【BBC地球脉动】淡水 01

英语自学网

Only 3% of the water on our planet is fresh. Yet these precious waters are rich with surprise. All life on land is ultimately dependent upon fresh water. The mysterious tepuis of Venezuela - isolated mountain plateaus rising high above the jungle. This was the inspiration for Arthur Conan Doyle's "Lost World," an imagined prehistoric land. Here, strange towers of sandstone have been sculptured over the millennia by battering wind and torrential rain. Moisture rising as water vapour from the surface of the sea is blown inland by wind. On reaching mountains, the moist air is forced upwards and as it cools, it condenses into cloud and finally rain - the source of all fresh water. There is a tropical downpour here almost every day of the year.地球上只有3%的水是淡水。这些珍贵的淡水中有许多令人称奇之处。陆地上所有的生命最终都要依赖淡水。这里是委内瑞拉神奇的蒂普斯地区。灌木丛林之上，孤立的山地高原拔地而起。这里是作家柯南·道尔的小说《失落的世界》的灵感来源，小说描绘了一个想象中的史前世界。千百万年的急风骤雨雕刻出了这些石塔奇观。风把大海蒸发出的湿气吹送到内陆。这些湿气遇到高山时被迫上升，同时也变冷，并凝结成云并最终形成降雨，这是所有淡水的来源。这里几乎每天都会有热带暴雨。