Landforms of Guatemala

The Andean Volcanic Belt, along the South American coast, is segmented into four main volcanic zones. These volcanoes, along the backbone of the Andes, are part of the Ring of Fire, an area in the Pacific Ocean basin where earthquakes and eruptions occur due to the collision of tectonic plates.

Lake Atitlán and Volcán Atitlán lie in a spectacular setting in the Guatemalan Highlands of the Sierra Madre of southwestern Guatemala. The lake is the deepest in Central America and is renowned as one of the most beautiful in the world. As a result, it is the country's most important tourist attraction.

The Mesoamerican Barrier Reef System is a marine region, underwater ecosystem and geological structure that stretches from the Yucatán Peninsula down to Belize, Guatemala and Honduras. This underwater wilderness of coral provides homes and food to hundreds of species.

The Petén Basin of northern Guatemala and southeastern Mexico is a geographical subregion of Mesoamerica and was a center of Maya civilizations. The Maya Forest, which includes Belize, is the second-largest remaining tropical rainforest in the Americas.

The Sierra de las Minas runs east to west through the Guatemalan Highlands in the country's southeast. The Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve contains a substantial part of the range and an estimated 60 percent of Guatemala’s remaining cloud forest.

​The Sierra Madre de Chiapas is a major mountain range of Central America that runs parallel to the Pacific coast, from southern Mexico northwest-southeast across the southern half of Guatemala and into El Salvador and Honduras.

The Yucatán Peninsula is the exposed portion of the more extensive Yucatán Platform and lies between the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. It includes the Mexican states of Campeche, Quintana Roo, and Yucatán, as well as parts of Belize and Guatemala.