Two or three miles below Lagunillas is one of the worst bits of road in the Andes, and yet it is on the main route to the south. First, a descent down a steep zigzag brings one to a picturesque wooden bridge over the torrent of the Chama, giving the name to the group of houses near by of Puente Real. Not many years ago travellers and their baggage were taken over the stream in a sort of breeches-buoy, while their mules were dragged through the swift current below, and often only landed with difficulty far down on the opposite bank; the bridge is at least an advance on this primitive mode of transit.
The bottom of the bare steep-sided ravine is hot and dusty, and on the far side, after a mile or two, the road begins to follow the nearly vertical side, finally narrowing down to a mere path, with a precipice into the torrent below. This lasts for some four or five miles, and the whole stretch takes its name from the most unpleasant part of all, Las Laderas, or “the steeps,” just before the San Pablo tributary enters from the south. Here the height of the road above the stream gradually increases, until at length the descent to the side valley is accomplished in a short distance by what is practically a staircase of loose rock, buttressed with logs, while there is a sheer drop on the offside into the foaming torrent beneath; not a pleasant place on a dry day, and almost impassable on a wet one. Once at the bottom, the rest of the way, until more open valleys are reached, is a precipice road, generally, but not always, wide enough for two mules to pass.
Beyond Estanques the main valley narrows down to a gorge, but the road climbs over the hills to the side, and at length descends past a tile and brick making yard to the hot valley of the Mucuties with its cacao plantations. A picturesque bridge across the river leads to the parting of the roads, one going up the Mucuties to Tovar, the other down the Chama Valley to El Vigia, and so to the Zulia plains.
Tovar forms a local market-centre for the produce of the cocoa and coffee plantations of the valley, but beyond it Bailadores marks the downward limit of the wheatfields which make the top of the Mucuties ravine almost like a European landscape in time of harvest.
Northward of Mérida, the Chama Valley has some coffee plantations, but the road soon leaves these, and at Mucuchíes, the highest town in Venezuela (10,000 feet), we are in the region of pasture-land and potatoes, even wheat being absent in these high altitudes. There are a few scattered houses above Mucuchíes, one of which is a small inn known as Los Apartaderos, the best stopping-place to ensure a calm crossing of the pass next day, the winds rising normally towards midday.
These high exposed passes are known in Venezuela as páramos, a word as to whose precise meaning some doubt appears to exist, though Humboldt’s definition as “all passes above 1,800-2,200 Toises above the sea, where inclement rough weather prevails,” seems to cover the present use of the word. The páramo of Mucuchíes or Timotes over which passes the main road between Mérida and Trujillo is the highest in the Venezuelan Andes, the big wooden cross at the summit being about 14,500 feet above the sea. In the rainy season, owing to the dense mass of clouds on the pass, it is often deep in snow, and woe betide the unlucky traveller whose mule becomes paramada then! The verb derived from the generic name of these high passes is often applied jokingly to an individual who has merely got wet through and is cold and uncomfortable.
At Timotes, the first town on the north side of the pass, the tropical plants begin again to make their appearance, but the valley is chiefly occupied by grazing land, as far, at least, as the boundary of Trujillo.
The most northerly State of the trio is far more temperate in its general aspect than Mérida, though in Trujillo also there are páramos as well as tropical lowlands. The chief products are coffee and sugar, and while Mérida has its metallic ores, the most notable minerals here are coal and petroleum.
The capital dates back to 1556, and has been the scene of many notable events in the history of Venezuela, while its commercial prosperity tempted Gramont to march from La Ceiba and sack the town in 1678. It stands in a valley alone, surrounded by coffee plantations and canefields, which provide the principal articles of commerce in its markets. As is the case with San Cristobal, a ford on the main road to its port makes communications uncertain, although there is a second but difficult track over the hills which can be used in emergencies; either route means about twenty-five miles to Motatán and the same distance on a branch road to Valera, an important town on the road to Mérida.