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La Vieja River
La Vieja River is a river in the Colombian
departments of Quindio, Valle del Cauca and Risaralda.
It is a major tributary of the Cauca River.
The river is formed by the joining of the Quindio River and the
Barragan River in an area known as the Valle de Maravelez. It has a
length of 102 km and flows in a northwesterly direction, meeting the
Cauca River approximately 7 km north of Cartago. Major
tributaries include the Roble, Consota, Barbas, Espejo and Pijao rivers. La Vieja forms the limit between the
departments of Quindio and Valle del Cauca; it also forms part of
the limit between Risaralda and Valle del Cauca.
The river basin has an area of 2,925 km and includes the entire
department of Quindio. Although Cartago is the only major urban
area situated directly on the river, the cities of Armenia and Pereira are
located in its watershed. The average river flow is 92 m/s.
Recreational use of the river includes the increasingly popular tourist activity balsaje, in which groups of up to 16 people explore the slow-flowing river in large rafts made of guadua. The majority of these excursions depart from Puerto Samaria in the municipality of Montenegro, Quindio, and arrive at Puerto Alejandrino in neighboring Quimbaya. The number of participants has grown from 400 during 2000 to over 11,000 in 2003, and there are at least a dozen firms offering this service.
La Vieja has significant contamination problems,
primarily due to inadequate waste water treatment in its watershed.
References
Corporacion Autonoma Regional del Quindio (2005), Proyecto Ordenacion y Manejo de la Cuenca del Rio La Vieja (in Spanish)
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This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article La Vieja River
