The savannah of Quaibaru is not nearly so picturesque as that of Baramaku, but it occupies a commanding position high above the left bank of the Kowa valley. As the forest veil falls, you step out on to the ridge of a grassy hill, whereon are perched three banaboos, one on the hill-top (2,550 feet above sea-level), the two others in échelon lower down the ridge. Then come in succession two narrow savannah valleys, divided by two more savannah ridges, on which also are banaboos. The houses of the savannah Indians are, as a rule, circular, about thirty feet in diameter, and they accommodate a large number of people and dogs. The walls are of mud, about four feet high, and the thatch slopes up sharply to a high pointed top, so that inside there is a sort of upper story, where provisions can be stored out of the way of the starving curs who abound in every village. The houses are only lighted by the doorway, and are, therefore, very gloomy within, the reason for this being that the pest of the savannahs, the biting kabouru-fly, never enters a dark place. The doorways generally face north-east, so as to get all the breeze possible, the wind blowing almost as steadily from that quarter over the savannah as it does on the coast.
We had anticipated much delay at Quaibaru, for we feared that our droghers, after short rations in the forest, would insist on celebrating their arrival in inhabited country by a feast. Luckily for us, the Quaibaru folk, who are Patamonas, were not in a hospitable frame of mind towards our convoy, though friendly enough to us. They declared that they had no cassiri and scarcely any cassava, so that our men were soon anxious to leave. Accordingly we made and ate our breakfast beside a stream in the first Quaibaru valley, a shadeless and uncomfortable place, where the Quaibaruvians brought us some excellent bananas, a limited supply of hard cassava—“wood-bread,” Mr. Menzies called it—and a bucketful of limes. Mr. Menzies had given the villagers some limes to plant a few years ago, and the trees had done extremely well. The limes were welcome, as the stock we had brought up from Potaro Landing was nearly exhausted. The villagers also undertook to fetch up for us the salt which we had left behind at Akrabanna, and to bring it after us to Puwa.
After a short midday halt we pushed on, winding in and out of the little Quaibaru valleys under a blazing sun; but a fresh breeze saved the situation. From a hill-ridge before descending a very steep forest slope to the Kowa River, we caught our first view of the big savannah, rising as a shining tableland high up behind smaller tree-clad hills on the other side of the river. It was a sight for sore eyes, and looked a veritable “Land of Promise.” An Indian trail always goes bang up the side of a hill in a straight line, and bang down the other side, with no thought of gradient or of avoiding unnecessary exertion, so down we had to go, sliding perpendicularly to the Kowa, hanging on to handy trees as we passed, and more than once taking an involuntary seat. We crossed the Kowa on a tacouba, just awash with the stream; and after a short rest and cool down, the process assisted by a limade, we went on through a forest of luxuriant wild papaw and banana for some distance. Our path then turned sharply out of the Kowa valley and proceeded to ascend a hill very nearly as steep as a house in a bee-line upwards. It was a bit of a scramble, and the stiffest climb we had had since the ascent to Kaietuk, the last part being a dry watercourse. Once on top, the forest dropped away. We had a superb view back over the Kowa to Quaibaru-toy, and we could just see a savannah hill with a tuft of trees on it away behind the Quaibaru forest. It was Baramaku-toy standing a-tiptoe to see the last of us. Kowatipu would have been in sight had he not been characteristically concealed in a rain-cloud. We sat down to admire the glorious breadth of landscape, hoping also to see our carriers emerge from the bush, for we were somewhat anxious to know how the Demerara River men would negotiate the hill. Haywood, who always kept up well, arrived almost as soon as we did, and inquired exultingly whether “Madam don’t think this country worth the walk.” I said, “Indeed I did.”
Haywood always carried his possessions in a bag upon his head, and managed most skilfully to look after his feet without upsetting his balance. Indians carry their loads on their backs, with a strap over each shoulder and a third strap across the forehead. Their hands are thus free, though Haywood always gave each drogher of our party some additional etcetera, such as a saucepan, lamp, or a teapot. I used often to wish I could sketch the oddness of a pair of extremely stalwart, naked, red legs, surmounted by a mighty bundle, trotting along in front of me, naught else of the man being visible save a pair of hands carefully conveying some absurdly civilized object, like a teapot or a kerosene lamp!
