00:00If you look closely at a map of the Americas, you'll notice something that seems like a mistake.
00:05Almost a provocation of geography. Two gigantic continents, full of cities,
00:10Roads, borders, and histories practically intersect. A simple narrowing of the land.
00:16It connects the north to the south. At first glance it seems obvious. There should be a continuous highway,
00:23An asphalt road connecting Alaska to Patagonia. But that road doesn't exist. And it's not for lack of reason.
00:28The reason is that there have been no attempts, neither for lack of technology nor for lack of human ambition.
00:34It's much deeper, darker, and more disturbing than it seems. It's at that exact point.
00:40From the map, the dream of crossing the Americas dies. And you'll understand why. During
00:46For hundreds of millions of years, Earth knew no borders. Before names, before countries,
00:52Even before the oceans as we know them today, everything was one single landmass. Pangaea dominated.
00:59The planet. A supercontinent where walking from one end to the other didn't require passports.
01:05ships or planes. The separation came violently. Tectonic plates moved slowly,
01:11But with relentless force. The ground split open, seas rose, continents drifted apart, like...
01:19Brothers torn apart by force. North America and South America followed different paths.
01:25distinct, separated not only physically, but by millions of years of independent evolution.
01:33Still, Earth left a reminder of that united past. A final connecting thread.
01:39It remained. A narrow strip of land, squeezed between two oceans, connecting what seemed
01:45destined to remain separate. Today, more than 200 million years later, that stretch is
01:52Everything that prevents the Americas from being isolated islands from one another.
01:57And, ironically, it is also the greatest obstacle ever faced by those who have tried to unite the continent.
02:04By road. The idea of a highway that would cross the entire American continent is not new. It
02:11It was born alongside dreams of integration, trade, and progress. The Pan-American Highway
02:17It is the most ambitious materialization of this ideal. It spans more than 48,000 kilometers of
02:24roads that cut through deserts, mountains, forests, cities and villages, connecting Ushuaia, at the far end
02:32From southern Argentina to Prudhoe Bay in Alaska. It is possible to see almost all of it from there.
02:38traveling by car, crossing countries, crossing borders, seeing landscapes change before your eyes.
02:44Eyes. Almost all of them. There's an abrupt silence along this path. An emptiness in the middle of the way.
02:51A point where the asphalt simply ends. A stretch of about 100 kilometers separates
02:57Colombia from Panama. 100 kilometers. Less than the distance between many capital cities.
03:03A small space on the map, but colossal in reality. A place known as the Strait.
03:10From Darien. Or, as many prefer to call it, the Green Hell of Earth.
03:15Darien is not just a jungle. It's a living wall, one of the densest regions.
03:21humid and hostile environments on the planet. Vegetation grows so aggressively that it engulfs anything
03:28Attempt to advance. Giant trees, thick vines, treacherous swamps, rivers.
03:35Unpredictable. In many stretches, the sky simply disappears. The sunlight doesn't reach the ground. The compass
03:43It becomes more reliable than any satellite because GPS and cell phone signals get lost in the process.
03:50from the dense forest. Each step is a struggle against the terrain, against the climate, against oneself.
03:57The body. The climate there is unforgiving. The heat is suffocating. The humidity prevents the sweat from evaporating.
04:04It just accumulates. Torrential rains arrive without warning, turning trails into mud pits.
04:11...and calm rivers become deadly traps. And when the temperature drops, it really drops. There are records.
04:18Intense cold with sub-zero temperatures that surprise even the most experienced.
04:25Darien is unpredictable. He tests human limits in every way, but...
04:31The jungle isn't the only danger. Over decades, the Darien Gap has become a territory...
04:36Without law. Armed groups, guerrillas, drug traffickers, and criminal organizations found refuge there.
04:42The perfect scenario for operating away from the eyes of the State. For a long time, the armed forces
04:48Colombia's revolutionary FARC used the region as a strategic route for trafficking.
04:54of drugs and weapons. Other groups followed the same path. The forest became a hideout,
05:00corridor, invisible border. Entering there has always meant taking risks that go
05:07Far beyond nature. Yet, people still enter. Every day.
