The Adventurer's Son(70)
Chapter 39
Roman’s Route
Upper Rio Claro, September 2014.
Courtesy of the author
When we arrived at Vargas’s farm in the dark on September 4 to finally walk Roman’s planned route, it had been eight weeks since he wrote us his last email and forty-three days since we realized he was missing. We followed Vargas uphill in the tropical dawn, the best hour of every day, set between sleep and sweat. With his son Jefe in the rear, Vargas walked us along a dirt road, then an ATV trail, and finally a footpath where we slipped across the park boundary into Corcovado. Our shared language with Vargas would consist mostly of river names: Agujas, Barrigones, Conte, Rincon, Sirena, Claro, El Tigre. We had no translator.
At first Vargas moved slowly and Peggy knew why. “He thinks I can’t keep up. Tell him to go faster.” She waved her hand forward from the wrist and frowned at Vargas.
“Mas rapido!” I said in my simple Spanish. Faster! When that didn’t work, she pushed him with both hands and a smile. Physically urged onward, he looked at me quizzically but moved quicker with Peggy hot on his heels.
In the park, the trail narrowed and we squeezed past huge tree roots that sprawled across the narrow ridgeline like fat lazy pythons.
“Cerro de Oro,” Vargas said, motioning to a side trail.
“La Tarde?” I asked, pointing ahead.
“No. Aqui,” he replied pointing down the Cerro de Oro trail again. Thai, Pancho, and Kique must have passed this way on their way to Dos Brazos.
Dawn slipped away and by eight we were sweating. We passed beneath a gang of spider monkeys barking, screaming, and shaking the trees above us. We climbed higher. Just before mossy woods and overcast skies closed overhead, we took in a rare view of Corcovado Lagoon. Soon after we passed the Rincon benchmark and entered Las Quebraditas’ disorienting bamboo forest.
At one of the picas, a small, subtle trail I would hardly notice, much less follow, Vargas led us to the Mueller benchmark. Startled, I turned slowly around trying to orient myself. For the second time on the summit plateau, I had lost my sense of direction. Peggy looked at my face. “What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I thought we were going a completely different way and am totally turned around. I’m glad we’re with Vargas.”
“If you don’t know where we are, then I’m glad we’re with him, too!”
After climbing over deadfalls and past muddy trail braids, we came to where an empty package from Vargas’s granola bar and heliconia leaves marked our lunch spot with Thai from a month ago. I looked at the litter and thought how many times I’d hoped to find a Starburst wrapper or other sure sign left by Roman. We sat on the same leaves on the same logs, knowing little more than the same facts about him we knew then. Peggy squirmed. Her bruised tailbone prevented her from sitting squarely on anything.
After lunch we moved down the broad ridge. Vargas motioned right: “Sirena.” Then left: “Rio Claro.” And behind us: “Madrigal y Rincon.” We had passed the five-pointed star and now slipped through the keyhole that led off the plateau to Rio Claro.
At times, tangles of liana-choked deadfall pushed us off the ridge trail, but Vargas quickly got us on track. The gentle tzing of his razor-sharp machete left a wake of fresh-cut vegetation behind like bread crumbs. Smiling and joking in the oppressive heat and sweat-soaking humidity, Peggy watched for birds and monkeys. She never complained, despite waking up nauseated from dinner the night before and fretting about snakes underfoot today. She had no difficulty keeping up. This was the mother of our son.
By early afternoon Vargas announced: “Rio Claro.” He pointed to a silver sliver far below at the bottom of a steep-sided valley. It seemed unlikely that Roman, following only the small, thin pica trails that are so rarely used and easily lost, would have made it to here. I hoped he had exercised judgment enough not to try crossing Las Quebraditas. But we had to. We owed it to ourselves and to him to be here and look. We kept close to the Osa’s most experienced tracker.
On a ridge high above two branches of the Rio Claro, Vargas and his son disagreed over where we were. Once my phone’s GPS acquired a signal through a thinning in the canopy, I showed Jefe our location and pointed to the Rio Claro on both map and landscape. Going right would take us down to the river, but instead Vargas took us left and then up, up, up, rushing headlong into a sudden downpour.
While trying to hang on to his pace, I gestured this didn’t seem right. Vargas responded by plunging off the ridge on a tapir trail where the rainstorm left a small stream spilling down muddy steps. The pouring rain chilled Peggy first and then us all. “You said we’d camp before the rain! That’s what you said!” Peggy reminded me over the din of big drops pounding on layer upon layers of forest leaves. “Why not here?” she implored.
“Acampar aqui!” I yelled over the crash of water. Camp here!
“No agua!” came the reply. No water!
I smiled and held out my arms, palms up at the deluge all around us, then dropped my pack, pulled out a large Visqueen sheet, and pitched it. Peggy and I ducked under the plastic to escape the cold rain. Vargas pulled out a brand-new, tiny dome tent and erected it quickly without Visqueen above.
Peggy collected rainwater in our bottles and cookpot as it ran off our plastic shelter. I erected our bug net tent, then took a full water bottle to the other tent as a peace offering. We stripped off wet clothes and hung them to drain. Peggy ate an entire hot meal, settling her cramps and relaxing her. While she’d found her appetite, she slept little, picking off small ticks from her skin as they bit her most of the night. Early in the morning, lightning flashed and thundered. A tree crashed to the ground.