Chuao is a small village located in the northern coastal range mountains of Venezuela, founded in 1660. The village is famous for its cacao plantations, Diablos danzantes and San Juaneras. The village is surrounded by mountains and dense rainforests to the south and the Caribbean Sea to the north. The nearby Henri Pittier National Park is the oldest national park in Venezuela, created in 1937. The village is only accessible by travelling via boat from nearby Choroní, and is approximately 4 kilometers inland.
History
While cocoa production in the site of Chuao can be traced back to 1591, Upon landing in Chuao, the attackers, which included two Americans, were detained.
Economy
The village of Chuao subsists largely on fishing and cocoa production.
Empresa Campesina de Chuao
The Farmer's Company of Chuao () is the worker's cooperative which operates the cocoa plantations of Chuao. The partnership sells 99% of its cocoa to foreign buyers.
The cooperative has benefitted largely from an increased global appetite for high-quality chocolate in recent years, The dancers who partake in this festival become members of a lifelong pact, known as the promise-keepers, to transmit their history and traditions to others.
The church of the Immaculate Conception was built in 1772, replacing an old chapel. It was declared a National Monument according to Official Gazette No. 26,320 dated August 2, 1960. The exterior of the church is two-body with a mixed-linear pediment and a series of double pilasters flanking the main entrance with a semicircular arch. Simple cornices define and compose the façade. The interior has a presbytery and vestry along the end wall and a bell tower on the right side. The church still has valuable colonial religious images including one of Saint Nicholas of Bari in wood and canvas.
The Pardon Cross is situated on the left side of the church courtyard, which gives on to the Calle Real and the Plaza Bolivar. In the time of slavery, if a hunted slave managed to get to the cross and kneel before it, he could not be punished, and he was absolved of blame.
The House on the Hill dates from 1652. It was the administrator's house of the Hacienda. The principal facade is two stories high, with windows. The. upper floor is reached via the staircase on the right side. It has a simple, linear facade where the verandas have circular section columns with a Tuscan capital and base, and wooden pillars on the upper floor determine the building's original commercial use.
The Mamey Ruins is a stone construction located on El Mamey hill in natural surroundings. Its age and use goes back to the first years of the Colony, Most of the stone walls are still standing in an L-shape (50 m x 40 m).
The Chalk Oven is located on the road between the Mamey ruins and the Caribbean Sea. This is a circular stone structure with chalk mortar and two buttresses.
The Royal road leading from El Mamey to the beach is beautifully designed and perfectly preserved. Its characteristics and size indicate that the Mamey Ruins must have been very important.
The Chuao Plantation has a cultural landscape representative of the traditional way of exploiting cocoa, one of the most important products in the economic history of South America. This has been possible because of the plantation's almost in-sable location the fact that its production has been maintained for centuries by people with deep cultural roots, and the very special variety of the criollo-type cocoa considered among the best in the world and which is in danger of extinction.
Chuao's unique cultural landscape consists of the natural surroundings of the Henri Pittier National Park, the combination of the natural forest with the cocoa plantations, and the existence of ancient irrigation systems that make it possible to irrigate the plantation all year round. The Chuao Plantation is also a place of living culture where the native black people, descended from the slaves, have kept their traditions alive until our days. This culture is the result of the combination of their deep African roots with the Western world through the Catholic religion and today it is the oldest cultural manifestation in Venezuela. Chuao is above all a living culture, the symbiosis of African Caribbean rites and music and Catholic rites and beliefs.
Gallery
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File:Chuao 2012 001.jpg|Chuao Bay
Image:cacao.jpg|Cacao beans
Image:Chuao_cacao01.JPG|Chuao cocoa beans under the sun
Image:Chuao_002.JPG|Plaza de Secado. The Church yard where the cocoa beans are sun dried.
Image:Chuao_003.JPG|Plaza de Secado. Boy helping his mother to collect the cocoa beans. Chuao, Venezuela.
Image:Chuao_004.JPG|Plaza de Secado. The mother collecting the cocoa away from the sun. Chuao, Venezuela.
Image:Chuao_001.JPG|Cocoa in fermentation process
File:Iglesia de Chuao.JPG|Chuao church
File:Chuao 2012 003.jpg|Chuao fishers' boats
File:Chuao 2012 000.jpg|Chuao new town
</gallery>