GUANACASTE—PUNTARENAS TO LIBERIA 433 



Liberia and although comida was long over, our host added 

 hot coffee and frijoles. 



The next morning, January 15, having partly dressed, 

 we walked some three hundred yards down the hill on which 

 the house was situated to a nameless brook of clear water, 

 where we washed, as the pigs also did at any hour of the day. 

 All the water for drinking and cooking was carried in jars 

 from this brook uphill to the house, causing us to wonder 

 why the latter had been placed so far away. Lower down it 

 would also have been shielded from the tremendous easterly 

 winds. 



Hacienda Guachipelin is the highest human dwelling to- 

 ward Volcan Rincon de la Vieja, although its elevation 

 is but 1700 feet by my aneroid, which gave Liberia as 500 

 feet.^ It lies not far from and south of the Rio Blanco. 

 Near the house and not very much higher is Cerro San Vi- 

 cente, 30° west of north, on the other side of the Rio Blanco. 

 Farther away and 60° west of North is Cerro Gongora, which 

 is different from a "Gongora" that some maps put near 

 Volcan Orosi. Volcan Rincon de la Vieja, we were told, 

 is not visible from Hacienda Guachipelin, being hidden 

 therefrom by another mountain known as Cerro Guachipe- 

 lin, lying to the west and south of the Cerro de la Vieja. 

 The highest part of Cerro Guachipelin so far as I could see 

 it — for it was always more or less cloud-capped — was 10° 

 east of north from the Hacienda. The location of Ha- 

 cienda Guachipelin is much more nearly that shown on the 

 map of 1865, accompanying von Seebach's account of his 

 journey through Guanacaste, than as displayed on Pittier's 

 map published in 191 2. On the latter, the Hacienda appears 

 as "H. Guachipelin" and to the north of the Rio Blanco, 

 the name Rio Colorado not being used for any river in the 

 vicinity. The Rio Blanco of the 191 2 map is the Rio Colo- 



' The Intercontinental Railway Commission gives Liberia as 496 feet. 



