El Peñón de Guatapé, or Piedra de Penol, in Colombia

Climb El Peñón, the Giant Rock Stitched With a Staircase

Climb El Peñón, the Giant Rock Stitched With a Staircase

Atlas Obscura
Your Guide to the World's Hidden Wonders
Jan. 19 2015 10:36 AM

El Peñón de Guatapé, the Giant Rock Stitched With a Staircase

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From a distance, this 10 million-ton stone towering 650 feet above the Colombian town of Guatapé looks like two halves of a giant rock messily stitched together. Get closer and you realize that the “stitching” is actually a zigzagging staircase wedged into the crack running down the rock.

Once worshiped by the local Tahamies Indians, the rock—known as El Peñón de Guatapé—had come to be regarded as a nuisance until 1954, when a group of adventurous friends climbed it using a series of boards jammed into the crack. The ascent took five days, but the view from the top of the rock was so spectacular that it had to be shared. A 650-step staircase was installed in the crack, and El Peñón soon began attracting visitors eager to make the trip to the top. You, too, can climb to the summit after a three-hour bus ride from Medellín.

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Ella Morton is a writer working on The Atlas Obscura, a book about global wonders, curiosities, and esoterica adapted from Atlas Obscura. Follow her on Twitter.