The park contains an abandoned village, once home to workers in a textile factory, which is now a tourist attraction.

[2] The park is in the Serra do Espinhaço, a range with quartz rocks in the Jequitinhonha River basin.

Flora include the Vellozia squamata, Caryocar brasiliense, jacarandá, pau-santo, Campomanesia pubescens, Hancornia speciosa and candeia, as well as many types of evergreens, orchids and bromeliads.

There is one caretaker who works in a shack at the park entrance, and there is a house at one of the highest points used as a lookout at periods of high fire risk.

[3] In April 2013, the Public Ministry and Justice department of Minas Gerais charged that the State Forestry Institute had been failing to comply with environmental legislation.

There were serious problems such as lack of a management plan, physical structures and personnel, and land tenure issues with the ecological stations of Mata do Acauã and Mata dos Ausentes and the state parks of Biribiri, Alto Cariri, Rio Preto and Serra Negra.

[1] The Estamparia SA, a textile factory, was created in the interior of what is now the park in 1876 by the Bishop of Diamantina, João Antônio dos Santos.

The workers lived in a small town in the center of a valley, which held a warehouse, school and church.

The Biribiri River, which runs through the park, powered the hydroelectric turbines that delivered electricity to the factory and the village.