Hotel Tinamu — Hotel in Manizales

My partner and I stayed at Hotel Tinamu/Tinamu Birding Nature Reserve for two nights and would highly, highly recommend to both birders as well as any nature lover, though the lodge is mostly oriented towards birdwatching. We arrived at the accommodation in the early afternoon, and because of the idleness/lack of other guests, were offered an evening bird tour with Fernando, the guide in residence. Walking around the estate with Fernando was magical and my partner and I both were astounded by Fernando’s ability to sense birds. We were also charmed hearing about Fernando’s history with nature (he’s a former hunter turned birder!).

Importantly, my partner and I are American with decent spanish (by no means fluent, but conversational). We would definitely recommend booking the spanish tour if your spanish is even half-decent – Fernando is just that good! Of note, the tour that is advertised on their website (110,000 COP for spanish, 220,000 COP for English at time of this review) is a full day tour running from about 6am to 5pm with breaks during breakfast as well as pre- and post- lunch when the weather gets too hot for birds – this was an absolute bargain for a full day with a guide. We saw dozens of species – the highlights being golden collared manakin (doing its mating display), blue-necked tanager, bay-headed tanager, and moustached puffbird.

Room and Board: The grounds at Hotel TInamu are gorgeous and there are about 8 rooms total at the lodge. The highlight of our room (bay-headed tanager room) was the shower with a floor-to-ceiling window looking out at the forest. We visited Tinamu in December/January and it was HOT, so be prepared for heat if you go around the new year. The food was tasty and all of the service staff were exceedingly warm and kind.

Other notes: During our stay we learned that the lodge was once a full-fledged coffee farm until around 2014, when the owners made a switch to conservation and ecotourism (they still grow and roast organic coffee in small batches). Also, staff at Tinamu helped arrange a transfer to and from Manizales with a local driver, Ana Lucia (Ana Lu), who we highly, highly recommend. She was awesome and a joy to chat with on either end of our stay.

We had an absolute blast at Hotel Tinamu and can’t wait until...

Nice place to spend time in the forest and see lots of birds. Hummingbird feeders and fruit feeders provide a lot of bird watching right from main area of the property. Hiking trails to explore deeper in the forest with bird guides. Hammocks and lots of seating on property to relax. Good price for private bird guide (they offer tours in English for extra cost). Food was good and they accommodated a vegetarian diet. Breakfast is included, but lunch and dinner are not (35,000 pesos per extra meal, per person). Not the easiest to get to - they gave us phone number for taxi driver who drove us from downtown Manizales to the finca for 70,000 pesos each way. We paid extra for queen suite to have private hammock, and the hammock and balcony area were nice, but the room was basic (no table or chairs inside), beds were firm, and linens were stained, so it could be updated a bit for the relatively high price point. Overall I would recommend this place for serious birders trying to see some lower elevation forest species (scaled antpitta, blue-lored antbird, mustached puffbird) with the helpful of patient and knowledgeable guides, but probably not the best place if you’re looking for a luxurious forest...

It is simply a heaven

We spent two weeks traveling around Colombia, stayed in Bogota, Manizales, Medellin and Cartagena, Tinamu is definitely the best among the five places we stayed.

It is a simple resort but you will get all try thing you need (they have WiFi and hot shower). Actually, you can't ask for more when you have the best team and owner to take care of you.

Bed is comfortable, food is simple but absolutely delicious, we stayed for two nights at Tinamu, had one lunch, two dinner and breakfast, the dishes never repeat.

There are different birds singing songs to wake you up in the morning, the best birding guide Fernando to show you around, we managed to see ~60 kinds of birds and an iguana in a day trip.

We have very limited proficiency in Spanish, so does Fernando's English, but we managed to understand each other.

The owner Clarita and his husband Maricio are super nice and helpful.

The resort is about 30-45 min away from town and literally have no other restaurants or entertainment nearby, but who need these things when you are already...