Cordillera Costanera

The Cordillera Costanera (Spanish sometimes also Cordillera Costeña , German coastal cordillera ) is a low mountain range in western Ecuador , directly on the Pacific coast . It runs parallel to the coast between the Esmeraldas River in the north and the city of Guayaquil in the south. It is on average 10 kilometers wide, around 330 kilometers long and at its highest point 800 meters high. It consists of volcanic sedimentary rock and was formed between the end of the Cretaceous and the early Tertiary .

The Cerro Santa Ana in Guayaquil, one of the last hills of the Cordillera

The Cordillera begins on the course of the Esmeraldas and runs as a fairly broad mountain group (up to 30 kilometers) through the coastal area of ​​the provinces Esmeraldas and Manabí . It presents itself as a rather rugged landscape of rounded rock walls, whereby the erosion took on different forms and thus prevented a uniform shape of the low mountain range. Overall, this northern part is more humid and rounder than the mountains to the south. Well-known parts are the hill of Cuaque in the north of the province of Manabí and the Mache-Chindul cordillera in the north of Manabí and the south of Esmeraldas , declared a nature reserve in 1996 .

It narrows in the southern, drier and narrower sections from around Jipijapa . In the past, the middle part was characterized by moist rainforests and drier bush and shrub landscapes, but many of these have disappeared by human hands. One of the few remaining ecosystems in this area is the Machalilla National Park near Puerto López on the border of the provinces of Manabí and Santa Elena .

Over the province of Santa Elena or on the northeastern edge of the Santa Elena peninsula (e.g. Manglaralto) the cordillera runs through the western part of the province of Guayas to Guayaquil. In this last area, it is known as the Chongón-Colonche Cordillera . This part of the coastal cordillera southwest of Guayaquil contains the highest peaks of the cordillera. The mountain range extends into downtown Guayaquil, where the Cerro Santa Ana and Cerro El Carmen conclude. The Cerro Las Cabras in Durán is also one of the last foothills.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Mache-Chindul , explored.com.ec (accessed February 23, 2008)

Literature and web links

• Nelson Gómez, Elementos de Geografía del Ecuador. El hombre y el medio, Ediguias, Quito, 2002, ISBN 9978-89-002-5 .
• Provincia Guayas. Geografía , in: explored.com.ec (Spanish)