Ecuador's great Andean-to-Amazon park, stretching from the glacier-capped Cayambe volcano to the cloud forests of the Quijos valley.
Cayambe-Coca National Park
Cayambe-Coca National Park is one of the largest protected areas in Ecuador, spanning the northeastern Andes and descending from the high páramo into the upper Amazon basin. It crosses the provinces of Imbabura, Pichincha, Napo and Sucumbíos, covering a vast range of elevations from around 600 meters in the Quijos river basin to more than 5,700 meters at the snow-covered summit of Volcán Cayambe.
Within this gradient the park protects a remarkable sequence of ecosystems, including Andean páramos with their distinctive frailejones and bunch grasses, high-elevation Polylepis woodlands, montane cloud forests, and the humid evergreen forests that descend toward the Amazon. Glaciers, glacial lakes, active volcanoes, waterfalls, and extensive wetland systems add to the variety of landscapes.
Beyond its natural value, the park holds cultural significance because indigenous Kichwa communities live in places such as Oyacachi, and Cofán communities inhabit parts of Sucumbíos. Cayambe-Coca is recognized as a Ramsar wetland site and an Important Bird Area, hosting hundreds of bird species, large mammals such as the Andean bear and the Andean fox, and a wide array of amphibians and reptiles.
