Engineering professor retraces Roosevelt's steps 100 years later

Marc Meyers, a professor of mechanical engineering here at the Jacobs School, shown at the start of his trip up the River of Doubt. Courtesy Jeffrey Lehmann. 

Marc Meyers, a professor of materials science here at the Jacobs School of Engineering, has been retracing Theodore Roosevelt's steps up the River of Doubt, 100 years after Roosevelt's expedition in the heart of the Amazon basin.

Meyers is traveling with UC San Diego alum and documentary filmmaker Jeffrey Lehmann. They have sent two dispatches from their trip to UT San Diego.

In his most recent dispatch, Meyers recounts their encounter with the local Cinta Larga Indians:

We were descending the river after the Naivete falls when we were met by a power boat carrying six (Cinta Larga) Indians. They did not respond to our friendly greetings and one of them photographed us. Upon arrival at the Cinta Larga Village, Sargent Douglas, our contact in Vilhena, told us that there was trouble. Soon an Indian wearing a feather headband and followed by a group of children crossed the bridge. Joao Brabo ( Mean John) faced us and, with a stern posture, stated a long discourse in his native language, staring at us with anger and contempt. |We did not understand the words but the tone was clear. We did not have the right to invade his lands.

The meeting resulted in a 100-mile detour for Meyers and Lehman, who continue their journey.

Their first dispatch, written by Lehman, describes some of the other difficulties they encountered, including torrential rain and rapids.

The afternoon brought mosquitoes and bees to annoy us and we set camp in the clearing, after assembling our Pak Canoe. We got up at daybreak and initiated a descent in a narrow and dangerous stream. The river, less than ten yards in most places, was littered with fallen trees and branches. This required constant navigation and more than one brush with a perilous branch that could easily have punctured our canoe or toppled any of our watercraft. Every now and then a buritizinho (palm tree) lay across the stream, exhaling a sweet essence. Macaws flew over us periodically, and the birds were the same ones that Roosevelt had reported.

We can't wait for the next installment of their adventures.

Dispatches from the Amazon - Last in a four-part series

This is an update we received July 13 from Professor Marc Meyers, who is currently in Brazil, scouting locations for an expedition up the River of Doubt, which he plans to start this fall. Meyers plans to retrace the steps of Theodore Roosevelt, who explored the river 100 years ago, in 1914.

More on Meyers' planned expedition here.

An earlier dispatch from Meyers was published online by UT San Diego here.

So, we called Lino, the chief from the Indian village we had visited, and were finally able to meet him in a poor neighborhood in Vilhena, upon our return at night. His instructions were somewhat vague: “. ..just in front of a tractor, one block after a bicycle shop…”. We finally identified three men in the dark, one just arriving home. A friendly dog received one of them, promptly carrying his baseball cap into the house, dropping it off, and returning for the backpack. The mutt struggled but was able to drag it through the dirt and into the doorway.

We took Lino to a local bar. He is already a city slicker, baseball cap, cell phone, and other trappings of urban life. His Portuguese, although heavily accented, was more easily understood than his father’s, Manuel. He assessed his father’s age as early eighties, a more modest figure than the number given by his daughter, 95, and wife, later on: 105!  Lino gave us more detailed explanations about the river. His wife was undergoing treatment for a disease that he could not explain well, but was out of the hospital already.

Rondon’s bridge was not at the village but a few kilometers downstream. Two tree trunks crossing the river are still there apparently, but the length, 20 meters (about 20 yards), is the same. The river turned into a marsh downstream and then reemerged, a couple of meters wide at first. This was also described by Candice Millard and Roosevelt: the river went underground in places. Beyond the true Rondon bridge, he could go down by motor boat for about one day until a major waterfall is reached. His tribe tried to go down from the village but got stuck in the marsh, and the old women had said, peremptorily: “It cannot be crossed. The legs sink until the knees. We took two days.”

Lino accepted to take us to the waterfall. He knows a fellow that lives there and apparently the larger fish cannot get upstream past that point. But I was interested in the entire journey, all the way to the Aripuanan River, following the memorable expedition. He looked at me for an instant, fear in his little eyes hiding behind the baseball cap: “I can’t go there. The Cinta Larga live there.”

So, things had changed much and yet so little in one hundred years. The Parecis plateau had become one of the richest agricultural expanses of Brazil. In Vilhena, personal trainers sculpted the derrieres of the local belles and happy kids returned from karate classes in the evening and wolfed down pizza slices. And 200 km from there, the Cinta Larga, the same ones that had killed Rondon’s dog and trailed the original expedition, still terrorized the less belligerent Indian tribes. “But if we can transport my boat beyond the marsh, we can go to the waterfall,” he said.

He sipped the beer, hoping that we would offer him a second bottle, and eyed the scantily clad waitress. Naif complimented her on her hardiness, since the night was chilly. We took her picture, as her father, the bar owner, watched us with an expression that was less than friendly. Then, we bailed out and took Nilo back to his wife. Before parting, he asked for some help to pay for her medicine, and we obliged. I also gave him some chocolates for the peccary girl and promised that we would return. I committed myself to plant 10 orange trees in the village, a habit that I have acquired over the years.

