Camuy () is a

town A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

and

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

Puerto Rico ; abbreviated PR), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, is a Government of Puerto Rico, self-governing Caribbean Geography of Puerto Rico, archipelago and island organized as an Territories of the United States, unincorporated territo ...

, bordering the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the ...

, north of

Lares Lares ( , ; archaic , singular ) were Tutelary deity#Ancient Rome, guardian deities in ancient Roman religion. Their origin is uncertain; they may have been hero-ancestors, guardians of the hearth, fields, boundaries, or fruitfulness, or an ama ...

and

San Sebastián San Sebastián, officially known by the bilingual name Donostia / San Sebastián (, ), is a city and municipality located in the Basque Autonomous Community, Spain. It lies on the coast of the Bay of Biscay, from the France–Spain border ...

; east of Quebradillas; and west of Hatillo. Camuy is spread over 12 barrios and Camuy Pueblo (the downtown area and the administrative center of the city). The town celebrated its 200th anniversary in 2007. Camuy is part of the "Porta Atlántico" Tourist Area.

History

Camuy, popularly known as Romantic City (''la ciudad romántica''), was founded in 1807 by Petronila Matos, and formerly part of

Arecibo Arecibo (; ) is a Arecibo barrio-pueblo, city and Municipalities of Puerto Rico, municipality on the northern coast of Puerto Rico, on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean, located north of Utuado, Puerto Rico, Utuado and Ciales, Puerto Rico, Ciale ...

is located in the northwestern coastal region of Puerto Rico, less than 5 minutes west of Hatillo municipality, on PR-2 and PR-119. As early as 1846, , a bridge over the

Camuy River The Camuy River (; ) is a river in Puerto Rico. It is the third largest underground river in the world and helped shape the cave system known as the Rio Camuy Caves. The river and water flow systems of Río Camuy have been studied by the US Geo ...

linked Camuy with Hatillo. The name ''Camuy'' derives from the

Taíno language Taíno is an Arawakan language formerly spoken widely by the Taíno people of the Caribbean. In its revived form, there exist several modern-day Taíno language variants including Hiwatahia-Taino and Tainonaiki. At the time of Spanish contact ...

, although a number of legends give differing explanations for the origin of the name. One such legend claims the name comes from the

Taíno The Taíno are the Indigenous peoples of the Caribbean, Indigenous peoples of the Greater Antilles and surrounding islands. At the time of European contact in the late 15th century, they were the principal inhabitants of most of what is now The ...

word for "sun", another claims derivation from ''camuy'', Taíno for "beautiful scenery", and still another states that ''Camuy'' was the name of the Taíno chief ''Yumac'' with the letters in reverse order. The "sun" legend is reflected in the coat of arms for the municipality. Puerto Rico was ceded by

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

in the aftermath of the

Spanish–American War The Spanish–American War (April 21 – August 13, 1898) was fought between Restoration (Spain), Spain and the United States in 1898. It began with the sinking of the USS Maine (1889), USS ''Maine'' in Havana Harbor in Cuba, and resulted in the ...

and became a territory of the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. In 1899, the

United States Department of War The United States Department of War, also called the War Department (and occasionally War Office in the early years), was the United States Cabinet department originally responsible for the operation and maintenance of the United States Army, als ...

conducted a

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of Puerto Rico finding that the population of Camuy was 10,887. In its beginnings Camuy was integrated into the Partition of San Antonio de la Tuna. The "partitions" were great expanses of land that divided Puerto Rico. This region today is known as

Isabela, Puerto Rico Isabela () is a Isabela barrio-pueblo, town and Municipalities of Puerto Rico, municipality of Puerto Rico located in the north-western region of the island, north of San Sebastián, Puerto Rico, San Sebastián; west of Quebradillas, Puerto Ric ...

. At the time the partition covered the areas between

Aguadilla Aguadilla (, ), founded in 1775 by Luis de Córdova, is a city and municipality located in the northwestern tip of Puerto Rico, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, north of Aguada, and Moca and west of Isabela. Aguadilla is s ...

and

, what is known today as the municipalities of Camuy, Hatillo, Quebradillas, Isabela, Utuado, and

. The population of Camuy was 35,159 at the 2010 census, and it has land area of . The municipality is part of the San Juan-Caguas-Guaynabo metropolitan area and is a popular

suburb A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

. It was named in 2015 by the U.S. Conference of Mayors as one of the most livable cities in the United States.

