The Sierra Nevada de Merida (Venezuela): Its rich environmental

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The Sierra Nevada is the highest mountain range of the Andes in Venezuela. It is nearly always covered with snow. This corridor has five iconic peaks : the Humboldt, Bonpland, la Concha, the Bull and the Pico Bolívar (5004 meters). It is located southeast of Mérida. For the inhabitants of the surrounding towns it means more than landscape, beauty, tourism. There exists between the Sierra and its inhabitants a consubstantiation: that is undeniably a part of its being. Its eternity, strength, toughness are passed along to those who gaze upon it day by day in security, serenity, solidarity, ultimately an existential identification, therefore, to the extent possible, they care for their Cordillera Merida. They monitor, spoil her, love her. She is the repository of their being.

Sierra Nevada constitutes an ethical, ecological, artistic anthological paradigm. Its height combined with its beauty defies, invites, challenges the body and spirit. If the rock is the body of the Cordillera - Cordillera from Genesis – then the women and men, who feed on the fruits of this earth, consume the rock, and carry in their bones, its psyche. Adding to this the green of the forests of the foothills, the nuances of the mass of the mountains, the peaks an emblematic blue and white wall of infinity.



Its beauty leaves an undeniable mark on the minds of its inhabitants near and far, native or foreign, to its environment. Cordillera, of Genesis in as much as its dwellers reside in its space of procreation, they take it in their hearts throughout their existence, during their pilgrimage through the days of their adventure as human beings.




THE SIERRA NEVADA DE MERIDA

When you contemplate
from this side of the abyss
those men, those women, who hold within
the other half to yourself,
this thirst for permanence in the motionless silence.
Him, her, you know how you look
you small, mischievous adventure of existence,
your eros, your laughter, your dreams, inevitably fleeting.
Always returning their gaze to you.
Knowing your unchanging, quiet peace
They find in your high lofty silhouette a temple
lost here in the reality of the hours.
They scavange their hearts for the cliff
finding only dissapointment, the hidden fear.
Walking hurriedly through the streets of your city,
along the paths of your fields,
constantly looking sideways
to be sure of your resolution.
You, the only, the essential meaning, the truth.
Before the confusion of the day,
sign it, the eternal, the membership offer.

Lubio Cardozo, Venezuelan poet.



Safeguarding the Sierra Nevada is a test of our efficiency to protect the natural environment.Through taking care of this space of Mother Nature we also take care of ourselves. Several decades ago the Cordillera de Mérida was declared a National Park.

By Lenin Cardozo / Lubio Cardozo / Edith Regier