The Village and Around
Everything in El Valle is spread out along Avenida Principal, the main street. Next to the church, a small museum (Sun 10am-2pm; US$0.25), run by nuns, has some good exhibits on local history and folklore, while the nearby Sunday market sells fruit, handicrafts (including carved soapstone, traditional earthenware pottery and woven baskets) and flowers. Opposite, a side road leads up to El Nispero , a plant and orchid nursery and zoo (daily 7am-5pm; US$2) where you can see monkeys, tapirs, the celebrated golden frog that is endemic to the area, and birds ranging from macaws and toucans to such exotic wonders as the Gallina Ingles - the English chicken. Cages are cramped, though, and some of the animals look pretty miserable. Beside the church a side road leads to the thermal baths (daily 8am-noon & 1-5pm; US$1) by the Rio Anton. Reputed to have medicinal powers, these make a great place to relax after a day walking in the countryside - one of the joys of a visit to El Valle. Across the bridge at the east end of Av Principal the road forks three ways. A thirty-minute walk up the right fork takes you up to El Chorro Macho (daily 8am-4pm; US$2), a 35-metre waterfall set amid the forest of a private ecological reserve; for another US$2 you can also use the delightful natural swimming pool in the river. The reserve also operates exciting cable rides through the forest canopy, the so-called "Canopy Adventure" (tel 983 6547), costing US$40 for just over an hour. The left fork from the bridge leads to the smaller Las Mozas waterfall, while the centre fork leads after a fifteen-minute walk to a group of petroglyphs . Carved on a huge white rock and high-lighted with chalk and charcoal, the petroglyphs are pre-Columbian abstract designs, including spirals and anthropomorphic and zoomorphic figures; nobody knows when or by whom they were carved, let alone their significance. Further afield, innumerable trails climb up into the cloudforests of the surrounding mountains, which are excellent for bird-watching - try following the path up behind the petroglyphs to the peak of La India Dormida , the mountain ridge that looms over the valley to the west and whose silhouette resembles the sleeping form of a legendary Indian princess.
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