After struggling a while with our plan to descend the Guarapiche river to the Golfo Triste, we took the direct road to the mountains. The Guanaguana and Caripe valleys are separated by an embankment or calcareous ridge famous for miles around for its name Cuchilla de Guanaguana. We found this way tiring because we still had to climb the cordilleras, but it is by no means as dangerous as they claim in Cumanà. In many places the path is no more than 14 or 15 inches wide; the mountain ridge it follows is covered with a short slippery grass; its sides are both very steep and the traveler who fell could roll some 700 to 800 feet down over that grass. However, the mountain has abrupt slopes, not precipices. The local mules are so sure-footed that they inspire confidence. They behave just like mules from Switzerland or the Pyrenees. The wilder a country, the more acute and sensitive is instinct in domestic animals. When the mules glimpse a danger they stop and turn their heads from right to left and raise and lower their ears as if thinking. They delay making up their minds, but always choose the right course of action if the traveler does not distract them or make them continue. In the Andes, during journeys of six and seven months, in mountains furrowed with torrents, the intelligence of horses and beasts of burden develops in a surprising way. You often hear mountain people say: 'I will not give you a mule with a comfortable gait, but the one that reasons best (la màs racional). This popular expression, the result of long experiences, contradicts far more convincingly than speculative philosophy those who claim that animals are simply animated machines.

In the New Andalusia and Barcelona provinces, under the name of the Gobierno de Cumanà, there are more than fourteen tribes: in New Andalusia reside the Chaimas, the Guaiquerí, the Pariagotos, the Quaquas, the Araucans, the Caribs and the Guaraunos; in the province of New Barcelona, the Cumanagotos, the Palenques, the Caribs, the Piritus, the Tomuzas, the Topocuares, the Chacopotes and the Guarives. Nine to ten of these tribes consider themselves to be of entirely different races. Of the remaining tribes, the most numerous are the Chaimas in the Caripe mountains, the Caribs in the southern savannahs of New Barcelona, and the Cumanagotos in the Piritu missions. Some Guarauno families live on the left shore of the Orinoco where the delta begins, under missionary discipline. The most common languages are those of the Guaraunos, the Caribs, the Cumanagotos and the Chaimas.

On the 20th of June, before sunrise, we set off for the Villa de Laguna, some 350 toises (13) above Santa Cruz harbor. The narrow and tortuous path leading to La Laguna climbs along a torrent, which in the rainy season turns into fine cascades. Near the town we met some white camels, barely laden. These animals are mainly used to transport goods from the customs house to the merchants. Camels are not numerous in Tenerife, while in Lanzarote and Fuerteventura there are thousands.