"If to Caracas I owe my life, to Mompox I owe my glory," reads an inscription on a statue of Simon Bolívar in the town square. It was also here, on 6 August 1810, that Colombia's independence from Spain was declared. For colonial Colombia, Mompós was a key trading town, linking Colombia's coast with the Andes. This sleepy place on a bank of the Magdalena river was once the third most important city in Colombia. In the beginning of the last century silt and debris built up on the Mompos river-arm, larger boats stopped taking the route past Mompós and it became a city forgotten by both Colombia, and the world. It still is quite hard to reach.
(c) Sander van Hulsenbeek
