The standing knowledge of the Pemón and the documented science of the expeditions.

All of it contained within those cliffs, above the clouds, at the corner of three countries, in one of the most extraordinary places on the surface of the Earth.

The lost world is not lost.

It is right here.

It always was.

The mountain that should not exist, does exist.

And knowing why it exists — really knowing, through the geology and the biology and the deep time and the human meaning — makes it more extraordinary, not less.

That is the final payoff of a place like Roraima: the real story is better than the impossible-seeming surface.

It always is, when you look closely enough.