secret tours in Colombia

My Colombia guidebook doesn't mention the 'secret tours' of San Agustin, but I found out on my first day that it was possible to visit a real-life cocaine factory as a tourist.  I'm sure the official tourist office wouldn't advertise them, but there were some local tour guides who had an arrangement with the grandmother who ran a family cocaine-processing plant to take tourists along and watch the proceedings.

I learnt this from another tourist - in fact he first told me about his tour a few hours before it started, and I suggested that he take care, not take any valuables with him, etc.  It sounded very dodgy to me. But he emailed later that evening to tell me he was safe and well and that the tour had been fascinating. We found ourselves on the same archaeological jeep tour the next day so he told me all about it, from the leaves being brought in, through the stage where the brown residue (the crack cocaine) is thrown away - apparently this family don't want to sell crack as it takes too many young lives - to the pure white powder at the end.  Amazingly, he was even allowed to take photos.

At first my reaction was that I wanted to do the tour, it sounded fascinating but more than that I suppose was a kind of glamour at seeing first-hand something that is highly illegal.  But then I thought more about it, about the fact that you have to pay to do the tour, that the payment helps to support the industry, and perhaps more than anything for me the fact that tourists going along and taking photos somehow adds legitimacy to the whole industry.  I have nothing at all against Andean peasants chewing coca leaves to stay awake longer, seems no different to me from London businessmen drinking wine to relax.  It has been a part of the local culture in the Andes for centuries and seems to do no harm.  Indeed I have no problem with anyone taking any drug as long as it doesn't make them a danger, or a nuisance, to others.  But cocaine makes people aggressive, is highly addictive, and the whole industry to produce it has led to low-level guerilla warfare for decades in Colombia with many associated deaths and millions having been forced from their homes.  So, reluctantly I admit, I decided not to seek out one of the guides offering secret tours
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