Mérida
Venezuela · 1630 m
Description
Mérida sits on a terrace between two rivers in the Venezuelan Andes with snow peaks above it, and its university keeps the town young and cheap. The Mukumbarí cable car climbs from sixteen hundred metres to Pico Espejo at 4765 metres in four stages and is the highest cable car in the world and the second longest. From the top the glacier remnant on Pico Bolívar is a short walk away. Villages along the Sierra Nevada road keep adobe churches and páramo farms. Paragliders launch from the ridges above the valley. The cable car reopened in 2016 after a rebuild that took eight years.
Length of stay
Recommended length of stay: 3 to 7 days (optimal 4 days)
Travel season
Best time to visit: December – March
- Jan
- Feb
- Mar
- Apr
- May
- Jun
- Jul
- Aug
- Sep
- Oct
- Nov
- Dec
Highlights
- Mukumbarí cable car to Pico Espejo
- Sierra Nevada National Park
- Paragliding from the valley ridges
- Plaza Bolívar and the cathedral
- Páramo villages along the Sierra road
- Los Nevados village on the mountainside
- Heladería Coromoto and its hundreds of flavours
- Jají and the restored colonial villages(Day trip)
- Trekking towards Pico Bolívar
- Andean market at Mucuchíes(Day trip)
- Laguna de Mucubají and the páramo lakes(Day trip)