Chapter 3

At San Diego, Portola left the sick under the care of the faithful surgeon, Prat, and a guard of ten cuera soldiers; Captain Vila of the San Carlos, with a few seamen; Frays Junipero Serra, Juan Vizcaino, and Fernando Parron, a carpenter, a blacksmith, and a few Lower California Indians, some forty persons in all. The governor also left with them a sufficient number of horses and mules and about sixty loads[15] of provisions. On July 16th, two days after the Portola expedition started, Junipero founded, with appropriate ceremonies, the mission of San Diego de Alcala, the first mission established in Alta California. The deaths continued, and before Portola's return in January, eight soldiers, four sailors, one servant, and eight Indians died, leaving but about twenty persons at the camp.

We will now follow the governor. Relying somewhat on the supply ship, San Jose, which was to meet him at Monterey, but which, as we have seen, was lost at sea, and also on the supplies to be brought by the San Antonio, the governor, knowing the uncertainties of a sea voyage, took with him one hundred mules loaded with provisions, sufficient, he concluded, to last him for six months.

On the march the following order was observed. Sergeant Ortega, with six or eight soldiers, went in advance, laid out the route, selected the camping place, and cleared the way of hostile Indians by whom he was frequently surrounded. At the head of the column rode the comandante, with Fages, Costanso, the two priests, and an escort of six Catalonia volunteers; next came the sappers and miners, composed of Indians, with spades, mattocks, crowbars, axes, and other implements used by pioneers; these were followed by the main body divided into four bands of pack-animals, each with its muleteers and a guard of presidial soldiers. The last was the rear guard, commanded by Captain Rivera, convoying the spare horses and mules (caballada y mulada).

The presidial soldiers were provided with two kinds of arms, offensive and defensive. The defensive consisted of the cuera (leather jacket) and the adarga (shield)[16]. The first, being made in the form of a coat without sleeves, was composed of six or seven thicknesses of dressed deer skins impervious to the Indian arrows, except at very short range. The adarga was of two thicknesses of raw bulls-hide, borne on the left arm, and so managed by the trooper as to defend himself and his horse against the arrows and spears of the Indians; in addition, they used a species of apron of leather, fastened to the pommel of the saddle, with a fall to each side of the horse down to the stirrup, wide enough to cover the thigh and a leg of the horseman, and protect him when riding through the brush. This apron was called the armas. Their offensive arms were the lance, which they managed with great dexterity on horseback, the broadsword, and a short musket, carried in a case. Costanso, who was an officer of the regular army, bears testimony to the unceasing labor of the presidial soldiers of California on this march, and says they were men capable of enduring much fatigue, obedient, resolute, and active; "and it is not too much to say that they are the best horsemen in the world, and among the best soldiers who gain their bread in the service of the king."[17]

It must be understood that the marches of these troops with such a train through an unknown country and by unused paths, could not be long ones. It was necessary to explore the land one day for the march of the next, and the camp for the day was sometimes regulated by the distance to be traveled to the next place where water, fuel, and pastures could be had. The distance made was from two to four leagues[18], and the command rested every four days, more or less, according to the fatigue caused by the roughness of the road, the toil of the pioneers, the wandering off of the beasts, or the necessities of the sick. Costanso says that one of their greatest difficulties was in the control of their caballada (horse-herd), without which the journey could not be made. In a country they do not know, horses frighten themselves by night in the most incredible manner. To stampede them, it is enough for them to discover a coyote or fox. The flight of a bird, the dust flung by the wind-any of these are capable of terrifying them and causing them to run many leagues, precipitating themselves over barrancas and precipices, without any human effort availing to restrain them. Afterwards it costs immense toil to gather them again, and those that are not killed or crippled, remain of no service for some time. In the form and manner stated, the Spaniards made their marches, traversing immense lands, which grew more fertile and pleasing as they progressed northward.

