CubaPLUS Magazine

The Bridge over the Bitirí River, nestled in a wild environment of the Cueto municipality, northeastern province of Holguín, has an exclusive singularity because there is no other natural accident that is equal throughout the national territory.

This place of notable beauty can be accessed by the road that connects Santa Isabel de Nipe with the town of Barajagua, crossing the settlement of Buenaventura of Birán. A pilgrimage through the most pure of Cuban nature.

These are lands where the system of elevations or hills of Maniabón and pre-mountainous areas of Mayarí, Sierra Cristal and Cuchillas of the Toa. The force of the elements carved into the geological surface areas that today show traces of erosion processes that produced strange shapes on the bedrock of karst origin. This would somewhat explain the birth of that wonder, in which there is no human hands, which has been declared a National Monument and that some experts consider it a natural accident of national  and even international importance.

The limestones that make it up have white, cream, yellowish, chestnut, and its texture shows a granulation that ranges from fine to very fine. Nature provided the ecosystem with a rich and diverse flora, with native  trees such as carob, almácigo, ateje and cedar, among others. The fauna is dominated by bats, reptiles such as the harmless snake called jubo, the galano birds, tocororos, cartacubas, woodpeckers and other birds with beautiful plumage and chirping.

Relevant natural accident in the Caribbean region, due to its geological characteristics, there is no doubt that the natural environment in this location, adds even more value to the site, since there is paleontological evidence that fossil remains contain foraminifera. That formation, born by the erosive force of the once mighty river Bitirí, is about 20 meters long and in some sections has a elevation greater than ten meters. Converted into a unique access route to a vacation camp, one would say that it is almost a carbon copy of a bridge created by human engineering, as far as functional elements are concerned.

Tradition says that this accident was used as a link or road since the times of the independence campaigns of the 19th century. So to its value as a curiosity is added the symbolism of national history, so beloved in that region of Cuba. Nothing but the limestone ring that surrounds the plateau of Pinares de Mayarí, made a good gift to  locals by giving it a unique place for their relief, beauty and treasures.