by David Yeadon
It was so good to be away from the city and among the broken treeless hills of the paramo uplands, swaying through sweeping pastures of yellow frailejon flowers, whose pale green stems and leaves were coated in white velvety fur. Venezuelans have a soft spot for the wild paramo and its characteristic hardy plant. They write songs and poems about it, claim dramatic medical properties, blend the pith into a kind of jam, and wrap home-churned butter and little goat cheeses in its fuzzy leaves to give them “perfume.” When nothing much else grows in the high Andean ranges but spiky grasses, heather, and mosses, you have to admire its tenacity, and beauty. A hillside of golden frailejon flowers is a soul-warming sight.
We paused for a lunch of fruit and coarse arepa cornbread. I had watched Paco’s mother bake the small rounds in her rock-walled kitchen in San Rafael. The tiny room had no chimney and blue smoke, cut by shafts of sunlight through a tiny window overlooking the pig pound, wraithed around our heads before slowly easing through chinks in the pantile roof. She was a small plump woman with one of those strong Indian faces that seemed to be hacked out of Andean gneiss. But when she smiled through the smoke her features immediately softened into girlish femininity. I liked her, even though I couldn’t understand a word of her soft chatter. And I think she liked me too because she picked our lunch loaves very carefully, smelling each one, tapping the hard, almost black crust with her fingers before wrapping them in cheesecloth and sending us off into the hills with a blessing and a final smile.
We let the horse, the mule, and the donkey graze by a stream which tumbled over large boulders into a deep pool, clear as uncracked crystal. It was hot in the sheltered spot we’d selected for lunch, out of the valley breezes. The water was tempting, so I stripped off and plunged in.
And almost plunged right out again. The pool was virtually ice and the hot sun made it seem even colder.
Paco laughed through his mouthful of arepa, spraying crumbs. In his broken Spanish-English I heard him explain that the water in the stream had come from melting snow and ice fields in the mountains high up above the pass.
I tried to fake nonchalance as I splashed about, aware that my body was rapidly losing all feeling.
“It’s fine, Paco. Once you get used to it, it’s fine. Come on in!”
Paco shook his head and continued spraying arepa crumbs. But, to be honest, it was fine after a while. My torso emerged tingling and invigorated and I lay back in the grass to let the sun dry me, enjoying the tickling sensations as veins began to run again.
After lunch the narrow path began to rise more steeply toward a vast wall of rock that seemed to grow higher and more ominous as we guided our animals between the broken boulders. Where was the pass? I looked for an inviting cleft between the jagged mountains, but all I could see was that rock face. Surely we weren’t going to clamber over that thing?
Apparently we were.
The path zigzagged across more screes of sharp rocks, descended into clefts, crossed tumbling streams, and then climbed ever higher, heading straight for what looked like the insurmountable barrier. Maybe you’d make it with ropes and pitons, but with animals and a donkey laden with packs of food and sleeping bags and cooking equipment? Crazy idea! No wonder the wise old man who’d cast off all society’s trappings was known as “the hermit.” He’d discovered a place well and truly shut off from the world. Well, he’d better live up to all the tales told about him. This was going to be a far harder journey than I’d first thought.
Back in Mérida, when I announced my plans to a few friends I’d made in the city, there’d been raised eyebrows, low whistles, and decidedly cynical grunts. But no one warned me I’d be climbing vertical rock faces and maybe using up yet one more of my catlike lives. They were envious. I could feel it. Maybe a little resentful that I could travel where I wished, allowing all the time needed, while they stayed home in the city living responsible, hardworking lives.
Well. It was my fault for maybe being a little too dismissive of the challenges and not doing enough background research on what I was letting myself in for. And now I could hardly change my mind. I was in it for the duration. I couldn’t go back and explain that it was a more difficult journey than I’d bargained for. After all, we world wanderers (even this rather overweight one) have a certain reputation to keep. And they’d given me a wonderful farewell dinner, plied me with excellent wines, and toasted to my success. I had to succeed, for them—and for me.