The expedition followed practically the route which afterwards became the Camino Real. Its fourth jornada (day's journey) brought it to the pretty valley where later was established the mission of San Luis Rey. They called it San Juan Capistrano, but that name was afterwards transferred to a mission forty miles north of this place. The command rested here, July 19th. Resuming the march on the 20th, the sierra (San Onofre), whose base they were skirting, drew so near the sea that it seemed to threaten their advance, but by keeping close to the shore, they held their way, and on the 24th they encamped on a fine stream of water running through a mesa at the foot of a sierra, whence looking across the sea, they could descry Santa Catalina Island. This was San Juan Capistrano, and here they rested on the 25th. On the 28th they reached the Santa Ana river, near the present town of that name; a violent shock of earthquake which they experienced caused them to name the river Jesus de los Temblores[19]. July 30th and 31st they were in the San Gabriel valley, which they called San Miguel, and on August 1st they rested near the site of the present city of Los Angeles. The stop this day, in addition to the needed rest and the necessity for exploration, was to give opportunity for the soldiers and people of the expedition to gain the great indulgence of Porciuncula.[20] The priests said mass and the sacrament was administered. In the afternoon the soldiers went to hunt and brought in an antelope (barrendo), with which the land seemed to abound. The next day they crossed the Los Angeles river by the site of the present city, and named it Rio de Nuestra Senora de Los Angeles de Porciuncula[21]. Passing up the river, they went through the canon and came into the San Fernando valley, which they called Valle de Santa Catalina de los Encinos--Valley of St. Catherine of the Oaks. Five days they spent in the valley, and crossing the Santa Susana mountains, perhaps by the Tapo canon, they came to the Santa Clara river near the site of Camulos, and there rested, August 9th. Portola named the river Santa Clara, which name it still bears, in honor of the saint, whose day, August 12th, was observed by them. Five days, by easy jornadas, they traveled down the river, and arrived on the 14th at the first rancheria[22] of the Channel Indians. It being the vespers of the feast of La Asuncion de Nuestra Senora, Portola named the village La Asuncion. It contained about thirty large, well-constructed houses of clay and rushes, and each house held three or four families. These Indians were of good size, well-formed, active, industrious, and very skillful in constructing boats, wooden bowls, and other articles. Portola thought this pueblo must be the one named by Cabrillo, Pueblo de Canoas (Pueblo of the Boats). This was the site selected for the mission of San Buenaventura, founded March 31, 1782. The natives received them kindly, gave them an abundance of food, and showed them their well-made boats, twenty-four feet long, made of pine boards tied together with cords and covered with asphaltum, and capable of carrying ten men each. The next four days they followed the beach and camped, on August 18th, at a large laguna, called by them La Laguna de la Concepcion. This was the site of the future presidio and mission of Santa Barbara. Everywhere were large populous rancherias of the Indians, and everywhere they were received in the most hospitable manner and provided with more food than they could eat. The next stop was three leagues beyond, on the shore of a large lagoon and marsh, containing a good-sized island on which was a large rancheria, while four others lined the banks of the lagoon. Portola gave to this group the name In Mediaciones de las Rancherias de Mescaltitan--The Contiguous Rancherias of Mescaltitan. The name of Mescaltitan is still attached to the island, though the marsh is mostly drained and contains some of the finest walnut groves in California. On the 28th, they turned Point Concepcion and camped just north at a place called by them Paraje de los Pedernales. Point Pedernales, about five miles beyond, preserves the name. On the 30th they crossed a large river, which they named the Santa Rosa, in honor of that saint, whose day it was. This is now the Santa Inez, so called from the mission of that name, established on its bank in 1804. Passing northward along the beach, a sharp spur of the sierra jutting out at Point Sal turned them inland through the little pass followed by the Southern Pacific Coast Line, and they came, on September 10th, to a large lake in the northwest corner of Santa Barbara county, to which was given the name of Laguna Larga, now known as Guadalupe Lake. Three leagues beyond, they camped at a lake named by Costanso, Laguna Redonda, but which the soldiers called El Oso Flaco--The Thin Bear--and it is still known by that name. Here Sergeant Ortega was taken ill, and ten of the soldiers complained of sore feet. They rested on the 3d, and on the 4th reached the mouth of the San Luis canon. Here they were hospitably received by the chief of a large rancheria, whose appearance caused the soldiers to apply to him the name of "El Buchon," he having a large tumor hanging from his neck. Father Crespi did not approve of the name which the soldiers applied to the chief, his rancheria, and to the canon leading up to San Luis Obispo, and he named the village San Ladislao. As in so many cases the good father was unable to make the name he gave stick, the saint has been ignored, but Point Buchon, just above Point Harford and Mount Buchon, otherwise known as Bald Knob, bear witness to the staying qualities of the tumor on the chief's neck. Passing up the narrow canon of San Luis creek, they camped at or near the site of the mission and city of San Luis Obispo. From here, instead of proceeding over the Sierra de Santa Lucia by the Cuesta pass into the upper Salinas valley, whence the march to Monterey would have been easy, they turned to the west and followed the Canada de los Osos to the sea at Morro Bay, which they called El Estero de San Serafin. The Canada de los Osos[23], still so called, they named because of a fight with some very fierce bears, one of which they succeeded in killing after it had received nine balls. Another wounded the mules, and the hunters with difficulty saved their lives.

