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Cocos Island National Park
| Site number: | 820 |
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| Type of site: | Natural | |
| Date of Inscription: | 1997, 2002 | |
| Location: | South America, Costa Rica, Province of Puntarenas, South Eastern Tropical Pacific | |
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NHK World Heritage 100 seriesUp to 75 images are shown here. Click on each for more details or on Image Gallery for more images.
| Description: | Situated some 550 km off the Pacific coast of Costa Rica, Cocos Island National Park is the only island in the tropical eastern Pacific in possession of a tropical rainforest. The area is an ideal laboratory for the study of biological processes due to its position as the first point of contact with the northern equatorial counter-current, as well as the multitude of interactions between the island and the surrounding marine ecosystem. The national park’s underwater world infamous for the attraction it holds for divers, who consider it one of the world’s best places to view large pelagic species such as sharks, rays, tuna and dolphins. --WHMNet paraphrase from the description at WHC Site, where additional information is available. | |
| Cocos Island (Spanish: Isla del Coco) is an island located off the shore of Costa Rica. It constitutes district 11 (one of 13 districts) of Puntarenas Canton of Puntarenas Province. It should not be confused with the Cocos (Keeling) Islands. It is one of the National Parks of Costa Rica. It is located in the Pacific Ocean, 550 km (330 mi.) from the Pacific shore of Costa Rica, at 05°31′08″N, 087°04′18″W. Its area is 23,85 km² (16 mi²), about 8x3 km (5x1.8 mi), more or less in a rectangular shape. Wafer Station (Estación Wafer) is located at Wafer Bay (Bahía Wafer) on the north coast. Its perimeter is about 21 km (12½ mi). Surrounded by deep waters with counter-currents, it is admired by scuba divers for its populations of Hammerhead sharks, rays and dolphins. Cocos Island is located on almost the exact opposite side of the globe as the Cocos (Keeling) Islands south of Sumatra. --Wikipedia. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. | ||
| Source: | http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/820 | |
| Source2: | http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/820/video | |
| Reference: | 1. UNESCO World Heritage Center, Site Page. | |