A VAST REGION

Located in the Western Hemisphere south of the U.S., Latin America has a land area of about 8 million square miles. The contries of the region share a heritage of settlement by Europeans, especially those from Spain and Portugal. Most of these settlers spoke Spanish or Portuguese. Geographers divide Latin America into three areas - Middle America (Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Belize, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica), the Caribbean Islands (Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Cuba, Dominica, Grenada, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, and Trinidad and Tobago.) and South America ( Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, and Venezuela).

MOUNTAINS AND PLATEOUS

One of Latin Americas most distinctive landforms is its towering mountains like the Sierra Madre in Mexico, the Central Highlands in Central America, and the Andes in South America. The Sierra Madres surround the densely populated Mexican Plateau, which covers most of central Mexico. In Peru and Bolivia, the spectacular Andes peaks encircle a region called the altiplano, which mean high plain. In southern Argentina, hills and lower flatlands form the plateau of Patagonia.

Eastern South America is marked by broad plateaus and valleys. The Mato Grasso Plateau spreads over much of Brazil and across the west to Bolivia and Peru.

LOWLANDS AND PLAINS

Narrow coastal lowlands wind their way along the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean and also in the Atlantic and Pacific coastsof South America. One of the longest strips of coastal plain in Latin America lies along Brazil's Atlantic Coast that is about 40 miles wide but narrows considerably as it winds southward. Inland areas of South America holds vast grasslands: the llanos of Colombia and Venezuela, and the pampas of Argentina and Uruguay. Both plains areas provide wide grazing lands for beef cattle.

WATER SYSTEMS

Like a massive circulatory system, Latin America's many waterways serve as arteries that transport people and goods to different parts of the region and the world. Most of the region's mayor rivers are in South America. One important exception is the Rio Grande which forms part of the long border between Mexico and the U.S.A.

Middle America's rivers are generally small, but the rivers that cross South America are gigantic. The Amazon is the Western Hemisphere's longest river. It travels from the Andes to the Atlantic Ocean . The Amazon and other smaller rivers form the Amazon Basin, which drains parts of Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, and Venezuela, as well as Brazil.

The Paraná, Paraguay and Uruguay Rivers together form the second-largest river system in Latin America. This system drains the rainy eastern half of South America. These rivers meet in the estatuary Río de la Plata which meets the Atlantic Ocean. Buenos Aires and Montevideo lie along this river.

Latin America has few large lakes. The biggest navigable lake, Lake Titicaca, in the Andes of Bolivia and Peru, lies about 12500 feet above sea level. Lake Maracaibo in Venezuela is regarded to be the biggest lake in South America.