Guatemala is Central America's most populous nation, with one 2002 study having estimated 12 million inhabitants in a territory of 108,890 square kilometers (42,000 square miles). Nearly 2.5 million people live in the capital, Guatemala City, but Guatemala also has a large rural population spread throughout the western highlands and along the coastal plains. The vast mineral-rich province known as El Petén in the north of the country is very lightly populated. The northernmost country in Central America, Guatemala is very mountainous, and the climate ranges from hot in coastal areas, to temperate in mountain valleys, to chilly at higher elevations. Guatemala exhibits the most complex racial and ethnic mix of any country in Central America. Nearly 60 percent of the population is descended from indigenous Mayan peoples, and this sector of the population speaks some two dozen indigenous languages. Roman Catholicism is the predominant religion, but Protestant evangelicalism has made rapid advances...