#trinidade

Photos : Praia Trinidade, au sud de Paraty

#6 - Premier week end à la plage

Nuvens e Pedras na praia de Trinidade

The island of Trinidade

About 1200 kilometers east of Brazil in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean lies the small and remote island of Trinidade. It belongs to the archipelago Trinidade and Martim Vaz and is part of a chain of submarine volcanoes. The island is only 8 kilometers long and 2 kilometers wide with a steep and rugged terrain.

Trinidade is made up of several lava domes and steep-sided volcanic plugs (mass of solidified magma or breccias filling the former feeder pipe of a volcano). It is the result of volcanic activity deep below the Atlantic Ocean and started to form at the end of the Pliocene period about 3 million years ago.

The island used to be covered by a forest until some Portuguese colonists brought along herds of goats, sheep and pigs. The animals and the cutting of trees made the forest disappear and caused heavy soil erosion throughout the island degrading fertile soils. Nowadays the archipelago has no permanent settlement. It is visited by researchers and teams from the Brazilian Navy periodically, though.

Trinidade has a tropical oceanic climate and is the most important nesting ground for green sea turtles in all of Brazil. There is also a large population of seabirds on the islands. These and all other forms of native wildlife are under serious threat and are highly protected.

Xandi