The Fountains of El Dorado

Artist's Comments:
Hacha Falls, Canaima, Venezuela.

"The legend speaks of a fantastic lagoon far beyond the great mountains, a place of unspeakable beauty and mystery, where the gilded man became king." Like Shangri La in Tibet, El Dorado is the mysterious mythical paradise of South America. When you arrive in the magnificent Canaima National Park in Venezuela, you feel like you've become privy to the secret. It's a vast landscape of mysterious table mountains, with hundreds of waterfalls pouring off the cliff edges into pristine rainforests and lagoons below. It's a land of Jaguars, Toucans, Quetzals, and river dolphins. And the Pemon people that live there are among the friendliest I've ever met. It's one of the Earth's greatest natural treasures and a crown jewel of South America's famous wilderness parks.

By Michael Anderson