[citation needed] The municipality contains part of the 26,626 hectares (65,790 acres) Serra Dourada State Park, created in 2003.

The most important are: Rivers that cross the municipality are: The economy of the region is dependent on tourism, cattle raising, and agriculture.

Surrounded by the Serra Dourada, Goiás Velho is the native city of the poet Ana Lins dos Guimarães Peixoto Bretas (1889-1985), better known as Cora Coralina.

The house where she lived, one of the oldest in the city, dating from 1782, has become a museum, containing her furniture, personal possessions, documents and letters from illustrious correspondents such as the poet Carlos Drummond de Andrade (1902-1987) and the Bahian writer Jorge Amado, one of the main representatives of the literature of the North East region and one of the most widely read Brazilian authors both inside and outside the country.

It is one of the most traditional events of Holy Week in Brazil and only in Angra dos Reis is a similar procession celebrated.

During the ceremony the farricocos (the people dressed in medieval robes and hoods that accompany processions of penitence) simulate Jesus' arrest by the Roman soldiers by running through the streets of the town at midnight with torches to the sound of drums.

In 2006, according to the Diario da Manhã Archived 2007-09-27 at the Wayback Machine a newspaper from Goiânia, 10,000 tourists came to watch the procession.