Salto Para

Salto Pará is where the Caura river drops over a broad rock step, and its scale comes from width rather than height: the fall runs in a broad horseshoe broken by forested islands into a series of separate curtains, with an enormous volume of water going over in the wet season. It is reached only by boat, several days up the Caura from the town of Maripa, through Ye'kwana and Sanema territory. The falls lie some 210 kilometres above the Caura's confluence with the Orinoco and mark the boundary between the upper and lower river - hard to carry boats past, they were long a frontier between peoples - and the French naturalist Eugène André was the first European to describe them, in 1900.

The landscape

• The horseshoe - a fall running several kilometres around a broad rock step.
• The island curtains - forested islands splitting the flow into separate falls.
• The volume - one of the largest water volumes of any fall in the country.
• The river journey - several days by boat through rainforest to reach it.

When to go

December to April is the dry season and the easiest for the river trip. The wet season brings enormous flow but harder travel. Trips must be arranged well ahead.

What to expect

The journey is several days each way by boat and needs a properly organised expedition. Permits and community agreements are required.

Nearby

Maripa is downstream, and Ciudad Bolivar is north.

Key facts