From Orotava, along a narrow and stony path through a beautiful chestnut forest (el monte de castaìos), we reached an area covered with brambles, laurels and arboreal heaths. The trunks of the latter grow to an extraordinary size and their mass of flowers contrasts agreeably with the abundant Hypericum canariensis. We stopped under a solitary pine to fill up with water. This place commanded a magnificent panorama over the sea and the western part of the island.

Wherever the Temi forms bays the jungle is flooded for more than half a square league. To avoid the bends and shorten our journey the Indians leave the river bed and go south along paths or sendas, that is, canals, some 4 or 5 feet wide. The depth of the water rarely exceeds half a fathom. These sendas are formed in the flooded jungle like paths in dry land. Whenever they could the Indians crossed from one mission to another along the same path in their pirogues. But as the passage is narrow the thick vegetation sometimes leads to surprises. An Indian stands in the bow with his machete, incessantly cutting branches blocking the canal. In the thickest part of the jungle we heard an odd noise. As the Indian cut at some branches a school of toninas - freshwater dolphins - surrounded our boat. The animals had hidden under branches of a ceiba and escaped through the flooded jungle, squirting up water and compressed air, living up to their name of 'blowers'. What a strange sight, inland, 300 to 400 leagues from the Orinoco and Amazon mouths!

Our first camp, above the Vasiva, was easily set up. We found a corner of dry land free from shrubs at the south of the cano Curamuni in a place where we saw capuchin monkeys, so easily identified with their black beards and sad, wild look, as they climbed along horizontal branches of a genipap. The next five nights became more and more uncomfortable as we approached the Orinoco bifurcation. The exuberance of the vegetation increases to such a point that it is hard to imagine, even when you have got used to the Tropics. There is no beach; a palisade of bunched trees becomes the river bank. You see a channel some 200 toises wide bordered with two enormous walls carpeted with leaves and liana. We tried to get ashore but could not even get out of the canoe. Sometimes at sunset we would follow the bank for an hour to reach, not a clearing, but a less overgrown patch where our Indians with their machetes could cut down enough to let thirteen or fourteen people camp. We could not spend the night in the pirogue. The mosquitoes that tormented us during the day crowded towards evening under the toldo, that is, the roof made of palm leaves that sheltered us from rain. Never were our hands or faces more swollen. Even father Zea, boasting that in his cataract missions he had the biggest and bravest (los más valientes) mosquitoes, agreed that these Casiquiare bites were the most painful he had ever felt. In the middle of thick jungle it was difficult to find any wood to light our fire; the branches are so full of sap in this equatorial region where it always rains that they hardly burn. Where there are no arid beaches we hardly ever came across that old wood which Indians say has been 'cooked in the sun'. A fire was only necessary to scare away jungle animals: we had such a low stock of food that we did not need wood to cook.

Soon after entering the Nueva Barcelona llanos we spent the night in a Frenchman's house. He welcomed us very cordially. He came from Lyon, and had left home when still very young. He seemed quite indifferent to all that was happening across the ocean or, as they scornfully say here, 'del otro lado del charco' ('on the other side of the pond'). He was busy sticking large bits of wood together with a glue called guayca, used by carpenters in Angostura. It is as good as any glue made from animal matter. It is found ready-made between the bark and sap of a creeper of the Combretaceae family (Combretum guayca). It resembles birdlime made from mistletoe berries and the inner bark of the holly. An astonishing amount of this glue pours out from the twining branches of the bejuco de guayca when they are Cut.

In the port of Encaramada we met some Caribs of Panapa with their cacique on their way up the Orinoco to take part in the famous fishing of turtle eggs. His pirogue was rounded towards the bottom like a bongo, and followed by a smaller canoe called a curiara. He was sitting under a kind of tent (toldo) built, like the sails, of palm leaves. His silent, cold reserve, and the respect others gave him, denoted an important person. The cacique was dressed like his people. All were naked, armed with bows and arrows, and covered in annatto, the dye made from Bixa orellana. The chief, the servants, the furniture, the sail and boat were all painted red. These Caribs are almost athletic in build and seemed far taller than any Indians we had seen up to now. Smooth, thick hair cut in a fringe like choir boys', eyebrows painted black, and a lively and gloomy stare give these Indians an incredibly hard expression. Having seen only skulls of these Indians in European collections we were surprised to see that their foreheads were more rounded than we had imagined. The fat, disgustingly dirty women carried their children on their backs. Their thighs and legs were bound by knotted cotton ligatures, leaving space for flesh to bulge out between the strands. It is noticeable that the Caribs are as careful about their exterior and dress as naked, painted men can be. They attach great importance to the shapes of certain parts of their bodies. A mother would be accused of indifference to her children if she did not artificially bind their calves in the fashion of the country. As none of our Apure Indians spoke the Carib language we could not ask the chief where he was going to camp to gather the turtle eggs.

We left Turbaco on a fresh and very dark night, walking through a bamboo forest. Our muleteers had difficulty finding the track, which was narrow and very muddy. Swarms of phosphorescent insects lit up the tree-tops like moving clouds, giving off a soft bluish light. At dawn we found ourselves at Arjona where the bamboo forest ends and arborescent grasses begin.

On the 7th of June we sadly left Father Ramon Bueno. Alone among all the missionaries we met he cared for the Indians. He hoped to return to Madrid to publish the result of his researches into the figures and characters that cover the Uruana rocks. In this area between the Meta, Arauca and Apure, Alonso de Herrera, during the first 1535 expedition to the Orinoco, found mute dogs (perros mudos). We cannot doubt that this dog is indigenous to South America. Different Indian languages have words for this dog that cannot be related to European languages. Early historians all speak of mute dogs, and this same dog was eaten in Mexico and on the Orinoco.