The country before us looked more forbidding than ever, as if it did not want us to penetrate any further into its mysteries, but our guide seemed to be quite at home here.
Our march toward Rio Chico was about thirty miles of ups and downs, ascending to a height of 7,600 feet and descending again some 3,000 feet. In the beginning it was almost impossible to make out the track; where it did not lead over bare rocks, it was nearly obliterated by overgrown grass. The first ascent was over a mile long in a straight line; then, after a little while, came the most arduous climbing I had until then ever attempted. Following the slope of the mountain, the track rose higher and higher in long zigzags, without any chance for the animals to rest, for at least three-quarters of a mile. It was necessary to push them on, as otherwise the train would unavoidably have upset, and one or the other have rolled down the declivity. One large white mule, El Chino, after it had almost climbed to the top, turned giddy at the “glory-crowned height” it had reached, and, sinking on its hind legs, fell backward and rolled heels over head down, with its two large canvas-covered boxes, like a big wheel. As luck would have it, it bumped against a low-stemmed old oak that cropped out of the hillside in an obtuse angle to it, some ninety feet below. Making one more turn up the stem, the mule was nicely caught between the forked branches, which broke the momentum, loosened the cargo, and caused the animal to fall back into the high grass. One box landed close by, the other, containing our library, pursued its course downward 200 feet further, bursting open on the way and scattering the wisdom of the ages to the winds, while the mule escaped without a scratch.
The burros came into camp three hours after us, and the drivers explained how they had succeeded in bringing them up the long slope only by constantly punching them to prevent them from “falling asleep.”
As we continued our journey toward Rio Chico the panorama of the sierra changed continuously. We got a side view of the big Mesa de los Apaches, and many weathered pinnacles of eroded conglomerate were seen standing out like church spires in this desert of rock, varying in colour from red to lead gray. Once we caught sight of a stretch of the Rio Aros deep down in a narrow, desolate valley, some 3,000 feet below us. The geological formation of the region is mostly volcanic; then follows conglomerate, and on the high points porphyry appears.
We camped on the crest of the eastern side of the Rio Chico Cañon, in an ideal place with bracing air. A fine, sloping meadow afforded quite an arcadian view with the animals peacefully grazing and resting; but looking westward, the eye revelled in the grand panorama of the sierra. The two sides of the Rio Chico Valley rise here evenly from the bottom of the gorge so as to suggest the letter V. In many places its brow is overhung by precipitous cliffs, and further down still more steeply walled chasms yawn up from the river bed.
My chief packer now became ill from the effects of poison ivy. He was one of those unfortunate individuals who are specially susceptible to it. According to his own statement it sufficed for him to pass anywhere near the plant, even without touching it, to become afflicted with the disease. In this case he did not even know where he had contracted it, until the cook showed him some specimens of the plant near an oak tree close by the kitchen tent. The poor fellow’s lips were badly swollen; he had acute pains in his eyes, and felt unable to move. Sometimes, he said, the disease would last ten days, and his skin become so tender that he could not endure the weight or contact of his clothes. But by applying to the afflicted parts of his body a solution of baking soda in water, I was able not only to relieve his suffering, but to enable him, after two days, to continue with us on our journey.
In the meantime we had investigated some caves in the conglomerate of the steep cañon side, about 250 feet above the bottom of the gorge, and rather difficult of access. The house group occupied the entire width of a cave, which was eighty feet across, and there was a foundation wall made of stone and timber underneath the front part. The walls were made of stone, with mortar of disintegrated rock that lined parts of the cave and were plastered inside and out with the same material. Lintels of wood were seen in the windows, and rows of sticks standing in a perpendicular position were found in two of the walls inside of the plastering. On one side of the cave, some two feet off, was a small tower, also in ruins, measuring inside four feet in diameter, while the walls were about six inches thick.
Pinnacles of eroded conglomerate are a prominent characteristic of the landscape west of the Rio Chico; further on, the usual volcanic formation appears again. After fully twenty miles of travel we found ourselves again in pine forests and at an altitude of 7,400 feet. Here we were overtaken, in the middle of February, by a rain and sleet storm, which was quite severe, although we were sheltered by tall pine trees in a little valley. It turned to snow and grew very cold, and then the storm was over. Here a titmouse and a woodpecker were shot, and the bluebirds were singing in the snow.
Travelling again eleven miles further brought us to the plains of Naverachic, where we camped. It was quite a treat to travel again on comparatively level land, but, strange to say, I felt the cold so much that I had to walk on foot a good deal in order to keep warm. The word Naverachic is of Tarahumare origin; nāvé means “move,” and ráchi refers to the disintegrated trachyte formation in the caves.
We had just emerged from a district which at that time was traversed by few people; perhaps only by some illiterate Mexican adventurers, though it had once been settled by a thrifty people whose stage of culture was that of the Pueblo Indians of to-day, and who had vanished, nobody knows how many centuries ago. Over it all hovered a distinct atmosphere of antiquity and the solemnity of a graveyard.