05:12In recent years, the Darien Gap has become one of the most dangerous migration routes in the world.
05:16World. Men, women, and children cross the jungle driven by despair and hope.
05:22They are fleeing poverty, violence, and hunger. They are seeking a chance to start over in the north. According to
05:28According to official data, more than 120,000 people crossed the Darien Gap in just a few months of a single year.
05:36year. The real number is unknown. Many never reached their destination. Many never left.
05:42From the forest. There are bodies that have never been found. There are stories that have never been told.
05:48People who disappeared without a trace, swallowed by the forest or victims of crimes that
05:55They will never be investigated. Darien keeps these secrets in silence. A heavy silence.
06:02Broken only by the sound of rain, insects, and the footsteps of those who insist on defying the impossible.
06:10And it wasn't just migrants who tried to defeat it. Travelers, adventurers, explorers too.
06:17They believed they could tame that territory. In the 1960s, a couple and two friends decided
06:26to prove that it was possible to cross the Darien Gap with vehicles. They left Panama at the beginning of
06:32February 1960. They advanced meter by meter, forcing their way through, braving rivers, mud,
06:40Illness, exhaustion. They arrived in Colombia in June of the same year, 131 days later, to overcome a stretch that...
06:49On the map, it seems insignificant. The average daily progress barely reached 200 meters. An epic victory.
06:56but also a clear warning, that was not a viable route. Who ventures into the region today?
07:02traces of these attempts are found. Rusty, twisted, abandoned car carcasses in
07:10Amidst the vegetation. Silent monuments to human arrogance in the face of a nature that does not
07:15It accepts being dominated easily. Each vehicle left behind tells a story of giving up.
07:22Fear or a narrow survival. Faced with all this, the question inevitably arises: Why not?
07:29Build a real highway? Why not unite the Americas by land once and for all?
07:35The answer lies not only in the danger, nor in the cost, nor in the technical difficulty. It lies in the life that...
07:42It exists there. The Darien Gap is one of the most biodiverse regions on the planet. Species
07:49Unique species of plants, animals, and insects live there, many of which are still poorly studied. Any large
07:56The infrastructure project would cause irreversible damage. It's not a matter of reforestation afterward. There's no way to do it.
08:03to recreate such an ecosystem. Furthermore, Darien is not a human void. At least 15 communities
08:11Indigenous people live in that region. Peoples who maintain ancestral ways of life, deeply connected to...
08:19For them, the territory is not just a place to pass through. It is home, history, and identity.
08:27The construction of a highway would mean the end of their isolation. The invasion of their lands,
08:33The disruption of their culture. It would mean exposing them to disease, violence, and exploitation. Many of these
08:41Peoples actively resist any project that threatens their existence. Even alternative proposals,
08:50Structures like skybridges, ferries, or elevated walkways face the same opposition. There is no neutral structure.
08:57in that place. Any intervention alters the fragile balance of the region. Environmentalists
09:03People all over the world are against it. Governments are hesitant. The financial costs would be astronomical.
09:10The human and environmental costs are incalculable. That is why the Pan-American Highway remains...
09:16Interrupted. A powerful symbol that not everything can be forcefully connected. A reminder.
09:22That progress has limits. And that, sometimes, respecting those limits is the only choice.
09:29Possible. Today, anyone wishing to travel the Pan-American Highway from end to end needs to accept...
09:36This is the reality. On the stretch between Colombia and Panama, the cars travel by ship. They are
09:42Shipped from Cartagena to Puertos Panameños, while their owners cross the stretch by plane.
09:49The dream of a continuous road breaks down there, temporarily, only to continue later.
09:56And perhaps this break is necessary. Perhaps the void on the map is, in fact, a space.
10:02of protection. A last stronghold where nature still imposes its rules. Where humankind...
10:09He is forced to acknowledge that he doesn't control everything. Upon reaching the end of this story, he is left...
10:14Of course, the Darien Gap is not just a geographical obstacle. It is a symbol.
10:21A place where ambition, survival, ethics, and respect meet. A place that challenges.
10:28Our idea of progress is challenged, and it forces us to ask how far we should go.
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10:58Stories that few tell, but everyone needs to know. Thank you for watching until the end and until next time.
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