The table-top mountain straddling Venezuela, Brazil, and Guyana is Mount Roraima, the highest of the Pacaraima chain of tepuis. Its flat summit and sheer sandstone cliffs make it one of South America’s most striking geological landmarks.
Mount Roraima rises to about 2,810 meters in the Guiana Highlands. Most of the mountain lies in Venezuela, with smaller sections extending into Guyana and Brazil. The tripoint where the three countries meet is located on the plateau, although the mountain’s highest point lies on the Venezuelan side.
Tepuis are ancient plateau mountains formed from resistant sandstone. Heavy rainfall and erosion have carved Mount Roraima’s summit into strange rock formations, channels, pools, and caves. Its isolation has also encouraged distinctive plant and animal life, including species found nowhere else.
European explorers described Roraima in the nineteenth century, and a British expedition led by Everard im Thurn reached the summit in 1884. The mountain later helped inspire the setting of Arthur Conan Doyle’s 1912 novel The Lost World. It is sometimes confused with Auyán-tepui, the Venezuelan tepui from which Angel Falls descends.