Hurricane Maria Hurricane Maria was an extremely powerful and devastating tropical cyclone that affected the northeastern Caribbean in September 2017, particularly in the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico, which accounted for 2,975 of the 3,059 deaths. It is the ...

on September 20, 2017 triggered numerous landslides in Camuy with the significant amount of rainfall. Electricity was restored to the town center on October 4. However, rural areas remained without electricity until March 2018. There were catastrophic damages in Camuy with around 2000 residences damaged or completely destroyed. The hospital's roof was torn off. The 40 animal husbandry businesses in Camuy, agriculture, and tourism industries suffered heavy losses. One of the main tourist attractions in Puerto Rico located in Camuy,

Parque Nacional de las Cavernas del Río Camuy The Parque Nacional de las Cavernas del Río Camuy (English: Camuy River Cave National Park) is a cave system in Puerto Rico. It is located between the municipalities of Camuy, Hatillo, and Lares in northwestern Puerto Rico, but the main entr ...

was destroyed, and would remain closed for four years.

Geography

Camuy belongs to the zone designated as the plateau of the northwest where the terrain is level and known as the Valley of Quebradillas. It is located in the

Northern Karst The Northern Karst Belt (Spanish language, Spanish: ''Cinturón del Carso Norteño'') is a limestone karst landscape located in the northwestern region of Puerto Rico. A karst is a topographical zone formed by the dissolution of soluble porous roc ...

zone of Puerto Rico. In the interior of the municipality the topography becomes very irregular near

Cibao The Cibao, usually referred as El Cibao, is a region of the Dominican Republic located in the northern part of the country. As of 2009, the Cibao region has a population of 5,622,378, making it the most populous region in the country. The region ...

. This strip of land, a zone of wooded hills and depressions, divides Camuy completely into two strips, north and south. The northern strip is known as Lomas de los Puertos. The

forms part of the hydrographic system with a length of 24 miles, which at one point becomes a narrow

canyon A canyon (; archaic British English spelling: ''cañon''), gorge or chasm, is a deep cleft between escarpments or cliffs resulting from weathering and the erosive activity of a river over geologic time scales. Rivers have a natural tendency t ...

that forms one of the most beautiful cave systems in the world: the Rio Camuy Caverns, first explored in 1958. The Camuy River along with the Caverns are the 3rd largest and longest underground system in the world and the river is one of the few remaining active underground rivers in the Americas, stretching for miles. The Cibao River also forms part of the system. Plaza de Recreo - Camuy Puerto Rico

Barrios

Like all municipalities of Puerto Rico, Camuy is subdivided into barrios. The municipal buildings, central square and large Catholic church are located in a small barrio referred to as , near the center of the municipality. # Abra Honda # Camuy barrio-pueblo # Camuy Arriba #

# Ciénagas # Membrillo # Piedra Gorda #

Puente Puente, a word meaning ''bridge'' in Spanish language, may refer to: People * Puente (surname) Places *La Puente, California, USA *Puente Alto, city and commune of Chile *Puente de Ixtla, city in Mexico *Puente Genil, village in the Spanish provi ...

# Puertos #

Quebrada Quebrada may refer to: Places Argentina * Quebrada de Las Flechas, a valley in the province of Salta in northern Argentina * Quebrada de Humahuaca, World Heritage, a valley in the province of Jujuy in northern Argentina * Quebrada de Luna, vill ...

Santiago Santiago (, ; ), also known as Santiago de Chile (), is the capital and largest city of Chile and one of the largest cities in the Americas. It is located in the country's central valley and is the center of the Santiago Metropolitan Regi ...

# Yeguada #

Zanja A zanja (, "water ditch" or "trench") is an archaic irrigation system used in the southwestern United States and that still occurs in various place names as a relic of that time. An acequia is a more highly engineered zanja, able to carry water ...

