Guamanchi and Assari tours to Lake Maracaibo are best arranged during rainy season between May and December, when electrical activity is at its peak.

BBC: Venezuela��s Andean playground

After a late-afternoon swim in Lake Maracaibo to cool off from the sweltering heat, we got our first glimpse of towering clouds amid the glow of the setting sun.

BBC: In Venezuela, nature��s most electrifying lightning show

In western Venezuela farmers, in many cases backed by their labourers, have blocked roads to prevent the army from executing a presidential order to expropriate their land around Lake Maracaibo.

ECONOMIST: Hugo Ch��vez's Venezuela

Meteorologists have yet to definitively explain why Catatumbo produces the most persistent electrical storms on the planet, but the most widely accepted theory is that trade winds from the Caribbean blow warm air over brackish Lake Maracaibo before hitting cool air from the Andes.

BBC: In Venezuela, nature��s most electrifying lightning show