Things to Do in Venezuela

A national-park reef archipelago 35 minutes' flight from Caracas: bone-white shadeless beaches, world-class diving and some of the Caribbean's best game fishing.

The world's highest and longest cable car: from Mérida's spring-like valley up to snow-capped Pico Espejo, with Venezuela's highest peak — Pico Bolívar, 5,007 m — filling the window.

Plaza Bolívar and its quarter: the 19th-century Capitolio, the 17th-century Catedral, the gilded altars of San Francisco (1575) — the old heart of a five-million-person capital under the Waraira Repano mountains.

The world's highest waterfall: 979 metres off the rim of Auyantepui, 807 of them in a single free fall — named for bush pilot Jimmie Angel, who put it on the map in 1935.

A 30,000-square-kilometre UNESCO park of table mountains and falling water, entered through a palm-fringed lagoon with pink-sand beaches and a skyline of half a dozen waterfalls.

Venezuela's best base for mountain adventures: spring-like weather all year, the Mukumbari cable car and every guide agency within a block of Plaza Las Heroínas. Stay 2–3 nights — it's also where you slow down after the intensity of Canaima.

Venezuela's holiday island: more than 50 beaches, water between 23 and 30°C all year, world-top windsurfing at El Yaque, and 2,000-plus duty-free shops.

The historic Orinoco river city that serves as the classic gateway to Canaima: colonial centre on the river bluff, and the airstrip where Jimmie Angel's original plane sits.

The hub you'll transit and can do well: historic core, serious museums, Altamira's cafés — moved through by Metro, planned with a local operator.

The eastern coast twin cities: ferry port for Margarita, marina waterfront, and Barcelona's narrow-street historic zone — the practical hub for Venezuela's beach east.

South America's serengeti-of-the-south: anacondas, capybaras, caiman, pumas and jaguars on vast working cattle plains, watched from ranch stays with resident naturalist guides.

Venezuela's oldest national park: a cloud-forest pass with 500+ bird species recorded, dropping to the colonial beach town of Choroní on the Caribbean side.

The 4WD day into Venezuela's remotest Andes: toyotero drivers run from Mérida's Plaza Las Heroínas to time-stopped mountain villages with traditional architecture and glacier-fed lakes on the way.

The under-visited coast en route to Puerto La Cruz: the outer sandbanks of the Laguna de Unare (entered via Boca de Uchire), Puerto Píritu's long beach, and Barcelona's well-preserved colonial quarter.

The multi-day walk up the Lost World: the flat-topped mountain that inspired Conan Doyle, climbed by its natural ramp through cloud forest to a summit plateau of black rock and endemic oddities.