Name: Geography Now! Guyana
Uploaded: 2020-03-30T02:27:00.000Z
Duration: 10 min 48 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

You know how Singapore is like the "Switzerland of Asia"?

Well, Guyana is kind of like the Singapore of South America.

Adverbs of manner

Actually, that's not a good comparison, they don't have the same-level-

Yes, the people here call their country "Guyana".

OKAY, this is not one of those Youtube channels! Let's move on.

Now, Guyana is kind of strange because geographically, they are located on the South American continent,

but if you ask a Guyanese person, they'll say that they are Caribbean,

even though they don't even touch the Caribbean Sea.

Guyana is located in the northern section of mainland South America,

bordered by Venezuela, Brazil, and Suriname, with the North Atlantic Ocean flanking the north coast.

The country is divided into 10 regions, with the capital along the coast (Georgetown).

By the way, the shape of the country kind of looks like a fat crucifix.

The country has a lot of small regional airports and airstrips, however,

the 2 largest and international airports are both located in Georgetown.

Cheddi Jagan International and the smaller one, Eugene F. Correia International.

Otherwise, outside Georgetown, Bartica has the largest regional airport.

Otherwise, seaports and container terminals can be found all along the coast in places like New Amsterdam, Linden, Essequibo, and of course Georgetown.

About 90% of people live along the coast on only about 10% of the land,

with a few outskirt communities mostly in the east, along on the border with Suriname and Brazil.

Cross-country driving in Guyana is very limited.

I mean, you could take a ferry at Bartica and drive down a little bit into the Upper Takutu, Potaro-Siparuni, and Cuyini-Mazaruni regions,

however, if you cruise along the the coast, you'll stop about somewhere around the farming town of Hackeny,

along the Pomeroo river, and suddenly everything turns into a dead end.

To this day, there are no roads that lead into the Barima Waini region.

The entire population of 26,000 people only have access to river navigation and landing strips for small planes.

In addition, there are no roads that lead into Venezuela.

If you wanna go there, you have to drive all the way south,

cross at Lethem, and then pretty much all the way at Boa Vista, Brazil,

you then backtrack up north into Venezuela.

This is because they kind of have a partially ongoing dispute with Venezuela.

Basically, Venezuela believes that everything west of the Essequibo river should be theirs.

Basically, they signed an agreement in Geneva in the 60's, but it really didn't do anything,

and to this day, Venezuela is kind of like:

Venezuela: Okay, fine...I guess the land is kind of yours now.

Guyana: Hey! Stop building a military base on Ankoko Island, that's OUR territory!

And then in 2011, Guyana was kind of like:

Guyana: Hey UN, I'd like to extend my coast about 150 nautical miles, please!

Venezuela: Uh, no, that's OUR water claim.

Guyana: Uh, no, it literally juts up from our coast,

and all nations are entitled to exclusive economic zones, okay?

Suriname: Back off from the Tigri New River Triangle!

Suriname: Okay, let's agree to withdraw our military forces from the region.

Oh, South American countries! Always fighting over land you will never inhabit.

Otherwise, some top notable sights and landmarks include places like:

St. George's crumbling colonial townscape with St. George's Cathedral,

Demerara Harbour Bridge, one of the longest floating bridges in the world,

the headquarters of CARICOM (or the Caribbean Community)

Oh my gosh, there are so many cool spots in a place that is a mostly unexplored jungle.

Basically, Guyana is like a survival-themed, reality TV show, location shoot paradise.

Guyana is the 2nd most densely forested country in South America, after Suriname,

as 3/4 of the country is covered in trees.

Keep in mind though, the country is actually made up of 5 natural regions:

the white sand belt inland, made up of sand/clay and where most of the mineral deposits are located,

and if you go WAAAYY far south, you can get a little bit of desert and savannah in the interior,

and then you get the interior savannah lowlands, located along the border with Brazil.

Guyana sits on what is called the "Guyana Shield",

an elevated geological formation on South America and north of the Amazon.

This area essentially creates some of the most beautiful, iconic waterfalls

and all of the strange, flat top Tepuis mountains,

including the tallest peak in Guyana, Mt. Roraima, shared by Venezuela and Brazil,

even though Brazil only has about 5% of it, but hey, it still counts!

The longest river is, of course, easily visible from satellite images,

Essequibo River, which pretty much transects the entire country east to west and is a major source of transport/trade in Guyana.

In the forest, you can find thousands upon thousands of species of mammals and birds and reptiles,

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Geography Now! Guyana

iconic

potentially

territory

influence