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Updated: May 8, 2025
Among the few rivers worthy of attention, the Rio Guines may be noticed, the Rio Armendaris or Chorrera, of which the waters are led to the Havannah by the Sanja de Antoneli; the Rio Canto on the north of the town of Bayamo; the Rio Maximo which rises on the east of Puerto Principe; the Rio Sagua Grande near Villa Clara; the Rio de las Palmas which issues opposite Cayo Galiado; the small rivers of Jaruco and Santa Cruz between Guanabo and Matanzas, navigable at the distance of some miles from their mouths and favourable for the shipment of sugar-casks; the Rio San Antonio which, like many others, is engulfed in the caverns of limestone rocks; the Rio Guaurabo west of the port of Trinidad; and the Rio Galafre in the fertile district of Filipinas, which throws itself into the Laguna de Cortez.
The great mole, constructed with wood, and very useful to commerce, was damaged in discharging pieces of artillery. It is entirely destroyed, and it was undecided whether it would be best to reconstruct it with masonry, according to the project of Don Luis de Bassecourt, or to open the bar of Guaurabo by dredging it.
On all this southern line the coast is exempt from danger with the exception of that part which lies between the strait of Cochinos and the mouth of the Rio Guaurabo. These seas are very difficult to navigate. I had the opportunity of determining the position of several points in latitude and longitude during the passage from Batabano to Trinidad of Cuba and to Carthagena.
The municipality caused us to be conducted to the mouth of the Rio Guaurabo in a fine carriage lined with old crimson damask; and, to add to our confusion, an ecclesiastic, the poet of the place, habited in a suit of velvet notwithstanding the heat of the climate, celebrated, in a sonnet, our voyage to the Orinoco. It seemed as though the starry firmament reposed on the savannah.
These good people requested us mount two by two on the same horse; and, as the heat was excessive, we accepted their offer. The distance from the mouth of the Rio Guaurabo to Trinidad is nearly four miles in a north-west direction. The road runs across a plain which seems as if it had been levelled by a long sojourn of the waters. Probably the same species which struck Messrs.
Proceeding from the mouth of the Rio Guaurabo to the Villa de la Trinidad, I saw on the north-west, the Lomas de San Juan, which form needles or horns more than 300 toises high, with their declivities sloping regularly to the south. This calcareous group presents a majestic aspect, as seen from the anchorage near the Cayo de Piedras.
The distance of the town from Puerto de Casilda and Puerto Guaurabo is nearly equal; yet the expense of transport is greatest in the former port. The Boca del Rio Guaurabo, defended by a new battery, furnishes safe anchorage, although less sheltered than that of Puerto Casilda. Vessels that draw little water or are lightened to pass the bar, can go up the river and approach the town within a mile.
On the 14th of March we entered the Rio Guaurabo, one of the two ports of Trinidad de Cuba, to put on shore the practico, or pilot of Batabano, who had steered us across the flats of the Jardinillos, though not without causing us to run aground several times.
The cacique fed this young fish for several days with yucca bread, millet, and the roots the natives eat. While it was still young, he put it in a lake near to his house, as in a fish-pond. This lake, which had been called Guaurabo. was henceforth called Manati. For twenty-five years this fish lived at liberty in the waters of the lake, and grew to an extraordinary size.
The surveys and plans of defence made by M. Le Maur, at the time of the commission of Count Jaruco, prove that the anchorage of Xagua merits the celebrity it acquired even in the first years of the conquest. The coast, I was told, is so steep that a frigate may approach the mouth of the Rio Guaurabo. Columbus says expressly that in his time the inhabitants of Cuba did not collect wax.
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