HARRY TRUMAN LIBRARY Papers of NATHANIEL DAVIS Despatch no. 159, April 22, 1949, San José, Costa Rica American Embassy, UNCLASSIFIED enclosure no. made the rounds of all 400 inhabitants of the cow that had had a bath. It was jokingly suggested that a placard be erected stating Aqui se bafió el Toabajador americano (The American Ambassador Bathed Here. must say it felt 2000.
Pancho wife served us an excellent breakfast and we got ourselves ready for a o clock departure down the river.
The Conandancia is directly across the street from the hotel and the entire guard force of six men was lined up for roll call. observed what looked suspiciously like padding of the rolls for the officer in command called off six names to each of which a guardsman replied and then called off in rapid succession: Pulano, Fulano, Fulano, mulano, Fulano, mulano.
We were at the launch on time but the captain said there were two additional passengers. As we had chartered the launch for our own party it seemed a little strange but evidently sowe private deals had been made and eventually two men did show up. One was a cacao buyer who was going only about an hour doin river and the other a poisonous individual who apparently got himself signed on 4s a member of the crew in order to make the trip to the nouth of the river and back. ile was quite discourteous to us not even üsking if it was convenient to take him. He shared our food, drank all the captain coffee, and made a general puisance of himself. But as he claimed to he secretary of the Municipality of Alajuela, we figured that rancho and the captain Lolt it desirable to keep in his good graces so we permitted hla vo so with us. e nicknamed him ajuela which we promptly corrupted to Allelujah to the great delight of the captain, crew, and Pancho.
The captain assured us that with his fast launch and no tow we would easily make the run from 103 Chilles all the toy dom the San Juan to Barro Colorado in the houro. thead but, as Pancho had been equally positive that the trip from Cuataso to Los Chilles would take 12 hours, we were not entirely convinced. It soon becane evident that it would take a lot longex. Just before reaching the mouth of the Rio Prio, we crossed the border into Nicaragua and saw Somoza cattle farn which straddles the border. The launch had to put in at San Carlos to clear with the local authorities and we called on the comandante. it about 10 o clock we iinally got a way and headed down the river, There wasn much life to be seen on the river, just a few clearings here and there. We went through a 308) rapid and shortly after arrived at El Castillo, strategically sit la ted opposite the biggest rapids on the river and just upstreun from a bend in a shallow gorge. At El Castillo are the ruins of an old Spanish fort which fuarded the river in the days when the Spaniards and the British were disputing poss asion of that potentially valuable route from UNCLASSIFIED