Cobija

The Bolivian city of Cobija is located ca. 600 km north of La Paz in the Amazon Basin on the border of Brazil. Cobija lies on banks of the Rio Acre across from the Brazilian city Brasiléia. Cobija lies at an elevation of 280 m above sea level and has a tropical and rainy climate.

Cobija has approximately 25,000 inhabitants, is the seat of a university and capital of the Bolivian Pando Department. Cobija has two airports and is connected by one road to El Choro in the Beni Department, which is not always passable during the rainy season.

Cobija was founded in 1906 by Colonel Enrique Cornejo, originally under the name of Bahía and received its current name in 1908 in commemoration of the former Bolivian sea port Cobija on the Pacific, the site of which is on territory belonging to Chile since the Salpeter War. In the early 1900s, Cobija experienced a boom as a India rubber industry center. When the industry collapsed, a major source of income being lost, Cobija became impoverished and its population greatly decreased. Currently, the region's primary industry is Brazil nuts.

Cobija is located on the Acre river. At an altitude of 280 meters above sea level in the northwestern jungle region Cobija is located in the rainiest region in Bolivia. Coboja also has a hot climate, with temperatures commonly above 26 degrees Celsius.

Cobija was the first significant Pacific Ocean port of independent Bolivia. In 1825, it was the main port of Bolivia due to the Potosí silver mine.

The city was destroyed by an earthquake in 1865, but it was revived with the discovery of ore in Caracoles. At the end of the War of the Pacific, the city and the entire coastal province of Bolivia was annexed by Chile. In a treaty signed in 1904 Bolivia recognised the loss of Cobija.

Eventually, Cobija was replaced by the port at Antofagasta and in 1907 it was abandoned and its parish was moved to the town of Gatico which is itself now nearly a ruin.