So—onward and upward.
And upward and upward.
The rock wall now loomed like the Hoover Dam over us. I could see clouds across the high crags being slit to ribbons by the frost-shattered ridges.
Then the real climbing began. Surprisingly there was a path of sorts between piles of smashed rocks, but it was too steep for mule riding. We dismounted and began to drag our reluctant mounts higher and higher up the cliff face.
At eight thousand feet in San Rafael, where I’d arranged for my guide and transport, the air had been invigorating, full of the scent of flowers. Now we were around eleven thousand feet and I was aware of diminishing oxygen. My breaths were shorter and my body complained of thin air. I stopped leading the mule and let him make his own way up the narrow path. I had enough problems dragging my own weight up the steep face.
I tried not to look up. It was just too depressing to see the wall looming above me. Step—inhale—step—exhale. A slow steady rhythm was best. One step after the next, allowing the hypnotic pace to reduce thought to the now and nothing more.
Paco seemed unfazed by our change of pace. He’d made this journey before and didn’t mind telling me.
“This is the easy bit,” he called out, grinning like an idiot.
Thank you, Paco. Just what I needed to hear.
And of course he was right. Compared to what came later, this was a country ramble.
It became colder too. The mists were beginning to creep down the rock face. The top of the pass was blocked from sight by swirling wraiths of ribboning cloud. Soon we disappeared entirely into the cloying dampness. At times I lost the path and had to clamber back over mossy boulders to find my way again.
After two hours of this I was drained of all energy. Only the mental rhythm—step, inhale, step, exhale—kept me moving ever upward. Pilgrims seeking out the lonely hermit must really be burdened with problems to make this journey. I wondered what comforts they brought back with them. Apparently Juan Felix Sanchez, for that was his name, was known to speak in elliptical wisdoms, zenlike in their simplicity—or complexity, depending on your attitude. I’d heard similar tales in Nepal of mountain-bound gurus to whom the frantic faithful flocked in search of insights and gleamings of timeless knowledge. They say you value what you struggle for. In which case this was going to be a most enlightening journey.
The rock wall was almost vertical now. Somehow the animals climbed surefooted up the serpentine path, which was only a couple of feet wide. I was puffing and wheezing like a leaky steam engine. It was only that pungent quote from Shakespeare’s Macbeth that kept me going:
…stept in so far that
Returning were as tedious as go o’er
Paco was at the rear, still smiling and cajoling the donkey who, every few minutes, would bray out his anguish at having to carry our hefty load of food and equipment up such a ridiculously steep path.
Upward and upward; thirteen thousand feet and still climbing.
We were now totally smothered in the mist. Nothing existed outside the pounding of my heart, the rasp of my oxygen-starved lungs, and the scratch of boots on hard rock.
Upward and upward.
Surely we must be near the top of the pass by now. It was getting darker. My watch told me it was six-thirty P.M., too late to make it down the other side in safety. That meant a night on the mountain. Not a welcome thought. We’d obviously set out on the journey too late in the day. Paco had warned me about this, but I’d ignored him in my enthusiasm for getting started. An enthusiasm that had now diminished to
surly resentment at the fickleness of these mountains.
Then suddenly all my mumbling and grumbling ceased as a blast of frigid wind tore at my wet parka and almost sent me tumbling backward down the rock wall. My eyes were reduced to narrow slits and I could see nothing in front of me except slabs of ice-coated rock. But at least they were horizontal slabs, not vertical. Like a graveyard of fallen headstones. The top of the pass!
There was little time or enthusiasm for rejoicing. We both pulled our hoods tightly around our faces and tried to take shelter behind a boulder as the wind and clouds tore past us.
Paco had to shout to make himself heard in the maelstrom.
“Welcome to La Ventana—“the place of the winds”! We go down a little way. Find somewhere out of the wind. Make camp.” Then he added ominously. “This is not good. We leave too late.”