Sectors

Barrios (which are, in contemporary times, roughly comparable to minor civil divisions) and subbarrios, are further subdivided into smaller areas called (''sectors'' in English). The types of ''sectores'' may vary, from normally ''sector'' to ''urbanización'' to ''reparto'' to ''barriada'' to ''residencial'', among others.

Special Communities

(Special Communities of Puerto Rico) are marginalized communities whose citizens are experiencing a certain amount of

social exclusion Social exclusion or social marginalisation is the social disadvantage and relegation to the fringe of society. It is a term that has been used widely in Europe and was first used in France in the late 20th century. In the EU context, the Euro ...

. A map shows these communities occur in nearly every municipality of the commonwealth. Of the 742 places that were on the list in 2014, the following barrios, communities, sectors, or neighborhoods were in Camuy: , and .

Demographics

Tourism

Camuy is known for its '' Parque de las Cavernas del Río Camuy'' (Camuy River Cave Park), a large network of natural limestone caves and underground waterways shared with nearby municipalities of Hatillo and

. The cave system was first documented in the 1973 book ''Discovery At The Rio Camuy'' () by Russell and Jeanne Gurnee. The park built around the cave system features tours of some of the caves, and is one of the most popular natural attractions in Puerto Rico. The caverns were created by the ''Río Camuy'' (

), the third longest underground river in the world. In recognition of this, the Camuy coat of arms includes a symbol for the underground river.

Landmarks and places of interest

There are 9 beaches in Camuy, including . Other places of interest of Camuy include: *Hacienda Morell *Peñon Brusi Beach *Peñon Amador Beach (Home of the Flamingo) * Rio Camuy Cave Park *Paseo Tablado del Río Camuy (Boardwalk) *

Ernesto Memorial Chapel The Ernesto Memorial Chapel, also known as the (Stone Church) and the (Methodist Stone Church) is located in Abra Honda, a rural barrio in Camuy, Puerto Rico. After the Kiplinger family lost their 21-year-old son, Ernesto, they donated money ...

*Camuy History Museum To stimulate local tourism during the

COVID-19 pandemic in Puerto Rico The COVID-19 pandemic in Puerto Rico was an ongoing viral pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a novel infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). It is part of the ongoing COVID-19 pa ...

, the

Puerto Rico Tourism Company The Puerto Rico Tourism Company (, or simply ''Turismo'') is the government-owned corporation in charge of tourism matters and regulations in Puerto Rico. The company was created during Governor Luis A. Ferré's administration (1969-1973) to coo ...

launched the ''Voy Turisteando'' (I'm Touring) campaign in 2021. The campaign featured a passport book with a page for each municipality. The Camuy passport page lists , , and , as places of interest.

Culture

Religion

Camuy is first and foremost

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

but there are other religions present in the town, including

Protestant Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that emphasizes Justification (theology), justification of sinners Sola fide, through faith alone, the teaching that Salvation in Christianity, salvation comes by unmerited Grace in Christianity, divin ...

denominations such as the

Pentecostals Pentecostalism or classical Pentecostalism is a movement within the broader Evangelical wing of Protestant Christianity that emphasizes direct personal experience of God through baptism with the Holy Spirit. The term ''Pentecostal'' is derived ...

Presbyterians Presbyterianism is a historically Reformed Protestant tradition named for its form of church government by representative assemblies of elders, known as "presbyters". Though other Reformed churches are structurally similar, the word ''Pr ...

, Methodists, and others. There are four Roman Catholic parishes in Camuy: *The San Jose Parish named after the patron of the town and located in the town square *The

Miraculous Medal The Miraculous Medal (), also known as the Medal of Our Lady of Graces or the Medal of the Immaculate Conception, is a devotional medal, the design of which was originated by Catherine Labouré following her Marian apparition, apparitions of the ...

(also known as "El Calvario") in Piedra Gorda *The Assumption of Mary located in Quebrada *Our Lady of Montserrate located at Soller near the municipality of Quebradillas *The Ernesto Memorial Chapel, a

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a Protestant Christianity, Christian Christian tradition, tradition whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's brother ...

church also known as (Church of Stone) is famous and on the US National Register of Historic Places, because it was handmade with limestones.

