Chacachacare

Template: Infobox Island / Maintenance / height missing

Chacachacare is related to Trinidad and Tobago of the archipelago Bocas Islands in the Dragon 's Mouth Strait ( Bocas del Dragón ), which form the northern boundary of the Gulf of Paria to the Caribbean sea. Administratively, the island is one of the region Chacachacare Diego Martin.

Geography

Chacachacare is Chaguaramas upstream in the northwest of the island of Trinidad. Trinidad is separated from the Venezuelan mainland by the Strait Boca Grande, the widest of the Bocas del Dragón. The distance to the Venezuelan mainland at Punta Peñas is 10.7 km, and the Isla de Patos 10.3 km. From the east neighboring island of Huevos Chacachacare is separated by the nearly 1300 meters wide Boca de Navios.

In the middle of the island by the great Chacachacare Bay to the east and the La Tinta Bay is almost split in two in the west. Only through a 70 meter wide isthmus the north part and the south part are connected.

History

The discovery of a ceramic shard in 1925 suggests that Chacachacare was visited occasionally, at least in prehistoric times by Native American peoples. "Discovered " in the modern sense was the island on 12 August 1498 by Christopher Columbus during his third voyage of discovery. He gave her due to their horseshoe-shaped coastline of the name " El Caracol ", the snake. In the 18th century Chacachacare Trinidad's main cotton-growing area. 1783 alone nearly 60 tons of cotton were exported. 1813 took Santiago Mariño the island from base for a campaign against the Venezuelan mainland during the wars of independence to Venezuela. After the cotton trade mid-19th century was no longer profitable, Chacachacare served until the turn of the century as a whaling station. From 1922, the island was used as a leper colony, in consequence also the sick caring nuns settled. During the 2nd World War up to 1000 U.S. Marines were temporarily stationed on the island since 1942. In the 1980s, the island was abandoned after the transfer of the last leprosy patients to Port of Spain and the subsequent task of the nuns quarters. Today Chacachacare serves only as a destination for the popular with locals "down the islands " excursions, boat tours to the in the northwest of Trinidad Bocas Islands. Periodically inhabited the island only by staff of a lighthouse and a Hindu temple, both of which were built in 1945. The U.S. real estate tycoon Donald Trump elicited in 1999 as part of the taking place at this time in Trinidad Miss Universe contest the possibilities for the establishment of a casino with adjoining hotel on the island, but it remained in the planning stage.

Flora and Fauna

Large parts of the island are covered by dry forest, which was explored in the 1940s by the British forest scientist John Stanley Beard. In the bay inside the island of highly toxic Manchinelbaum growing. On the cliffs on the southern shore grow cacti and aloes. Everywhere there are feral cotton plants as well as " buttery wood" called Ebony growths.

On Chacachacare there is the only Grausaltator population of Trinidad. The bird, however, is quite prevalent in the rest of Central America. The island is also home to many iguanas.

Gallery

Dry forest

Dry forest

Pictures of Chacachacare

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