Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
not get afloat. The commissions had to reorganize and at the same time develop new methods that
would enable the completion of our assignment.
TheBrazilianCommissionwasthussharplyreduced,asitsmemberswerenowmuchtoonumerous
for the resources that had so abruptly declined by half. I arranged with Sr. Buenaño, the head of the
Peruvian Commission, for us to use our little launch to the best advantage to transport our supplies,
and proceeded forward towing the rest of the food after dividing it among those who would stay.
The adjutant, the quartermaster, and the secretary and the crew of the
Cunha Gomes
remained in São
Braz. The measures we agreed on were ready: the Brazilian Commission would include da Cunha, an
aide, the doctor, a sergeant, and eleven soldiers and laborers and would continue the voyage to the
Chandless. On the 23rd, we met up with the Peruvian mission, diminished only by the crew of the
Cahuapanas
.
When we next reunited on the 25th of May at the mouth of the Chandless, the commissions agreed
to measures that the situation demanded: among these were communication with our respective gov-
ernments, providing them with a real picture of the emerging conditions and, given the unforeseen
character of these problems, information that might justify the development of new instructions. It
was an indispensable step. The news about the state of the river ahead was extremely disheartening.
The Purús was at low water and largely blocked to navigation. A few miles ahead, provisional bar-
racks were set up by the stranded Peruvian-Brazilian administrative commission. Three steamships,
the
Santos Dumont
, the
Phénix
, and the
Cassiana
, had run aground not far from us, trapped in the
sands. Every day, canoes and
montarías
descended the river headed for Manaus, their crews and pas-
sengers united and unvarying in their assessments of the unfavorable level of the waters. All this jus-
tified an urgent communication that was entrusted to a subaltern of the Brazilian force, who on the
26th of May left for Manaus, also charged with acquiring more supplies.
In spite of disaster, our communications were merely preventative; we were not contemplating
stopping or going back, but rather thinking about how to proceed although now using canoes and
small
batelãos
forourflotilla.Wedidnotdeludeourselvesaboutthedifficultiesawaitingus,butwhen
we examined the map, we noted that we had already advanced a great deal. We were about 1,500
milesfromthemouth,oraboutthree-quartersofthewayupthePurús.Thereremainedstillthesouth-
west route just a bit more than 2 degrees longitude and less than 2 in latitude: a traveling distance of
some 450 miles. But our new means of travel, imposed on us by the recent events and dictated by the
stage of the river, made our apparent proximity to our objective completely illusory. We would, after
all, have to achieve our goal against the current.
In fact, traveling at a velocity of about five miles a day (and this would be no small feat given the
tasks we had to carry out—tasks that would increase to the same degree as we advanced into the un-
known—we concluded that only with ninety days of forced travel could we arrive at the headwaters.
And thus we set out on this extensive journey, leaving the confluence of the Chandless at noon, at a
pace that totally counterposed in its slowness the ever expanding enormity of our route: May 30, 1.7
miles; May 31, 4.4 miles. June 1, 5 miles . . .
Thissluggishpacewasmostlyrelatedtotheproceduresthatwehadadoptedfortakinghydrograph-
icdata,wheretheorientationswetookwiththecompasswerelinkedtotheindirectdistanceswewere
taking with the Lugeol lens, which forced us to stop at all the inflexions and meanders of the river. If
we continued with this system we would extinguish our supplies well before our objective. We mod-
ified it, substituting the indirect measures of the lens for those we obtained by measuring the velocity
of the canoes, and by repeated base measurements taken along the beaches most apt for these opera-
Search WWH ::
Custom Search