Sports

The town has many local sports teams (volleyball, basketball, martial arts, swimming etc.) but most notably are their

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...

teams. Many of them are part of the little league and the intermediate system but at the top the two professional Class A and Double AA baseball teams called "Los Arenosos" (Referring to the abundance of sand from the coastline).

Festivals and Events

The

patron saint A patron saint, patroness saint, patron hallow or heavenly protector is a saint who in Catholicism, Anglicanism, Eastern Orthodoxy or Oriental Orthodoxy is regarded as the heavenly advocate of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, fa ...

of Camuy is

Saint Joseph According to the canonical Gospels, Joseph (; ) was a 1st-century Jewish man of Nazareth who was married to Mary, the mother of Jesus, and was the legal father of Jesus. Joseph is venerated as Saint Joseph in the Catholic Church, Eastern O ...

. His day is celebrated on March 1. The patron saint festivities (Fiestas Patronales) are celebrated every year around the last 2 weeks of the month of March, the month of Saint Joseph. His official liturgical day is March 1. Other festivals and celebrations that take place in Camuy include: *Velorio Tres Reyes Magos or Three Kings Celebration - January * Mondongazo Festival - February *Camuy Carnival - February *Balseada del Río Camuy and 5k Race - March *Patron Festivities San José - March *"Reviving Our Traditions Festival" - June *Peñon Brussi Beach Festival - July *Municipal Cultural Fair - November

Economy

Agriculture

Agriculture (

sugarcane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of tall, Perennial plant, perennial grass (in the genus ''Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar Sugar industry, production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with stout, jointed, fib ...

some time ago) and cattle and milk production.

Business

There's an active manufacturing industry in the city, including companies such as Alaska based Cazador Apparel, Seamless Textiles,

Hanes Hanes (founded in 1900) and Hanes Her Way (founded in 1985) is an American clothing brand headquartered in Winston-Salem. Founded in 1900 as Shamrock Knitting Mills by John Wesley Hanes, the company is owned by Hanes, Inc. History Hanes was f ...

, Best Quality Coop and Camuy Furniture Warehouse. SNC Technical Services is another textile manufacturer in Camuy which picked up production in 2019. In terms of commercial development, several fast foods franchises, banks and stores can be found in Camuy. Two strip malls are also planned to be constructed in the city. Tourism plays an important role in Camuy's economy due in part to the Rio Camuy Caves, and Camuy's public beaches.

Government

All municipalities in Puerto Rico are administered by a

mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a Municipal corporation, municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilitie ...

, elected every four years. The current mayor of Camuy is Gabriel Hernández Rodríguez, of the New Progressive Party (PNP). He was first elected at the 2020 general elections. The city belongs to the Puerto Rico Senatorial district III, which is represented by two Senators. In

2024 The year saw the list of ongoing armed conflicts, continuation of major armed conflicts, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Myanmar civil war (2021–present), Myanmar civil war, the Sudanese civil war (2023–present), Sudane ...

, Brenda Pérez Soto and Gabriel González, both from the New Progressive Party (PNP), were elected as District Senators.

Transportation

In 2019, there were 4 bridges in Camuy.

Symbols

The has an official flag and coat of arms.

Flag

The flag is green like the coat of arms. A white undulating band runs horizontally across and is interrupted in the middle by the figure of the Camuy sun, in this case represented by the colors yellow and black.

Coat of arms

The silver-waving stripe symbolizes the Camuy River (interrupted in the center because the river goes underground for part of its trajectory). The three tower crown distinguishes Camuy as a municipality.

Education

Camuy currently has 17 public schools and a community college.

Gallery

Parroquia San Jose - Camuy, Puerto Rico - panoramio.jpg, The Camuy parish church in downtown Camuy Flamenco and other birds in Camuy, Puerto Rico.jpg, Flamingo and other birds in Yeguada barrio in Camuy

References

External links

Camuy and its barrios, United States Census Bureau, 2000Municipio de Camuy, P.R. on Flickr
{{Subject bar, auto=y, d=y Municipalities of Puerto Rico Populated coastal places in Puerto Rico San Juan–Caguas–Guaynabo metropolitan area Populated places established in 1807 1807 establishments in Puerto Rico