Speaking to Prensa Latina, he explained that the park is located in the Bay of Buena Vista, declared a Biosphere Reserve by Unesco, where the provinces of Villa Clara, Ciego de vila, and Sancti Spritus converge.
It is a protected area of ​​20,000 490 hectares, divided into terrestrial and marine zones, where biodiversity stands out. The marinas have a stretch of Buenavista Bay where the Cayos de Piedra archipelago is located, he said.
The keys, with a unique morphology of their kind in the country, consist of a series of small islands with karst domes and a large development from the speleological point of view, as well as more than 150 caves distributed on flaps. caves and caverns.
Antonio Nez Jiménez, believed to be the fourth discoverer of Cuba, classified the caves there as Caguanes-type horizontal phreatics, he asserted.
They are very important because these caves have a wide variety of secondary formations that make them real speleothem laboratories (stalactites, stalagmites, columns, mantles, dams, cave pearls, mushroom-shaped or inverted mushroom-shaped formations, and helictites or eccentrics), he added.
Its geographical features allowed pre-Columbian men to settle here for more than six thousand years, leading to the creation of sanctuaries commemorating these communities.
According to the specialist, there are 40 sites, 39 of them on the Keys, where the presence of all the archipelago’s indigenous cultures—the Guanajatabeyes, Siboneyes, and Tainos—is visible, along with Mesolithic groups, gatherers, fishermen, and many more hunters.
As a main detail, the murals with pictograms with abstract creations in red and black colors stand out, with those in the caves of Los Chivos and Cueva del Pirata in Caguanes standing out.
While the largest petroglyphic mural in this part of the country can be seen in the Judas Cave of Guayares, there are also works at Los Cuchillos and de las Pinturas in Cayo Salina, among others.
A striking site is the Cueva de Ramos in the center of Cayo Caguanes, along with Colón, Conchas, and Nuevas, over 1,100 meters long, known as the Cathedral of Cuban Rock Art.
A revealing fact is that more than two thousand years ago, the site was inhabited by aboriginal communities that carved traditions, myths, and legends into the walls.
Some caves have phreatic lakes, and thanks to this diversity, the mangrove ecosystems have hosted a large amount of food, such as fish, birds, reptiles, crustaceans, and marine mammals.
Analyzing the existence of archaeological sites, he named Playa Carbó as the most important, a city of the Arawak culture that lived in stilt houses or houses on stilts and where pieces of ceramics, shells, and stone appeared. The most representative is the guaiza, or shell mask, he clarified.
The most recent archaeological dig, Falcón recalled, was an excavation at Cueva de La Guinea on Guayares Hill, along with experts from the University of Winnipeg, Canada, in February 2020, that found the remains of six individuals from the oldest aboriginal groups in the area.
In addition, there are more than 400 species of plants in the park, which is a microphyll semi-deciduous forest that grows on the karst hills of the Cayos de Piedra. The flora includes autochthonous and endemic species such as the bacona, the wood tree with the largest population in this part of Sancti Spritus.
