel

Four days in the jungle to reach an 800-year-old city built on a mountainside

You hike four days from Santa Marta through the Sierra Nevada jungle, sleeping in camps and passing through Kogui settlements, to reach Ciudad Perdida, an 800-year-old Tayrona city hidden in the mountains. The climb to the ruins involves 1,200 stone steps, and you spend a full morning exploring the terraced platforms before descending and returning to Santa Marta by evening on day four.

Step-by-step itinerary

Day 1 — Travel to Mamey and Camp 1

Depart Santa Marta at 7:30 am
Drive 2.5 hours to Mamey
Have lunch in Mamey
Begin search for Tayrona sacred place
Arrive at Camp 1 late afternoon
Relax at rivers, pools, and waterfalls
Dinner at Camp 1
Sleep in hammock or bed

Day 2 — Hike to Camp 3 via Mutanyi

Have early breakfast at Camp 1
Walk through Buritaca river valley
Visit Mutanshi Kogui indigenous houses
Hike 7 hours through Sierra Nevada jungle
Arrive at Camp 3
Dinner at Camp 3
Sleep in hammock or bed

Day 3 — Ascend to Lost City and Camp 2

Have early breakfast at Camp 3
Climb 1,200 stone steps to Lost City
Tour Lost City with guide
Rest and take photos at Lost City
Have lunch at Lost City
Return hike to Camp 2
Dinner at Camp 2
Sleep in hammock or bed

Day 4 — Return to Santa Marta via Mamey

Breakfast at Camp 2
Hike back passing rivers and waterfalls
Arrive at Mamey for lunch
Truck ride back to Santa Marta
Arrive in Santa Marta around 5:00 pm

The Experience

You climb into a 4×4 truck at 7:30 am in Santa Marta and drive two and a half hours toward Mamey, watching the coast drop away as the road turns inland. The truck stops, you eat lunch, and then the walking starts — not on a trail yet, but through the Buritaca river valley where Kogui indigenous families still live in houses scattered across the mountainside. By afternoon you reach Camp 1, where hammocks hang between trees and the sound of waterfalls fills the space around you. That first night you sleep in whatever you chose — hammock or bed — and the jungle doesn't quiet down.

Day two is the long one: seven hours walking through the Sierra Nevada, the path climbing steadily as the river valley opens up to show you the scale of what you're inside. You pass through Mutanyi, a Kogui settlement, and the guide talks about the people who live here and have lived here for centuries. The jungle is dense enough that you stop noticing the time, and then Camp 3 appears — another cluster of hammocks, another meal, another night in the mountains. On day three, you wake early and start the real climb: 1,200 stone steps built by the Tayronas themselves, cut into the mountainside and worn smooth by eight hundred years of feet. The Lost City sits at the top, terraced into the ridge, a series of circular stone platforms and tiled paths that the guide walks you through, pointing out what each space was used for, what the ruins tell you about how people lived here before Machu Picchu was even built. You spend the morning there — resting, taking photographs, letting the place settle into you — then you descend the same steps and sleep at Camp 2.

The last day is the return: breakfast, then the path back down to Mamey, where the truck is waiting. You reach Santa Marta around 5:00 pm, four days of walking compressed into the space between your ribs. The trek to Ciudad Perdida demands a moderate level of fitness — the climbing is real, the humidity is real, and there's no shortcut through the jungle — but it's the difficulty that makes the city feel earned, not just visited.

What’s included

Transport from Santa Marta to Mamey and back in a 4×4 truck, accommodation in hammocks or beds at three jungle camps, all meals for four days (breakfast, lunch, and dinner), a guide who explains the history and culture of the Lost City and the Tayrona civilization, and entry to Ciudad Perdida. The guide also provides context about the Kogui indigenous people and the Sierra Nevada region as you walk.

Good to know

Moderate physical levelNot for heart conditionsNot for back problems

Operated by Ecosierra Perdida Tours

Is this one for you?Right for travelers with moderate fitness who want to reach an ancient city on foot and have the logistics handled — the camps, meals, and transport are all arranged. Plan for four full days of walking and climbing; the physical demand is what makes reaching a place this remote and preserved actually possible.