Not to miss

Amazon Jungle

The southern Amazonas region is thick with tropical rain forest, crisscrossed by rivers, and home to a number of isolated Indian tribes. The charming, balmy town of Puerto Ayacucho is rife with tour operators ready to whisk you deep into the Venezuelan Amazon on the Orinoco, Sipapo or Autana rivers.

Coro

At the base of the Península de Paraguaná, this World Heritage listed town houses Venezuela's best colonial architecture - unique adobe and earthen buildings adorn the cobblestone streets. Lined with mansions, Calle Zamora is one of the most perfectly historical streets in the country.

When you're swinging in your hammock and that coastal breeze blows in, you can understand why the natives called this place curiana, the Caquetío word meaning 'place of winds'. Coro is also a base for exploring the arid peninsula and the lush Sierra de San Luis.

Río Caura

The picturesque Río Caura, a tributary of the Río Orinoco, offers a variety of natural and cultural experiences few other rivers can match. The thick jungle setting resembles what you might find around Canaima, but unlike Angel Falls it is a year-round boat destination that's not seriously affected by the dry season.

The river is graced with islands, beaches and huge granite boulders, and cut by rapids and waterfalls. The most spectacular is Salto Pará. At the end of the lower Caura, two rapids form a huge lagoon and the long sandy beach of El Playón. For a good part of its course, the Caura flows through wildlife-rich rainforest, with riverbanks inhabited by indigenous communities. Small, personalized boat tours, usually taking four to five days, operate out of Ciudad Bolívar.

Catatumbo Lightning

Imagine a region where lightning flashes virtually nonstop, but without a single clap of thunder. That's the stunning natural phenomenon that occurs in this bizarre national park on the southwest side of Lake Maracaibo. Known as the Relámpago de Catatumbo (Catatumbo Lightning) or Faro de Maracaibo (Maracaibo Beacon), the flashes can be seen at night all over the region, weather permitting. This phenomenon is found nowhere else on earth.

The natural lightshow consists of frequent flashes of lightning with no accompanying thunder, which gives an eerie sensation. On clear dry nights you are in for an unbelievable and shocking experience. No-one has proven why it happens, but the clash of cold winds descending from the freezing Andean highlands with the hot, humid air evaporating from the lake is thought to produce the ionization of air particles responsible for the lightning.

Colonia Tovar

A little piece of old Germany lost in the Venezuelan cloud forest, this scenic town of red-tile-roof cabins lies scattered on a mountainside in the Cordillera de la Costa. It was founded in 1843 by a group of 376 German settlers from the Schwarzwald (Black Forest), recruited by swashbuckling Italian soldier/explorer/pirate Agustín Codazzi.

Isolated from the outer world by the lack of roads and rules prohibiting marriage outside the colony, the village followed the mother culture, language and architecture for a century. It wasn't until the 1940s that Spanish was introduced as the official language and the ban on marrying outside the community was abandoned. Today Colonia Tovar draws hordes of Caraqueños (Caracas locals) on weekends, curious to glimpse the traditional architecture and chomp on German sausages, candied apples or strawberries and cream. The town hams up its European heritage shamelessly and it's all very kitsch, but on weekdays you can enjoy the lush surroundings and cordial inhabitants in relative peace.