Posada Alemana
Estate owned by a former Colombian drug lord
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Posada Alemana (Spanish for "German Inn") was a hotel complex built by Colombian former drug lord Carlos Lehder, located between the towns of Armenia and Pereira.[1][2][3]
History
The Inn was built on an old Cyclo-cross track and opened in 1982.[4]
The Inn had several Swiss-style cabins, a wine bar and cages with Andean condors, tigers and llamas. It had a life-size statue of John Lennon, commissioned by Lehder from the Colombian sculptor Rodrigo Arenas Betancourt. The statue depicted Lennon naked in a German worker's helmet and featured two holes representing shots fired by Mark David Chapman during Lennon's murder.[5][6]
The inn was partially abandoned when Lehder went into hiding. In 1985, a fire destroyed the restaurant and part of the bar.[7]
Following Lehder's capture and extradition in 1987, the inn was the target of looting. After having been abandoned for several years the inn was expropriated by the Colombian government in 1998.[1] The Lennon statue was stolen in late 2003.[8][9][10][11][12][13][14] In 2020, the government of the department of Quindío announced the creation of an ecological theme park on the site.[15][16][17]