For most visitors, the only function of Lago Agrio (also known as Nueva Loja) is asthe gateway to the stunningly beautiful Cuyabeno Reserve. Just twenty minutes in town and its obvious why nearly all travelers only stop overnight, or even just for a few hours, enroute to Cuyabeno.

A small grid of dusty streets full of rundown bars, restaurants, and hostels makes up thetown’s dodgy central area, which is frequented by oil workers andprostitutes. The vast majority of Lago’s residents are employed by the oil industry in some capacity– no surprise considering that the place is named after the Sour Lake, Texas, home of theTexaco oil company that extracted more than 5 billion liters of oil from the region over a thirty-year span beginning in 1964 (while allegedly dumping some 70 billion liters of toxic waste into the area as well).

Lago has also gained a reputation – given its jungle locale and close proximity (20 km) to the Columbian border – as a favored hideout for Columbian fugitives, paramilitary, and drug runners, a reality evidenced by the security checks on busses leaving town. Crossing into Columbia is, by all accounts, best done at another point.