There's a reason the best decisions a company makes almost never happen in the same old boardroom. A leadership team needs physical distance to gain mental distance: to step away from the building, the traffic, the notifications, and find a place where conversation can breathe. Less than an hour from Bogotá, between the Tominé Reservoir and the mountains of Cundinamarca, there are two very different settings for making that happen: Club Náutico El Portillo and La Tartaria. Neither is better than the other — each shifts a group's energy in its own way, and choosing the right one is half the work of planning a good offsite.
Before getting into venues, it's worth naming what really matters when an executive team steps away to think big. It's not the elegant catering or the pretty view, though those help. It's the structure of the experience.
With that in mind, the question stops being "where should we book?" and becomes "what does this team need right now?"
El Portillo, right on the waters of the Tominé Reservoir, has something few corporate venues manage: facilities built for serious meetings, with the water just steps away. The rooms work well for presentations, strategic planning, or long working sessions, and when the group needs to step away from the table, the sailing club is right there. An afternoon on the water — even for people who've never touched a tiller — has an almost immediate effect on team dynamics: it demands attention, coordination, and shared silence, three things that rarely happen in an office. For offsites that need to keep one foot in operations while letting go with the other, El Portillo offers exactly that balance: a formal agenda in the morning, wind and water in the afternoon. If the offsite calls for a memorable closing dinner, it's also possible to arrange an evening on the reservoir with Sailing Hotai, or a waterfront evening at Club Náutico Hansa, so the last night is planned as carefully as the first working session.
If El Portillo invites focus, La Tartaria invites release. It's a farm in Tena, surrounded by mountains, where the pace is set by the horse rather than the clock. For teams that have spent months in urgency mode, riding as a group — even for a couple of hours — has a resetting effect that no PowerPoint presentation can match. The tree-planting experience adds a layer many leaders value especially today: a tangible, collective activity with real meaning, something the team can point to afterward as theirs — something they did together that's still standing. La Tartaria works best for the part of an offsite devoted to rebuilding trust, aligning on values, or simply letting difficult conversations happen while walking, rather than sitting face to face. And for teams who want to close the day with something restorative, a stop at the thermal baths of Club Duchi, in La Calera, is a natural addition to the route.
The question I usually ask a leadership team before recommending a venue is simple: what do you need more of right now, clarity or rest? If the goal is strategic planning, setting next year's objectives, or a difficult decision that demands concentration, El Portillo provides the right frame. If the goal is reconnecting as a team, healing accumulated tension, or simply pausing after a demanding year, La Tartaria serves that purpose better. Many of the offsites that work best, in fact, combine both: a day of formal work by the water and a day of nature and pause on the farm.
Designing an offsite that actually shifts something in a team — not just gets them out of the office for a day — is exactly the work we do at Encuentro. If your leadership team needs that kind of space, write to us and we'll build the experience together, from the first item on the agenda to the last toast.