Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 3 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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The Image Of The Virgin, Preserved In The
Church Of The Convent, Has Been Long Revered By Mariners.
The hill
itself forms a prolonged ridge from west to east.
The calcareous rock,
with cardites, meandrites and petrified corals, somewhat resembles the
tertiary limestone of the peninsula of Araya near Cumana. It is split
and decomposed in the steep parts of the rock, and the preservation of
the convent on so unsolid a foundation is considered by the people as
one of the miracles of the patron of the place. Near the Cerro de la
Popa there appears, on several points, breccia with a limestone cement
containing angular fragments of Lydian stone. Whether this formation
of nagelfluhe is superposed on tertiary limestone of coral, and
whether the fragments of the Lydian stone come from secondary
limestone analogous to that of Zacatecas and the Moro de Nueva
Barcelona, are questions which I have not had leisure to investigate.
The view from the Popa is extensive and varied, and the windings and
rents of the coast give it a peculiar character. I was assured that
sometimes from the windows of the convent and even in the open sea,
before the fort of Boca Chica, the snowy tops of the Sierra Nevada de
Santa Marta are discernible. The distance of the Horqueta to the Popa
is seventy-eight nautical miles. This group of colossal mountains is
most frequently wrapped in thick clouds: and it is most veiled at the
season when the gales blow with violence.
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