Island Coconuts

The island Cocos is an island belonging to the republic of the Costa Rica. It is classified with the world heritage of UNESCO since 1997. Located at 482,7 kilometers in the South-west of this one, it is attached to the province of Puntarenas. It was known to accommodate the Pirate S which hid the treasures plundered with the Spanish there. This is why it is called today the island with the treasure.

It is the only island of the Eastern tropical Pacific having a wet tropical forest.

Nowadays, the island is known primarily for its fauna and its underwater Flore which is exceptional, like for its wet tropical forest. Since 1997, it belongs to the World heritage of humanity. http://cocos-island.org Autor: Peter Disch-Lauxmann

History

The island Coconuts, also called “the Emerald of the Pacific”, was discovered by the sailors at least at the beginning of XVIe century. It appeared the first time on a chart of Nicholas Desliens under the name of “OF Cocques d' Y' sle” in 1541. Thereafter, one could find the island on several charts and works.

The flibustiers and the pirates, whose sphere of activity was with the length of the Pacific of the Spanish America, took the island for strong trunk and place of refuge between XVIIe and the beginning of the XIXe century. One counts several pirates who attended this island among them, one a: Bennett Graham, William Davis, Benito Bonito, William Thompson. They chose this island for its wood and its drinking water. The island was then called “the island with the treasures” and this because of many treasures would seem to be hidden by pirates in several caves. Thus, the writer Robert Louis Stevenson was inspired some to write the history of “the island to the treasure”. The first visitors of the island were then the hunters of treasures of the whole world which undertook more than 500 forwardings between 1846 and 1997.

The island was then classified World heritage of Humanity in 1997 and the excavations were then prohibited by the government of Costa Rica in order not to denature the site.

Description

The island coconuts is composed of a ground surface of 46,6 km ² with a circumference of approximately 23 km. It has 12 km of length and 5 km broad. It is located at the first contact point with the north-equatorial counter-current. On the Western part, one can see Cerro Iglesias the highest point of the island. It is, moreover, the only island of the Eastern tropical Pacific papered of a wet tropical forest.

However, the island is entirely covered with flows of lava of labocorite and andesite. Thus, one finds remainders of origins volcanic which form cliffs. Around this one, one counts several small small islands made up of basalt colomnaire which are used as refuge with the marine birds such as the idiots, the gulls and the noddis.

Its fauna is of Eastern peaceful origin, the central American continent and Galapagos. The establishment of the permanent payments was avoided thanks to the topography of the island and its distance what prevented the destruction of the flora and fauna normals.

One counts 155 vascular factories and 48 nonvascular, including 15% endemic, in the flora of the island.

The climate is tropical wet and hot. During nine months out of twelve from May to October, there are rain and fog.

Thus, among the many activities which it offers, the tourists can visit the forests enchanters of giant and foam-draped trees, of bromeliads of drainage, ferns of tree of colossall, palms of slender and muddled vines. Nevertheless, these visits are very thoroughly controlled by the State and the island cannot be entirely visited because a third of the territory is interdict to the public. In addition, this one is being the ideal laboratory for the study of the biological processes thanks to the myriad of interactions between the island and the surrounding marine ecosystem.

One counts at least 60 species of animals, endemic in the island and the majority are in danger. Among these animals, thousands of marine birds can be seen while skirting a path which crosses the island. Mainly 4 species are counted: fuliginous terns and white terns like two species of noddis.

The Cocos island is also very famous for its marine world and more and more of plungers regard it as the best place in the world to be able to contemplate the great species.

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