Forest across the valley

I'm a little surprised how the area is as dry as it is - like high chaparal east of the Cascades or the Grand Mesa in Colo. My uber-fallible imagination thought it was more tropical.
What keeps grabbing my attention here are those little luminant spiky-leaved plants that punctuate the mid-tones over much of the image. They seem to add alot of brightness & contrast.

HMMM... I don´t know what makes you think the area is dry ? Shape of the vegetation ? This is the water reservoir for Bogotá and it receives more than 2,500 mm (that is > 100 inches) of rain a year ! The spiky-leaved plants are high-altitude members of the sunflower. They are covered with silver hairs and absorb IR radiation, to avoid freezing.