🇨🇴 New country: fly over Colombia!

Toponauts is flying to South America again — welcome, Colombia! 🇨🇴✈️ It's a country of rainforests, coffee farms, snow-capped peaks and two very different coastlines, split into 33 departamentos (departments) — 32 regular ones plus the capital district of Bogotá, which is its own special area. Let's go explore!

🌊🌊 A country with TWO coasts

Colombia is one of only a handful of South American countries that touches two different oceans: the warm Caribbean Sea in the north (with the famous cities of Cartagena and Santa Marta) and the rainy Pacific Ocean in the west. Flying from one coast to the other means crossing three whole mountain ranges — it's a big trip!

⛰️ The world's tallest coastal mountain

Most of Colombia's mountains belong to the Andes, which split into three parallel ranges (cordilleras) as they cross the country. But the very highest point isn't in the Andes at all! It's Pico Cristóbal Colón, 5,775 metres high, in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta — a separate, triangle-shaped mountain massif that isn't connected to the Andes chain. The wildest part: its snowy peak is only about 42 kilometres from the Caribbean beach, making it the highest coastal mountain on the entire planet!

🌴 A third of the country is rainforest

In the south and east lies the Colombian Amazonía — part of the vast Amazon rainforest — which covers more than a third of the whole country. It's home to rivers like the Caquetá and Putumayo, which eventually join the mighty Amazon River itself. Far to the east, the grassy plains of the Orinoquía region (nicknamed "Los Llanos") stretch out towards Venezuela, drained by rivers flowing into the Orinoco.

☕ The land of coffee

Colombia is one of the world's most famous coffee-growing countries. The hilly "Coffee Triangle" (around the departments of Caldas, Quindío and Risaralda) has the perfect mix of altitude, rain and rich volcanic soil for growing delicious coffee beans — millions of cups around the world start their journey right there.

🏝️ A tiny piece of Colombia, far out at sea

Way out in the Caribbean Sea, hundreds of kilometres from the mainland and much closer to Nicaragua, lie the small islands of San Andrés and Providencia. They form their own department — and their own little dot on the Toponauts map, far from the rest of the country! In the Pacific Ocean, Colombia also has the uninhabited island of Malpelo, a protected nature reserve full of sharks and seabirds.

🏛️ Bogotá: a capital with its own zip code

Colombia's capital, Bogotá, is so big and important that it isn't really part of any department at all — it's its own special "Distrito Capital", similar to how Buenos Aires works in Argentina. Confusingly, there's also a department called Cundinamarca that surrounds the city and lists Bogotá as its "capital on paper" — even though the city itself belongs to neither! One more First: Bogotá sits at a breezy 2,640 metres above sea level, making it one of the highest capital cities in the world.

🏛️ 9 UNESCO World Heritage treasures

Colombia has 9 UNESCO World Heritage Sites to fly to and discover, including the walled colonial city of Cartagena, the mysterious giant stone statues of San Agustín, and the tropical wetland island of Malpelo. Each one has its own story waiting to be found on the map.

🎉 Fun facts

• Colombia's two main rivers, the Magdalena and the Cauca, both start in the southern mountains and flow all the way north into the Caribbean Sea — you can fly along both of them as real rivers on the map.
• Colombia borders 5 other countries: Venezuela, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador and Panama.
• The name "Colombia" honours the explorer Christopher Columbus — and so does the country's highest mountain, Pico Cristóbal Colón ("Colón" is Spanish for "Columbus")!
• With 33 departamentos to learn, Colombia has one of the richest map puzzles in Toponauts yet.

▶️ How to play

Switch your country to Colombia with the "change your country" button, then pick a map — departments, capitals, big cities, rivers, mountains, lakes, islands, natural regions or UNESCO sites. Zoom into a single department to practise its towns and villages. Safe flight! 🚁