On the 21st we started as soon as we could see—for amongst these strong currents it is impossible to move in the dark—and proceeded up the creek formed between an island and the right bank of the mainland. Here also the current is very strong, and forms, one may say, a continuous cachuela, up which we have to pass in ropes’ lengths. The progress made was consequently slow, and as the greater part of my men were sick, I was greatly dependent on my Bolivian friends for assistance. Fortunately I had good stocks of cachaça (white rum) and farinha (yuca flour), and at each stoppage I plied the men of the other canoes with a tot of rum and a handful of farinha; so they helped me along willingly. This farinha they eat constantly during the journey, putting about a handful into a gourd or calabash (“tortuma”), filling up with water, and they seem to find much refreshment from this preparation, which they call “shebee.” So fond are they of it, that frequent halts for “shebee”-taking have to be allowed, the mayordomos and others of a higher grade adding a little sugar to the mess when they can obtain it; but this latter luxurious addition the poor peons seldom get, although mine had it throughout the voyage, for I had taken a large stock of coarse sugar with me. In the afternoon we had to partially unload the canoes in order to ascend the current known as the “Cuerpo del Rabo,” or the “body of the tail,” and at dusk made fast at the top, and set to work carrying overland the cargo taken out of the canoes, so that we might be ready again for an early start next day.
Next morning, the 22nd, we started at 6 a.m., after having had to catch the fowls, of which I still had ten left, and which the boys had allowed to escape from the coop, that had got much broken in the work of carrying it over the land portages. I feared they would all be lost in the forest, but when free they appeared to be quite dazed, and were caught without very much trouble, a couple of wildish ones being shot as the quickest means of stopping them. Roping and hauling by the bushes, we proceeded but slowly, but soon got a sight of the “salto” itself. This is the main body of the fall, with a drop of about fourteen feet; and imposing enough it looked, being much broken up into islands, with huge waves breaking heavily over the numerous rocks. The river at the Rabo and at the fall is very broad, and this probably accounts for the name of Ribeirão, or “great river,” being given to this part of it. Two corrientes were ascended by roping, and then a short stretch at the paddles brought us to another, the thirteenth of the series forming the “rabo,” and which we ascended between the land and a large tree that forms a point. This is at times the last current before entering the remanso that takes the canoes up to the foot of the main fall. There proved, however, to be two more before we got into the bay with its “remanso” and “olada,” that form the chief and most dangerous features of the passage of this salto. One of my Bolivian friends lent me a second captain, and I took the men out of the small canoe, or “montaria,” so that I passed these dangers with fourteen paddles going and two captains aft, each using his big paddle for steering, one on either side of the “popa,” or stern. It is a great help throughout the journey to have two good captains behind, for when strong currents or dangerous bits of river have to be encountered, one of them can keep the boat in its proper course; while the other encourages the paddlers forward, keeping them together in their strokes by shouts and good sounding thumps of his heel on the projecting boards on which the captains have to stand behind the “camarota,” or cabin.
The wave, or “olada,” was not nearly so bad as that met with at Theotonio, and as the canoe was much lighter we passed very well, the only approach to a casualty being that we grounded on a sandbank in the bay, on which a canoe preceding us had struck also, but which it was impossible to avoid from the set of the current right on to it. However, the peons jumped into the water with great alacrity, and pushed us afloat again before the waves had time to swamp us. I had heard a good deal of the danger of this “remanso” and “olada,” but with a good crew and captains, and a garitea well up at the prow, I don’t think it is much to be feared. The unloading place for the land portage is a short distance up the mouth of the river Ribeirão, which comes into the big river a stone’s throw below the fall on the right or Brazilian side, and we got safely into quiet water up the Ribeirão by about 1 p.m., overtaking two of the Bolivian patrons who had got ahead of me, and had already passed their canoes and cargoes over the portage.
The “arrastre,” or portage, is not nearly so steep as at Theotonio or Girão, being, perhaps, an ascent of one in eight for about 100 yards over a pretty even bed of rock, then one in twelve over earth for another 200 yards, level for 200 more, and then sharp down to the river in about a further 100 yards, at the rate of about one in four.
We got our cargoes unloaded, two canoes being hauled over the portage before dark, my own being left for the following day. To drag the heavy canoes up the ascent taxed all the powers of the thirty men that we could get together for the work, but by dint of cachaça and shouting we got the craft over without assistance from the patrons who had preceded us.
The accompanying sketches of curious marks to be seen on rocks at three of the rapids, were made by Mr. Alan Grant-Dalton, who was my able and indefatigable assistant engineer during our stay at San Antonio. My ascent of the rapids having been made whilst the river was in flood, these marks were all under water, and I was consequently unable to inspect them; but I have been assured by many travellers that Mr. Grant-Dalton’s sketches are exact and faithful copies of the inscriptions. Most probably they are the work of the Caripuna, or other wandering savages, for the Bolivian Indians ascending and descending the river are not likely to have wasted their time cutting these figures out of the hard rock.
CURIOUS INSCRIPTIONS ON ROCKS AT DIFFERENT RAPIDS.