60 pieces · NaturePhoto by Xatly2, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (Wiki Loves Earth 2019 in Colombia). Caño Cristales in the Serranía de la Macarena National Natural Park, Meta, Colombia, photographed in August 2018 — a clear river bed carpeted in crimson Macarenia clavigera, with patches of yellow sand and green weed showing through the water and gallery forest closing in along both banks.
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Caño Cristales, the river of five colours
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Caño Cristales, the river of five colours
This is Caño Cristales, a clear mountain stream in the Serranía de la Macarena National Natural Park in Meta, Colombia, and for a few months of the year the most improbable-looking river in South America. The red is alive. It comes from Macarenia clavigera, an aquatic plant in the Podostemaceae family that grips bare rock in fast-flowing, sunlit water and turns deep crimson when conditions suit it. The rest of the palette is the river bed showing through: yellow sand in the shallows, green weed and moss on the shaded rock, black stone where the current has scoured it clean, and the blue of the sky on the surface. Five colours, hence the names it goes by — el río de los cinco colores, the liquid rainbow — though in a single frame like this one the red does most of the talking.
The display is seasonal and narrow, because the plant needs the water level to be exactly wrong for everything else. Run too deep in the wet season and the current tears the plants off the rock while the depth starves them of light; drop too low in the dry season and they bake. The window falls in between, broadly from the middle of the year into late autumn, which is when the photograph here was taken. The rock itself is far older than the plants on it: the Macarena range is an outlying block of the Guiana Shield, some of the oldest exposed stone on the continent, standing between the Andes, the Amazon and the eastern plains and collecting species from all three. Caño Cristales was effectively closed to visitors for decades while the region was caught up in Colombia's armed conflict, and it reopened to regulated tourism only after security improved — access now runs through licensed local guides, with group sizes capped and sunscreen and insect repellent banned in the water, because the thing people come to see is a plant that detergents and oils will kill.
As a jigsaw it is an unusual one, because the normal strategy of building the frame first does not help much here. Start with the hard lines instead: the slab of grey rock across the bottom of the picture, the pale bleached branches reaching into the middle of the frame, and the rim of sky and cloud along the top. Then take the forest wall along the far bank as its own project — the foliage is dense, but it runs through distinct greens from the silvery scrub on the right to the darker canopy in the centre, so sort by shade before you try to place anything. Leave the river for last and treat it as the real puzzle. It is not one colour but a mottled wash of crimson, wine, ochre and olive where the sand and weed break through, and the surface carries reflections of the trees on top of all that. Work it in horizontal strips from the near bank outward, and let the yellow patches act as landmarks.
How to play
- Tap Play Caño Cristales, the river of five colours puzzle to open the puzzle board, then choose your piece count and difficulty.
- Drag pieces from the tray onto the board and snap them into place until the full image is complete. Works with mouse on desktop and touch on mobile.
- Use the Preview button on the play screen to peek at the full reference image whenever you need a hint.
- When you finish, check your solve time on the completion screen and share it with friends to see who can beat your record.
Frequently asked questions
- What makes the water of Caño Cristales red?
- A plant, not a mineral or an algal bloom. Macarenia clavigera is an aquatic species that anchors itself to the rock on the river bed in stretches of fast, shallow, sunlit water, and it develops an intense red pigment when the light and flow conditions are right. The water itself stays clear — you are looking straight through it at a carpet of red vegetation on the bottom, which is why rocks, sand and reflections all remain visible in the same view. Where the plant does not grow, the bed shows its ordinary colours of stone, sand and green weed.
- When does the river actually look like this?
- Only during part of the year, in the transition between Colombia's wet and dry seasons — broadly from around the middle of the year into the later months, which is the period this photograph falls in. The plants need a specific balance: enough water to stay submerged and enough sunlight to reach them. In the full wet season the river runs high and fast, which keeps light off the bed and strips plants from the rock, and in the deep dry season the shallows fall away and the exposed plants die back. Outside the window the river is still beautiful, but it reads as an ordinary clear stream over dark rock.
- Where is Caño Cristales?
- In the Serranía de la Macarena National Natural Park, in the department of Meta in central Colombia, east of the Andes and north-west of the Amazon basin. The Macarena range is a geological outlier of the Guiana Shield rather than part of the Andes, and its position at the meeting point of three major ecosystems gives the park an unusual mix of plants and animals. The nearest town, La Macarena, is the gateway for visitors and is generally reached by air rather than by road.
- Can you swim in it, and why are the rules so strict?
- Swimming is allowed in designated pools, but the park controls visits closely and for good reason. Entry is through licensed local guides, groups are limited in size and kept on marked routes, and sunscreen, insect repellent and other lotions are not permitted in the water because the oils and chemicals in them damage the Macarenia plants that create the colour. The plants grow slowly and are confined to a handful of rivers in this one range, so a trampled or contaminated stretch does not recover quickly. The restrictions exist so the river keeps doing the thing people travel to see.