Though Mount Everest is Earth’s tallest peak, the planet isn’t perfectly round. A bulge at the Earth's equator, where Ecuador is located, makes Mount Chimborazo the closest point on Earth to the moon. That’s despite the fact that Mount Everest is over 9,000 feet higher than Mount Chimborazo, which is 20,564 feet tall.

Bolivia is one of just a handful of countries around the world to have two capitals. Bolivia’s official seat of government is in La Paz, while Sucre is the legal (constitutional) capital and the seat of the judiciary. Sucre was the first capital after independence from Spain, but after a period of political upheaval, an agreement was made in 1899 to share power between the two cities.

The Amazon River is at least 4,000 miles long, but after the Amazon, the second-longest river in South America is the Paraná, whose 3,032-mile span begins in Brazil and runs south through Paraguay and into Argentina. There, it joins the Uruguay River to form the Río de la Plata estuary, which flows into the Atlantic Ocean.

South America’s largest island is Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, the largest island in the “Land of Fire” archipelago located on the southern tip of the continent. The eastern half of Isla Grande, as well as some of the smaller islands, belong to Argentina, while the western half is part of Chile. The Tierra del Fuego islands are separated from South America by the Magellan Strait.

Wedged between the Cordillera de la Costa mountain range and the Andes, Chile’s 600-mile-long Atacama Desert is the driest non-polar desert in the world. (Deserts in parts of Antarctica are even drier.) The Atacama Desert receives less than one millimeter of rainfall each year on average, and there are parts of the desert that have never recorded rainfall.

More than 1,000 individual UNESCO World Heritage Sites dot the globe, but a select few cities and towns are so full of cultural experiences and landmarks that their entire area has been named a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Quito, the capital city of Ecuador, is one such cultural treasure. The city was founded in the 16th century on Incan ruins, and it remains one of the best-preserved and least-altered historic cities in South America.

Angel Falls, the world's highest uninterrupted waterfall, is 3,212 feet tall. The dramatic single drop is more than 20 times taller than Niagara Falls. The falls were named after American pilot James Angel, who was the first to fly over them and share his discovery with the outside world in 1933.

The deepest lake in South America has two names: O’Higgins if you live in Chile or San Martin if you’re from Argentina. Located on the countries’ shared border, the lake has a maximum depth of 2,743 feet. The namesakes for the lake are both national independence heroes, who fought together and are known as the Liberators of America: Bernardo O'Higgins of Chile and José de San Martin of Argentina.

Argentina, the world’s eighth-largest country, covers much of the southern portion of the South American continent, stretching 2,360 miles from north to south and 880 miles across at its widest section. The Pampas — a series of grasslands in the nation's central plains — is one of the main regions of Argentina. The name “Pampa” comes from the Quechuan language and means “flat plain.”

Salar de Uyuni is the largest salt flat in the world, spanning over 4,000 square miles. Located at 12,000 feet above sea level, the salt flat formed when a lake dried up between 10,000 and 25,000 years ago and is now a major source of salt for Bolivia as well as a popular tourist attraction.

The Andes are the longest mountain range in the world, spanning over 4,350 miles and passing through seven countries: Chile, Argentina, Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Venezuela, and Colombia. The mountain range contains some of the highest peaks in the Western Hemisphere. Tallest among them is Mount Aconcagua, which sits at 22,831 feet above sea level on the border of Argentina and Chile.

Colombia borders the Pacific on the western side of the country; on its northern edge is the Caribbean Sea (considered a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean). The country’s extensive coastline makes it a mecca for water activities such as snorkeling and scuba diving. One other South American country also borders both the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans: Chile.

The 20 highest volcanoes in the world, in terms of peak elevation, all have one thing in common: They can be found in South America. More specifically, they can be found along the Ring of Fire in the Andes Mountains in South America. Nevados Ojos del Salado, in Chile and Argentina, is the highest of them all, reaching more than 22,500 feet above sea level.

Located at an elevation of 11,942 feet in the Andes Mountains, Bolivia’s capital of La Paz is higher than any other world capital. As the seat of government, La Paz is considered the country’s de facto capital, but Bolivia’s official capital, Sucre, isn’t far behind in elevation at 9,022 feet.

Although it’s the fourth-largest continent, South America has the fewest number of nations on the map, with only 12 countries: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, and Venezuela. Australia is both a country and a continent, but Oceania — which encompasses countries such as New Zealand, Micronesia, and Polynesia — is included in the continent’s country count, bringing its total up to 14.

Brazil instantly conjures an image of vast rainforests and a diverse array of animal and plant life — but its 4,600-mile-long coastline also boasts impressive sights and more than its fair share of biodiversity. Brazil's coastal region is home to six significant coral reefs that span some 1,800 miles and contain several species of coral that cannot be found anywhere else in the world.

The Patagonian city of Ushuaia, Argentina, calls itself the “end of the earth” (“el fin del mundo” in Spanish) — a moniker you’ll see all over hotels, restaurants, and attractions in town. Ushuaia is the closest major city to Antarctica, which is located 620 miles south, though the settlement of Puerto Williams, Chile, has challenged its assertion as the southernmost city in the world.

The population of the greater São Paulo metropolitan area is 21.7 million people, making it the 12th-largest in the world. That is almost five times greater than that of Brasília, the actual capital of Brazil. Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, is the continent’s second-most populous metropolitan area, with nearly 15 million residents.

A former Dutch colony, Suriname is the smallest South American country both in size (63,252 square miles) and population (581,000 people). The country borders the Atlantic Ocean, Guyana, French Guiana, and Brazil. Suriname gained independence in 1975, and Dutch is still the official language of the country today.

The largest country by far on the South American continent is Brazil, covering a massive 3.3 million square miles. Argentina is the second-largest in South America and the eighth-largest in the world. It has an area of 1.1 million square miles and a population of 46.7 million people. The name "Argentina" is derived from the Latin word for silver.

An isthmus refers to a narrow strip of land that connects two larger landmasses, separating two large bodies of water in the process. The Isthmus of Panama, which unites North and South America, is the site of one of the world’s most famous trade routes, the Panama Canal, which allows passage between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.