Unhalted by a dam anywhere on its 1,300-mile [2,092-kilometer] course, the Orinoco [shown above at its delta] floods annually and prodigiously. When the rainy Venezuelan 'winter' arrives, lasting from May through November, the river rises more than 40 feet [12 meters], drowning grazing lands miles from its low-water line.
—From "The Orinoco: Into the Heart of Venezuela," April 1998, National Geographic magazine
