Gulf of Guinea: description and location

The Gulf of Guinea bathes Africa from the northwestern part of the Guinean coast, where Cape Palmas is located, and the southeast, where the Cape Palmeirinhas is located on the territory of Angola. At the same time, there are no boundaries on the water surface as such.

Description

It so happened that on this section of the World Ocean the Ecuadorian line intersects with the zero meridian. Thus, this is the starting point for all geographical landmarks on our planet.

The territory of the Gulf of Guinea, covering an area of 1533 thousand square kilometers, is divided into two smaller gulfs, bearing the names of Biafra and Benin.

Water temperature

Due to the fact that the Gulf of Guinea is located in the curve of the coastline on both sides of the equator, the temperature in its waters does not drop below + 25 ° C, which in turn makes it a truly tropical pond.

Among other things, several large rivers flow here at once, and the bottom of the bay has both underwater canyons and even seamounts. A beautiful seascape on its bottom appeared due to the work of powerful river flows.

On its territory, the Gulf of Guinea has a large number of islands - both small and large enough, magnificent in appearance: the land of the mainland and islands, washed by the waves of the bay, is beautiful and bizarre. Here you can see capes and bays, the coasts are mostly flat, sandy and only in some places rocky.

Like any warm body of water, the Gulf of Guinea, the special climatic conditions on its banks and warm currents created excellent conditions for the prosperity of various representatives of the animal and plant world.

In the forests on this land grows more than one hundred and fifty valuable species of trees, for example, Maslenica and coconut palms, iron and breadfruit.

In the water - brown and red algae, locally forming fairly large concentrations, phytoplankton and jellyfish. But the number of them is very small, if we are talking about the animal kingdom of the Gulf. It is worth noting that its depth reaches 6363 meters, therefore representatives of the fauna occupied almost every mark of it, changing the species and forms according to the conditions in which their vital activity proceeds.

In the coastal zone there is a large number of mollusks, crabs, shrimps, crayfish, lobsters, sea stars, snakes and worms, as well as tropical fish, including volatile ones. A little deeper live the representatives of large fish, especially many dolphins, rays and sharks, who are attracted by the possibility of hunting for tuna - the desired delicacy of all predators. Far away from this whirlpool, the bay is visited by giant whales - sperm whales.

For a newcomer, the climate is very unaccustomed. Although the temperature reaches relatively low figures during the day, but the humidity daily is about 80%, which, in aggregate, creates an unbearable stuffiness and fertile soil for the existence of malarial mosquitoes. But the undoubted advantage is that the fertile land is regularly irrigated, so several centuries ago the first plantations of coffee and cocoa appeared on the Guinea coast, which have been developing up to now.

The living conditions of the local population also leave much to be desired: tap water is unsuitable for drinking because of the high likelihood of contracting hepatitis A, typhoid fever, or yellow fever. The roads are broken and have almost no asphalt cover, the transport structure is very poorly developed, and air transport is too unreliable to be able to carry out long-distance flights and establish regular passenger traffic.

Place of Birth

In 1984, oil fields were discovered in the Gulf waters, and later the entire oil and gas basin was taken into operation, where several states, including energy companies of the Russian Federation, simultaneously extract oil on a regular basis.

A famous bay is depicted on coins

Probably few people remember, but the view of the Gulf of Guinea was also imprinted on metal coins of the Soviet Union of various denominations. More precisely, they minted on the back of the coin a whole picture including a globe with continents illuminated by the sun's rays, framed with ears, bandaged with a ribbon, a star at the top and an inscription of the USSR below.

Now in the catalogs describing rare and valuable coins, as well as in discussions and disputes over the value of any numismatic collection of those times, the Gulf of Guinea on coins of the USSR became one of the criteria by which the rarity of the specimen is estimated. This takes into account the degree of its severity, the presence or absence of a parallel in this area, the clarity of the contours of the continents, as well as some other factors. Till now there are disputes also about, whether it is necessary to take into consideration the Guinean Bay at all when examining coins, or it only confuses the expert more when performing such laborious work.

Conclusion

Paradoxically, on the Guinea coast, the image of which, by the way, is present on the currency of not only the former Soviet Union, but also some other states, more than half of the inhabitants live below the poverty line. And this despite the huge deposits of minerals, natural gifts and the growing number of tourists wishing to see the Gulf of Guinea personally - is not only the "beginning of the world", but also a real paradise on the planet!