Depending on who you talk to, the Cañón
del Colca in southern Peru is the third or fourth, or maybe the fifth, deepest
canyon in the world.
Some say Nepal’s Kali
Gandaki Gorge holds the title. Where the river runs between the peaks of
Annapurna and Dhaulagiri the elevation difference reaches 5,570 meters (18,275
feet). For others the Tsangpo Canyon in Tibet is the deepest; though listed at
5,500 meters (18,000 feet) deep, at one point the river flows 6,009 meters
(19,714 feet) below the land above it.
Then there’s the DenmanGlacier, hidden under the snows of Antarctica. Reaching 3,500 meters (11,500
feet) below sea level doesn’t make it the deepest in relation to the land
around it, but it does make this glacier-carved valley the lowest point of dry
land on Earth.
Cañón del Colca, then, seems to sit at #3
on the list of World’s Deepest Canyons. With a maximum depth of 3,501 meters, this
remarkable hole in the ground is fully twice as deep as the Grand
Canyon in Arizona, USA.
Which is nice. But that’s
not why we’re here.
