Personal Narrative of a Journey to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent by Alexander von Humboldt

Author:Alexander von Humboldt
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780141961026
Publisher: Penguin Group USA, Inc.
Published: 2009-12-09T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 11

Journey from Cumaná to La Guaira – The road to Caracas – General observations on the provinces of Venezuela – Caracas

Crossing from Cumaná to La Guaira by sea our plan was to stay in Caracas until the end of the rainy season; from there we would go to the great plains, the llanos, and the Orinoco missions; then we would travel upstream on the great river from south of the cataracts to the Río Negro and the Brazilian frontier, and return to Cumaná through the capital of Spanish Guiana, called Angostura64 or Straits. It was impossible to calculate how long this journey of some 700 leagues would take in canoes. On the coasts only the mouth of the Orinoco is known. No trading is carried out with the missions. What lies beyond the plains is unknown country for the inhabitants of Caracas and Cumaná. In a land where few travel, people enjoy exaggerating the dangers arising from the climate, animals and wild men.

The boat that took us from Cumaná to La Guaira was one of those that trade between the coasts and the West Indies Islands. They are 30 feet long, and not more than 3 feet above the water, without decks. Although the sea is extremely rough from Cape Codera to La Guaira, and although these boats have large triangular sails, not one of them has been lost at sea in a storm. The skill of the Guaiquerí pilots is such that voyages of 120 to 150 leagues in open sea, out of sight of land, are done without charts or compasses, as with the ancients. The Indian pilot guides himself by the polar star or the sun.

When we left the Cumaná coast we felt as if we had been living there for a long time. It was the first land that we had reached in a world that I had longed to know from my childhood. The impression produced by nature in the New World is so powerful and magnificent that after only a few months in these places you feel you have been here years. In the Tropics everything in nature seems new and marvellous. In the open plains and tangled jungles all memories of Europe are virtually effaced as it is nature that determines the character of a country. How memorable the first new country you land at continues to be all your life! In my imagination I still see Cumaná and its dusty ground more intensely than all the marvels of the Andes.

As we approached the shoal surrounding Cape Arenas we admired the phosphorescence of the sea. Bands of dolphins enjoyed following our boat. When they broke the surface of the water with their broad tails they diffused a brilliant light that seemed like flames coming from the depths of the ocean. We found ourselves at midnight between some barren, rocky islands in the middle of the sea, forming the Caracas and Chimanas groups. The moon lit up these jagged, fantastic rocks, which had not a trace of vegetation.

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