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It is located in the Guayana Region, amidst the states of Guárico, Anzoátegui, Monagas, and Delta Amcuro to the North; Apure to the West and Amazonas to the Southwest. It limits with Brazil to the South, and it does so to the East with the territory under claim by Venezuela and British Guiana. It has an area of 238 thousand square kilometers, and practically all of the state lies in the Guayana Massif, whose epeirogenic movements and geologic processes gave birth to a stepped gradation that produced tabular relief formations known as tepuyes (teh-pooh-yes). These are located predominantly to the center and South parts of the state.
The Guayana Massif is the largest and less populated of all the Venezuelan regions and represents approximately 45% of the Nation's territory. It extends South of the Orinoco river, to the limits with Colombia and Brazil. It is the region where the most ancient geological formation of the Earth can be found.
Geographical Conditions
The Bolívar state has an average altitude of 400 meters above sea level. The highest plateaus rise over 2000 meters. The summit is the Roraima tepuy (2,810 meters a.s.l.), located in the Pacaraima sierra, which merges at the South with those of Parima and Tapirapeco. The northern massif is fairly homogeneous, with heights below 400 meters and numerous hills. The sierras of Nuria and Imataca stand out in the Northeast, and high plains and hills above 500 meters drained by the Yuruari river. The Southeastern sector comprises the Gran Sabana (Great Savannah) and the rest of the territory to the West of the Caroní river, formed by three plateaus. Here lies the famous Canaima National Park, location of the spectacular 979 meter high Angel Falls.
Indigenous peoples of the Pemon ethnos inhabit this vast extension of land, gathering the Arekuna, Taurepan and Kamaracoto families, who in spite of having been influenced by other cultures still preserve their own traditions and peculiarities.
Inside this imposing and not less wonderful natural scenery lie the most ancient rocks of the planet's history, from the pre-cambric period, estimated at around 1,500 y 2,000 million years of age. These rock formations compose the Guayana Massif.
Climate and vegetation
The climate is tropical, though it varies according to the zone visited. Hence, low areas have high temperatures -reaching up to 27º C as average- and abundant rain, especially during the last months of the year. However, it is not strange to have showers showing up during summer as well.
Vegetation is exuberant and greatly diverse in species, except for a narrow strip at the North where the savannah is dominant. The main mountain ranges of the South form watershed divisions: rivers spawned from them generally flow to the Orinoco, yet some of them belong to the Amazon basin. The Raúl Leoni hydro-electrical central (also known as the Guri Hydro-electrical Complex) built on the Caroní river is noteworthy, as well as the centrals of Macagua, Caruachi, and Tocoma, currently under construction.
The massif's hillsides bear thick forests of enormous trees that teach survival; these huge creatures of the vegetable kingdom have had to develop abutments to keep themselves upright as their roots need to be superficial to extract the nutrients from the decomposing organic matter on the ground. Their trunks and branches host epiphytic plants like orchids and bromeliads. The delicate soil of fallen leaves grows heliconias, ferns, small palms and mosses, their flourishing blessed by the ever present moisture of the area. These conditions also favor the presence of fungi and lichens in this ecosystem.
As in most all of the Guayana mesas, the top of the Auyantepuy hosts endemic ecosystems, that is, plants that do not exist elsewhere in the planet, which makes it fragile and delicate. In fact, 77% of the more than 800 plant species that dwell the place are exclusive of this outstanding kingdom.
The terrain's relief is varied and goes from gently sloped plains at the margins of the Orinoco river to the mesas that rise spectacularly up to heights of 2,800 meters above sea level. World unique, bordered by vertical walls, each is known as a tepuy.
The Tepuyes
Tepuyes are flat-topped rock formations, plateaus or mesas, that resemble gigantic stone tables sculpt by thousands of years of erosion. They have been called "islands of time" for their geological antiquity. Their features rise abruptly from savannahs and dense forests, showing vertical walls of polychromatic sandstones and quartzite.
In Venezuela, they can be found to the South of the Orinoco river, on the Guayana Massif, within the Canaima National Park, which covers an area of about 30 thousand square kilometers. Among the most important we find Roraima-tepuy, Auyantepuy, Tereke-turen-tepuy, Kawarkawari-tepuy, Apakara-tepuy, Anwararapaima-tepuy, Ptari-tepuy, Tramen-tepuy, Karauni-tepuy, Wedekapuiapue-tepuy, Aparaman-tepuy, Chimanta-tepuy, Aprada-tepuy, Acopan-tepuy, Wei-tepuy (mountain of the Sun), Soropan-tepuy, Ilú-tepuy, Yuruani-tepuy (Warakarina) and Matawi-tepuy (Kukenan).
Standing out in the Canaima National Park is Auyantepuy, of 700 square kilometers of extension. To get an idea of its huge dimensions we can compare it to the island of Margarita (940 km2). It is Venezuela's largest tepuy, with a maximum altitude of 2,510 meters above sea level. Its main feature is no less than the world's highest waterfall: the Angel Falls, with a drop of 979 meters. That is 15 times higher than the Niagara Falls and three times taller than the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Known to the Pemon natives as Kerepacupai Meru, its more famous name honors the North American aviator, explorer and adventurer James Crawford Angel Marshall (Jimmy Angel), who flew over and had an emergency landing on its summit back in 1937. Some historians credit the discovery to Felix Cardona, a captain of the Venezuelan Navy; others to Ernesto Sanchez, who had visited it in 1910; but most assure that it was Jimmy Angel who showed it to the world, thus the waterfall was named after him.
Another imposing tepuy is Kukenan, called Matawi by the Pemon. It has Venezuela's second highest waterfall, with 610 meters: Salto Kukenan, which is occasionally interrupted during summer. Kukenan tepuy is described as a mysterious rock formation, facing the Roraima tepuy and its famous valley of crystals, rising up to 2,810 meters above sea level.
Tips for the trip