Yes, Paco, I know. And it was my fault.
The animals sensed our moroseness. They too knew things had gone wrong and made odd whinnying noises, beginning the descent warily, placing their feet delicately on the loose icy rocks of the path.
Fortunately, as we moved lower, the wind dropped. By nine-thirty P.M. we had found a sheltered spot in a rough circle of tumbled boulders and agreed to stop and spend the night. There were patches of brittle grass and frailejon, so at least the animals would have something to eat. We untied the packs and pulled the rolled sleeping bags off the shivering little donkey.
“You want some soup?” asked Paco.
“Great idea,” I think I said as we both scrambled into our waterproof sleeping bags, but I don’t remember anything else. Maybe Paco cooked and drank some soup, but I was already asleep, cocooned in duck down and dreaming of those long, leisurely dinners I’d enjoyed with my friends back in the cozy candlelit restaurants of Mérida that now seemed so far away….
Sometime in the middle of the night I awoke briefly. It was still very cold, but there was no wind and no cloud. The black sky was a vast scattering of stars. The moon shone between the peaks of the mountains, silvering their summits. The silence buzzed in my ears. Only the soft breathing of Paco huddled in his sleeping bag reminded me of where I was and what I was doing.
Dawn came as a fanfare: sudden surges of peach and amber across the layered ranges. Far below, the tangled valleys were filled with lavender mists.
Paco was already up, hunched over the butane stove trying to boil water for coffee (almost an impossibility at fourteen thousand feet). The animals looked fine, heads down, munching on the ice-flecked grasses. The sun rose rapidly; dun-colored hills turned bronze and the whole mountain panorama beckoned us to move on, deeper into this lost world of the Venezuelan Andes.
The descent was slow and difficult. Ice still coated the narrow path and we moved cautiously on the slippery rocks. But our spirits were different now. The worse had been overcome and we knew that somewhere down there, deep in one of the valleys, was a house, shelter, a place to cook a decent meal—and Juan Felix Sanchez.
Finally we saw the house, a rambling structure of black rock topped by sections of tin roof set against a hillside of wild bushes. There were no other buildings, no other sign of human habitation anywhere in that vast sweep of valleys and mountains. But curls of blue smoke, easing out from under the roof (no chimneys once again), made the place seem friendly, beckoning.
As we approached we noticed small rock shrines, one in the shape of a cross, one a tiny chapel the size of a doll’s house set by a swirling stream. We crossed the stream lower down and dismounted on a pasture of close-cropped grass at the side of the house. A cock crowed. A dog barked. Other than that there was no noise at all.
“They will be inside,” said Paco.
We crossed a second stream by way of a bridge of broad stone slabs and entered a dusty corral. Ahead of us a doorway led through to an enclosed courtyard. A couple of oddly shaped benches stood by the one outer wall of the house, pieced together from wood planks supported by sections of twisted branches. On a low plank table lay two clay bas-reliefs. The clay was still moist and someone had left them to dry in the sun. The figures were crudely shaped, but it was obvious that they depicted two scenes from the stations of the cross.
We entered a dark room built of black rock. Thin strands of sunlight filtered through chinks between the unmortared joints. Still nobody.
Paco pointed to a thick wooden door to our left. It was slightly ajar and smoke trickled out. We pushed it open and entered a smoky room entirely without sunlight and lit only by a smoldering fire. At first I could see nothing. My eyes hadn’t adjusted from the sear of sunlight outside. Paco eased past me and moved toward the fire. There were grunts of recognition and then he was speaking quietly—almost reverently—and stooping to greet someone beyond the flames. A figure rose up, small and hunched. Another figure remained seated in the shadows. I eased forward across the earth floor. A hand—warm and rough-skinned—reached out. I saw a dark smiling face and a magnificent silver mustache. Eyes sparkled in the glow of the fire.
“I am Juan Felix Sanchez. You are welcome.” He spoke Spanish in a slow gravelly voice. His hand gently squeezed mine and led me to a bench by the fire.
