Rainforest burns in Colombia's remote amazon basin. Although the 2016 peace accord with FARC revolutionary guerillas brings the promise of peace to rural Colombia, the state's presence in many regions is still limited. In areas long "preserved" by decades of armed conflict, illegal land clearing for cattle ranching, lumber production, and coca farming is now accelerating at an unprecedented pace. Peace comes to Colombia, but at what cost?
This image received a "Commended" award in the 2021 TPOTY.com Green Planet category
There's also an interesting story about how we happened upon this scene. We had been camping outside of San Jose del Guaviare and had decided on taking a little-traveled back road to Macarena. Some police stopped by the camp, and after learning of our plans, they tried to dissuade us.
"You will be muy solitos out there" they said (meaning we would be very much alone). They explained that the local police have no presence in the area, and there was a potential for meeting FARC dissidents, who hadn't agreed to the 2016 peace accord. When they said that they themselves would not travel that route, I replied, "Because you are police." I don't think they appreciated that comment!
In any case, they recommended we speak with the colonel at the nearby army base.
When we showed up the next morning at the guard shack, and explained what we were asking for, we were met with silent stares. Eventually, after a few back and forth calls with the soldiers on duty, a severe looking colonel came out to meet us. I explained what we were intending to do, and what the police had told us. He stared suspiciously at me, inches away from my face. When I started to repeat my explanation, he abruptly cut me off.
"That is not the way to go," he said.
After some more discussion, he repeated, "That is not the way to go."
When I asked him to explain, he paused, again giving me a severe and suspicious look. Then, he simply directed us to go back to San Jose del Guaviare, take the junction at the Guayabero bridge, and head toward Cerro Azul. This route, as it turned out, was basically the same route we had intended all along!
Two days later, driving out of Puerto Nuevo (where we were refueled by a storekeeper who siphoned gas into our tank), we came through a section of virgin forest which had been recently cleared and lit on fire. We stopped for a moment, took a few pictures, then hurried on our way, concerned that our presence might not be welcome.
We encountered no dissident guerillas (in fact, we didn't pass a single vehicle in 12 hours of driving), and arrived safely at Macarena.