River
Courantyne River
724 km from source to mouth · Guyana and Suriname.
Guyana and SurinameFlows into Atlantic Ocean2nd longest in Guyana
In numbers
Length
724km
Average flow
580m³/s
Basin
56,000km²
Drop
192m
from 192 m to 0 m
Countries
2
The journey
From source to mouth
724 km of river and 7 stops on the way: 0 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.
- 0 kmSourceat 192 m
- 3 kmCoeroeni Rivertributary
- 242 kmDrios Fall
- 248 kmNew Rivertributary
- 266 kmKing Frederick William Falls
- 353 kmTiger Falls
- 408 kmWonotobo Falls
- 559 kmKabalebo Rivertributary
- 724 kmAtlantic Oceanat 0 m
Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.
River in South America
At the mouth it carries 584 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 4.3 seconds. It drops from 192 m to 0 m, 0.3 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 56,000 km², about the size of HR. 8,367 people live in it. Highest water: from June to July; lowest: from October to January. No large dam holds it back: it is one of the world's free-flowing rivers.
Where to start
- SkeldonLargest city on its banks · 5,859 people
- Cheddi Jagan International Airport (GEO)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 141 km from the cityCar hire at GEO airport (Georgetown)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- On the water4 ferry piers, marinas, boat rentals and boat ramps along the river (OpenStreetMap)
- February and from September to DecemberThe best months to visit
Courantyne River, month by month
Highest water: from June to July
Lowest water: from October to January. Best months to visit: February and from September to December.
From about 300 m³/s in the lowest month to 1,300 m³/s in the highest. An estimate: the monthly flow is modelled from the lowest and highest months of WaterGAP (RiverATLAS, 1971–2000) and the rain and snow along the river (WorldClim). Dams change the real rhythm. The chip is the average air temperature; below it, the month's rain.
Plan the trip
Plan the trip: boat trips, a bed by the river, a car
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
The basin
Courantyne River: the basin in numbers
64,284 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.
- 8,367people live in the basin
- 0/km²people per km²
- 223maverage altitude of the basin
- 2,056mmof rain a year (basin average)
- 26.4°Caverage air temperature
- 5%protected areas
What covers the basin
- 97% Forest
RiverATLAS (HydroATLAS v1.0, CC BY 4.0): land cover, people, protected areas, glaciers and dams over the whole basin upstream of the mouth.
Along the river
Courantyne River: what you find on the way
- 1WaterfallsWonotobo Falls
- 1Boat ramps
- 3Ferry piersCanawaima Ferry Service
From OpenStreetMap, within 2.3 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.
Cross-checked with our atlases
Courantyne River in our other atlases
What our sister atlases know about the waterfalls on this river, the lakes it flows through, the beaches at its mouth, the mountains where it rises and the islands off its mouth.
4waterfalls on the riverCascadyas
Waterfalls (4)
On the river, by Cascadyas
- Drios Fallkm 233
- King Frederick William Fallskm 256
- Tiger Fallskm 341
- Wonotobo Fallskm 394
Cascadyas is coming soonOpen Cascadyas ↗
From space
The source and the mouth, seen from orbit
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 by EOX IT Services GmbH (contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2016), CC BY 4.0. The glowing line is the river as drawn by RiverATLAS.
Photos
Courantyne River in pictures
Tributaries
Where it flows, and what flows into it
Tributaries (3)
Also: New River, Kabalebo River, Coeroeni River
Nearby
Rivers nearby
Guyana595 km370 m³/s67 km awayEssequibo RiverGuyana1,014 km2,100 m³/s177 km awayCoppename RiverSuriname400 km550 m³/s133 km awaySaramacca RiverSuriname255 km280 m³/s135 km awayDemerara RiverGuyana350 km290 m³/s160 km awayCuyuni RiverGuyana618 km2,100 m³/s179 km awaySuriname RiverSuriname480 km440 m³/s225 km awayMaroni
French Guiana612 km1,700 m³/s346 km awayWhere these numbers come from
| Name, length, places | Wikidata (Q508582) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| Course, profile, basin | RiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed from the source to the mouth given by Wikidata |
| Flow | WaterGAP (RiverATLAS), 1971–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Climate along the river | WorldClim (RiverATLAS), 1970–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Towns, bridges, dams | Wikidata · CC0; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0 |
| Along the river | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
| Our other atlases | Cascadyas — Wikidata · CC0; © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0; HydroLAKES · CC BY 4.0; NOAA OISST |
Every source and licence is on the data sources page.
The family
Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers or canyons?
Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, month by month, in seven languages.
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