In days to come it is to be hoped that one of the main roads of British Guiana may lead up to this plateau; and, when the time is at hand for building such a road, its trace will probably be carried from the watershed of the Sirani-baru into the Kowa valley by easy gradients, and thence round hill contours, without ascending the Baramaku or Quaibaru savannahs up to the high-level tableland. But the existing trail could with a few détours at small expense be made into a bridle track suitable for pack animals and for cattle; and if this were done the savannah highlands, which are to-day within nineteen hours’ march from the Potaro at Chenapowu, would be made economically and speedily accessible. A launch would place Chenapowu within two hours of Kaietuk, and a motor road would bring Kaietuk within a day’s journey of Bartika. It would then be a matter of no difficulty and small expense to travel up or down between the highland savannahs and the coast in three or four days.
We got tired of waiting for our laggard carriers, took tea, and started off again. The trail now went once more into the bush for a few minutes, up and down one more hill, and then emerged into savannah for good. The sun was very hot and shone straight in our eyes; but the glorious air prevented fatigue, for every breath of it was like a draught of strength. Our path ran fairly level through high grass; but, like all Indian trails, it was uncomfortably narrow, as the Indians put their feet down one immediately in front of the other. The hills above the right bank of the Kowa, below the point where we crossed it, form a grassy tableland with high savannah crests; and, passing through a col between two such crests, we debouched after two and three-quarter hours’ actual marching from Quaibaru-toy on the magnificent plateau which forms part of Mr. Menzies’ ranch. The path dipped down to the deep pool of a stream, near a waving fringe of high bamboo. To the right rose a low tree-clad hill, and at its foot we camped in a banaboo built by Mr. Menzies near the northern boundary of his grazing land close to Karto village.
Mount Kowatipu from the Karto Tableland.
Towards sunset my husband and I went up a neighbouring knoll to take observations. The view over the lovely rolling plain, with its smiling valleys, was entrancing, and old Kowatipu actually put his head, rather crossly, out of his cloud for a few seconds. The Karto tableland is a flat, grassy plateau some 2,400 feet above sea-level. It is bounded on the east by the Kowa River; on the north-west and south-west by the Chiung River, both flowing in rifts far below the plateau level; on the south-east and north by hills which divide the Kowa from the Chiung valley. Its extreme length from north to south is about seven miles, and its extreme width from east to west is some eight miles. Its area is roughly fifty square miles; and the distance across the plateau by our trail, which ran in a tolerably straight line, my husband estimated at five miles. The whole tableland forms an excellent grazing-ground; and, although there was at the time of our visit no water on the central part of the plateau, there were many streams at its edges, falling into the Kowa and the Chiung, while across it ran a few dry channels, which are, no doubt, full of water in the rainy season. The Indian village, named Karto, stands at the north-west corner of the plateau, not far from Mr. Menzies’ banaboo. Its provision-fields are partly in the tree-clad hills, fringing the plateau to the north, and partly down in the fertile Kowa valley near the point of our crossing. We saw no cattle on the tableland; but the Karto villagers told us that there was a herd on some very attractive-looking pasture-grounds near the head of the Chiung River. For it must be understood that the highlands suitable for grazing are by no means confined to the tableland which we crossed, and from which we could see the savannahs round the upper reaches of the Chiung only a little below our level, while across the valley of the Chiung, lower in its course, we looked up to a yet higher, and apparently not less extensive, savannah plateau. These attractive and spacious highlands deserve to be developed, and would support a considerable population. They would, as it is, make an admirable hill-station. The scenery is beautiful. The climate at the season of our visit was delightful. The locality could be made easily and cheaply accessible from Georgetown, and would, I venture to think, prove much superior as a health resort to the West India Islands.