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Venezuela · South America
La Guajira Desert
Where South America's largest northern desert meets the Caribbean, the Wayuu people herd across windswept sands and dive for pearls in sapphire waters.
Why La Guajira Desert stands out
La Guajira Desert sprawls across the northernmost tip of South America, stretching some 1,100 kilometers north of Bogotá. This vast expanse—the continent's largest desert north of the equator—spans the La Guajira Peninsula, its territory divided between Colombia's La Guajira Department and Venezuela's Zulia state. Beneath its sun-baked surface lie immense coal reserves, mined in the region known as El Cerrejón.
The geography and story of La Guajira Desert
The Wayuu people call this harsh landscape home, having adapted to its extremes across generations. While many tend herds across the arid terrain, others possess a remarkable dual mastery: they are renowned deep-sea divers who venture into the Caribbean's depths to harvest pearls. This extraordinary skill—crossing from desert to ocean—defines their unique relationship with this remote peninsula.
The Wayuu are both desert herders and master pearl divers, seamlessly inhabiting two vastly different ecosystems separated only by the desert's edge.
La Guajira Desert at a glance
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Test yourself
Which desert's indigenous people are known for herding livestock on land, then diving deep into the Caribbean to harvest pearls?
La Guajira Desert is home to the Wayuu people, who uniquely combine pastoral herding across the arid peninsula with skilled deep-sea pearl diving in the adjacent Caribbean waters.
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