CHAPTER XXVI 
Across the Andes — The End of the Trans-continental Journey 
I WAS fortunate in obtaining some excellent Peruvian 
muleteers to accompany me on the expedition over 
the Andes. The trip might have been a rough one 
for the ordinary traveller, but for me it was a real holi¬ 
day excursion, after the horrible time I had experienced 
in Brazil. This notwithstanding the disagreeable weather 
I encountered during the fourteen days’ rough riding 
which I employed in reaching the Pacific Ocean. 
I started at once with my pack animals on the trail 
which has been cut by the Peruvian Government over 
the mountains. Rain came down in torrents. Most of 
the country was swampy, the mules sinking chest-deep 1 
in mud. The travelling was not exactly what you would 
call pleasant. Your legs dangled all the time in water 
and slush. As that trail was used by caravans, the mules 
had cut regular transverse grooves in the ground all 
along, in which successively they all placed their hoofs. 
Each groove was filled with slushy water, and was sepa¬ 
rated from the next by a mud wall from one to three 
feet high. The mules were constantly stumbling and fall¬ 
ing. After you had travelled a short distance you were 
in a filthy condition, the torrential rain washing down 
the splashes of mud and spreading them all over you. 
After leaving Yessup we crossed first the Sinchhuaqui 
River, then the Aguachini. We began to ascend two 
kilometres after we had left Yessup, and marched steadily 
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