Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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To Form An Accurate Idea Of The Situation Of
Caracas, We Must Bear In Mind The General Direction Of The
Mountains Of The Coast, And The Great Longitudinal Valleys By Which
They Are Traversed.
The Rio Guayra rises in the group of primitive
mountains of Higuerote, which separates the valley of Caracas from
that of Aragua.
It is formed near Las Ajuntas, by the junction of
the little rivers of San Pedro and Macarao, and runs first eastward
as far as the Cuesta of Auyamas, and then southward, uniting its
waters with those of the Rio Tuy, below Yare. The Rio Tuy is the
only considerable river in the northern and mountainous part of the
province.
The river flows in a direct course from west to east, the distance
of thirty leagues, and it is navigable along more than three
quarters of that distance. By barometrical measurements I found the
slope of the Tuy along this length, from the plantation of
Manterola* (* At the foot of the high mountain of Cocuyza, 3 east
from Victoria.) to its mouth, east of Cape Codera, to be two
hundred and ninety-five toises. This river forms in the chain of
the coast a kind of longitudinal valley, while the waters of the
llanos, or of five-sixths of the province of Caracas, follow the
slope of the land southward, and join the Orinoco. This
hydrographic sketch may throw some light on the natural tendency of
the inhabitants of each particular province, to export their
productions by different roads.
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