“Sit down. You will have some tea.”
At the mention of tea, the second figure arose.
“This is Epifania. She will make tea for you.”
I think Epifania smiled, but it was hard to tell with her face half hidden behind the shawl. She shuffled across the floor to bring two cups and then filled them from an enormous black kettle on the fire.
Whatever was in that odd-tasting brew worked its magic. Within minutes I felt relaxed and refreshed. All the aches in my bones after that cold night on the mountain eased away. It was time to get to know my hosts.
The conversation was slow, punctuated by periods of friendly silence as we all sipped together. Juan had obviously greeted many curious visitors to his remote retreat over the years and I was doubtless asking the same tedious questions as everyone else. But he answered quietly and politely as I tried to piece together the history of his unusual life.
As I’d been told in Mérida, he had left behind his important title as president of the community council and all the trappings of a prosperous legal career back in the San Rafael Valley. Along with his dogs, bed supplies, seeds, a container of fingerling trout to stock his own trout pond, some livestock, and a devoted wife, he had moved into the El Tisure Valley in 1943 and, except for a few rare occasions, had never ventured away from his simple home in almost fifty years.
“There was no reason to go anywhere,” he murmured softly. “Everything was here.”
The house had grown amoebalike over the years from a tiny shepherd’s shelter to this warrenlike complex of rooms and courtyards. On an upper level reached by a crude ladder made from tree branches he had built his own loom and wove his own rugs and thick cloth. Occasionally outsiders would come and stay to help him in the slow extension of his home, but usually it was just Juan and Epifania building the place together, rock by rock, over the years.
At one point as he talked he quoted something I couldn’t quite understand. I asked him to repeat it and Paco translated:
The dead are not those who
rest in a cold tomb:
The dead ones are those who
have dead souls
and continue to live.
“Did you write that?” I asked.
Juan suddenly started chuckling and spilled his tea over his stained trousers.
“No, no. That is on the gate of a cemetery in Mérida. I remember reading it when I was a boy. But it is very true—yes?”
We laughed and nodded.
“Were there many dead souls in San Rafael? Is that why you left?”
Juan smiled and shrugged. As I later realized, he rarely answered questions directly.
“A soul is all you have,” he said. “Everything else is…” he shrugged again and left the sentence unfinished.
By late afternoon I was sitting with Juan o
n an old wooden bench set against the corral wall outside his home. We were both drinking an herb tea of some kind prepared by Epifania. She was a shy woman whose face was always partially hidden by the shawl draped over her head and held in place by a broad-brimmed straw hat.
The sun was still bright and hot, burning my face as we laid our heads back against the wall and watched the chickens peck in the dust of the corral. On the hillside in front of us our horse, mule, and donkey nibbled happily on fresh green pasture. Behind them a waterfall tumbled off rock ledges into a series of cool dark pools before becoming a stream again, chittering away behind us.
I turned to look at Juan. His eyes were closed now. A bushy walruslike mustache hung down on either side of his mouth, which curved up slightly in a smile that never seemed to vanish. His dark brown skin was lined and leathery, his chin fuzzy with a silver stubble of unshaved hair. For a man in his eighties he had the face of a mischievous boy—part cherub, part imp. His two pet parrots, bright green with red markings, cackled at one another while nibbling on a pile of sunflower seeds left by Epifania. There was a peace about the place and I was glad to be here.
When Juan awoke I began to ask him about his church built on a hillside a short walk from the house, but he seemed to grow impatient.
“Have you been there?” he asked.
“No, not yet. We’ve only just arrived.”
“Well, go first. Then we talk.”
Paco leaned over and whispered, “Sometimes what he does not say is more important than what he says.”
Oh, boy. The zen was beginning.
It came again when I asked if I could see some of his weaving.
“You can see my weaving if you can see my weaving,” he replied. Then he laughed, spilling tea again, and reached across to touch my knee. “You are a good man, Señor David. A good man.”