In April 1536, a group of around 800 conquistadors left the relative safety of the Caribbean coastal city of Santa Marta to start a strenuous expedition up the Magdalena River, the main fluvial artery of Colombia.

After a journey of almost a year, where the Spanish lost over 80% of their soldiers, the conquistadors following the Suárez River, reached the Bogotá savanna in March 1537.

The rise in population during the twentieth century and the expansion of agriculture and urbanisation reduced the biodiversity and natural habitat of the Bogotá savanna severely.

June, July and August are the months that present the largest variations of temperature, and during the morning frost in the higher terrains surrounding the savanna is possible.

[24] Before the arrival of the European colonisers, the savanna was populated predominantly by white-tailed deer, the main ingredient of the Muisca cuisine.

The earliest confirmed inhabitation of present-day Colombia was on the Bogotá savanna with sites El Abra, Tequendama and Tibitó, where semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers lived in caves and rock shelters.

The economy of the Muisca, meaning "person" or "people" in their indigenous version of Chibcha; Muysccubun, was self-sufficient due to the advanced agriculture on the fertile soils of the frequently flooding Bogotá savanna.

More tropical and subtropical agricultural products as avocadoes and cotton were traded with their neighbours, in particular the Guane and Lache in the north and northeast and the Guayupe, Achagua and Tegua in the east.

This ritual, where the zipa covered himself in gold dust and jumped in the 3,000 metres (9,800 ft) altitude lake, gave rise to the -not so much- legend of El Dorado.

In April 1536, a group of around 800 conquistadors left the relative safety of the Caribbean coastal city of Santa Marta to start a strenuous expedition up the Magdalena River, the main fluvial artery of Colombia.

After a journey of almost a year, where the Spanish lost over 80% of their soldiers, the conquistadors following the Suárez River, reached the Bogotá savanna in March 1537.

The Spanish colonizers engaged in the construction of Spanish-style towns to replace all the indigenous villages and in the process of assimilation and religious convert of the Muisca.

The majority of those villages kept their indigenous names, but some were slightly modified in time, like Suacha which became Soacha, Hyntiba becoming Fontibón and Bacatá becoming Bogotá.

The rise in population during the twentieth century and the expansion of agriculture and urbanisation reduced the biodiversity and natural habitat of the Bogotá savanna severely.

The main cities of the Bogotá savanna, in addition to the capital city of Bogotá, are: Mosquera, Soacha, Madrid, Funza, Facatativá, Subachoque, El Rosal, Tabio, Tenjo, Cota, Chía, Cajicá, Zipaquirá, Nemocón, Sopó, Tocancipá, Gachancipá, Sesquilé, Suesca, Chocontá and Guatavita.