Back in the truck and on our way to a sophisticated restaurant, Naif explained that the Cinta Larga occupied a large swath of land along the river. It is called the Roosevelt reserve. He confirmed that this region was rich in diamonds and that South African geologists were scouting the area in rented pick-up trucks. “The Cinta Larga know about the illegal miners and come by their camps every now and then. They ask for money or diamonds and usually get them. If not…”

He then told me a story that was fascinating for the sheer terror of it. In a recent incident, a miner tried to cheat the Indians and swallowed his diamonds. They simply slaughtered him, field dressed him, and retrieved the gems from his stomach.

“Many cases like this take place. We never hear from them,” he continued after I mentioned a massacre that took place a few years ago.

“They are the pit bulls of the Indians,” he concluded philosophically. I thought of Lino’s father and the deep scar in his arm. So, we have a plan to go down the first 150 km of the river. What about the other 850 km? I close my eyes and imagine the scene, perfect for a Tarantino movie. A Cinta Larga painted in red and black, clubs down a miner and systematically inspects the entrails until the pebbles are found. Definitely, luck was on Roosevelt’s side, since only a dog was killed. Or perhaps it was Rondon’s gifts left hanging at their campsites as a proper payment for passage.  

A previous dispatch can be found here.

Dispatches from the Amazon-Third in a Four-part Series

This is an update we received July 10 from Professor Marc Meyers, who is currently in Brazil, scouting locations for an expedition up the River of Doubt, which he plans to start this fall. Meyers plans to retrace the steps of Theodore Roosevelt, who explored the river 100 years ago, in 1914.

More on Meyers' planned expedition here.

An earlier dispatch from Meyers was published online by UT San Diego here.

This was a good day, and my principal objective in Vilhena was accomplished: I was able to make it to the headwaters of the Roosevelt River. It was a stroke of luck, since my historian abandoned me after an enthusiastic start. I don’t know his reasons, but my mentioning of the Brazilian Army could have given him a sour taste. In any case, I was introduced to a local car rental agency and called its owner, Naif. I explained my situation, after he inquisitively asked me where I wanted to take the car, and informed me that I needed a four wheel drive. I suggested that he join me, something he had done 4 years ago. He remembered watching the Brazil-Netherlands game in the Indian village in 2010. We have a game coming on Saturday! (Editor’s note: Brazil faces the Netherlands for third place position at the World Cup). My luck is that he accepted to join me on such short notice and inquired about the road. Fortunately, he did not trust his sense of direction and obtained the help of Roberto, from the mayor’s office, through the intercession of Rita, a most efficient and competent person.

We started after lunch in his truck and soon abandoned the paved road, crossing immense fields of corn and soy fields. I thought I was in a living nightmare: a tropical version of the U.S. corn belt. The ‘cerrado’, a thin vegetation, had been cleared on this immense plateau to give rise to modern mechanized agriculture. This area has become one of the major corn and soy producers in Brazil.  The combines were neatly parked in the large garages of Fazenda Independencia. As the road got sandier and narrower, we got deeper into a forest that gradually grew denser. We were now on the Indian reservation. Then wooden bridges that grew more and more primitive and long sandy stretches, which could have never been crossed by a two-wheel-drive vehicle. After a couple hours and many forks with no signage, the road dipped further and we approached a slope that was too irregular even for our seasoned driver. We walked down a few hundred yards and saw the river between the trees. Exactly as described by Candice Millard in her book “The River of Doubt” about Roosevelt’s 1914 expedition, it had an ominous look. I crossed it with some emotion, since it is from there that Roosevelt and Rondon launched their dramatic expedition one hundred years ago. The trees hung over the rapid water like ghosts over a child. The stream was clear and innocent, but its movement had a disquieting nature. This is the flow that had taken them down, to suffering, death and, eventually, glory.

On the other side, a band of kids played in the water. They quickly ran out as the girls covered themselves. We asked for permission, which was given by the woman accompanying the kids, crossed the wooden bridge, and entered the minute village, two houses and a dozen people. She told us that she was a Nambiquara, but that this was a Sabanes village. The name Nambiquara arose a host of feelings, since these were the Indians studied by Levy Strauss in the 1940, which led to his classic book ‘Tristes Tropiques.’ These Indians were also described by Roosevelt in his account of the expedition.

 A crew from Vilhena was there, checking the health of the Indians and measuring their blood pressure and blood sugar. Two boys played soccer while a pair of parrots squawked with infernal dissonance. An old man sat on a chair and chatted with us, telling us, in a barely understandable voice, that he remembered Rondon and that his father used to tell him stories about him. Showing his arm, which had an old scar, he explained that he used to work for the military and would be sent ahead of the soldiers to establish contact with wild tribes. A poisoned arrow had hit him there. “They rub the tip in shit,” he said with disdain and anger.  He went on, telling some other stories about Rondon’s love of nature: “He never allowed his workers to kill snakes.” Then, he told us that the remnants of the old telegraph line still could be seen, a short distance from the village.

A beautiful little girl passed by, followed by a baby peccary (Editor’s note: a type of wild pig). I tried to fetch it and got a good bite. She ran into the hut, and the pet followed her as if she was the mother. Then, she brought the little critter out, holding it in her arms. “I have a monkey inside,” she said, and her mother authorized us to step inside. Indeed, a little marmoset was hiding under the roof.

I went down and looked at the river again. This time, it looked like a hole in the forest, pointing to countless dangers. The Indian lady had told me that it was impossible to go down. “We tried,” she said, “but the river disappears into marshes, reappears, and then drops.” 

We wanted more information, but the old man referred us to Lino, the chief. But he was in Vilhena with his wife, who was sick.