The travelers now marched up the coast until, on the 13th, they came to a point where further progress was disputed by the Sierra de Santa Lucia. This was where a spur from the sierra terminating in Mount Mars, blocks the passage by the beach and presents a bold front, rising three thousand feet from the water. Camping at the foot of the sierra, Portola sent out the explorers under Rivera to find a passage through the mountains. During the 14th and 15th, the pioneers labored to open a way into the sierra through San Carpoforo canon, and on the 16th the command moved up the steep and narrow gulch, with inaccessible mountains on either side. It is impossible to follow their route through this rugged mountain range with any degree of accuracy. Their progress was slow and painful. On the 20th, they toiled up an exceedingly high ridge to the north, and from its summit the Spaniards looked upon a boundless sea of mountains, "presenting," writes Crespi, "a sad prospect to us poor travelers worn out with the fatigue of the journey." The cold was beginning to be severe, and many of the men were suffering from scurvy and unfit for service, which increased the hardship for all; yet they did not falter but pressed bravely on, and on the 26th emerged from the mountains by the Arroyo Seco, which they named the Canada del Palo Caido[24] (Valley of the Fallen Tree), and camped on the Salinas river, which they christened Rio de San Elizario. From now on the march is an easy one down the Salinas valley to the sea.

On the last day of September, the command halted near the mouth of the Salinas river, within sound of the ocean, though they could not see it. They were persuaded that they were not far from the desired port of Monterey and that the mountain range they had crossed was unquestionably that of the Santa Lucia, described by Torquemada in his history of the voyage of Vizcaino, and shown on the chart of the pilot Cabrera Bueno. The governor ordered the explorers to go out and ascertain on what part of the coast they were. On the morrow, Rivera, with eight soldiers, explored the coast to the southward, marching along the shore of the very port they were seeking, while Portola, with Costanso, Crespi, and five soldiers, climbed a hill from whose top they saw a great ensenada, the northern point of which extended a long way into the sea, and bore northwest at a distance of eight maritime leagues, while on the south a hill ran out into the sea in the form of a point, and appeared to be wooded with pines. They recognized the one on the north as the Punta de Ano Nuevo and that on the south as Punta de Pinos, while between the two lay the great ensenada[25], with its dreary sand dunes. This was as laid down in the coast pilot (derretero) of Cabrera Bueno, but where was the famous port of Monterey?

They thought that perhaps they had passed Monterey in the great circuit they had made through the mountain ranges. For three days the search was continued. Rivera reported that south of the Point of Pines and between it and another point to the south (Point Carmelo) was a small ensenada, where a stream of water came down from the mountains and emptied into an estero; that beyond this the coast was so high and impenetrable they were obliged to turn back, and he believed that it was the same sierra which compelled them to leave the coast on the 16th of September.

Much perplexed by these reports, the governor called a council of officers to deliberate as to the best course to pursue. On Wednesday, October 4th, the council met and after hearing mass, the commander laid the matter before them. He set forth the shortness of their store of provisions, the seventeen men on the sick list, unfit for duty, the excessive burden of labor imposed on the rest in sentinel duty, care of the animals, and continual explorations, and to the lateness of the season. In view of these circumstances, and of the fact that the port of Monterey could not be found where it was said to be, each person present was called upon to express freely his opinion.

Costanso spoke first; Vizcaino had put Monterey in 37 deg.; they had only reached 36 deg. 42'; they should not fail to explore up to 37 deg. 30', so as either to find the port or decide it did not exist. Fages was for going up to 37 deg. or a little more. Rivera thought they should establish themselves somewhere. Then the resolute commander determined to go forward and put his trust in God. If they found the desired port of Monterey and therein the supply-ship San Jose, all would be well. If Monterey did not appear, they would find a place for a settlement; but if it should be the will of God that all were to perish, they would have discharged their duty to God and man in laboring until death in their endeavor to accomplish the enterprise on which they had been sent. To this decision all agreed, and signed their names to the compact.

Ortega and his scouts were now dispatched to lay out the route and locate camping places for several days in advance, and on the 7th of October, the march was resumed. Sixteen sick men had now lost use of their limbs. Each night they were rubbed with oil, and each morning they were put into hammocks swung between two mules, tandem, and thus carried in the mode of travel used by the women of Andalusia[26]. The march was slow and painful. Some of the sick were believed to be in the last extremity, and on October 8th, the holy viaticum was administered to three, who were thought to be dying.

On this day they crossed the Rio del Pajaro, which they named because of a great bird the Indians had killed and stuffed with straw, and which measured seven feet and four inches from the tip of one wing to that of the other. It was thought to be a royal eagle, and that the natives were preparing it for some ceremony when they were frightened away by the approach of the Spaniards. Crespi, who still had a supply of saints on hand, gave the river the name La Senora Santa Ana, but again the saint was ignored, and the river is known as the Pajaro (Bird). On the 17th they crossed and named the Rio de San Lorenzo, at the site of the present city of Santa Cruz. On the 20th they were at Punta de Ano Nuevo, and camped at the entrance of the canon of Waddell creek. They recognized Point Ano Nuevo from the description given by Cabrera Bueno, and Crespi estimated that it was one league distant from the camp. With good water and fuel, the command rested here the 21st and 22d. Both Portola and Rivera were now added to the sick list. Meat and vegetables had given out and the rations were reduced to five tortillas of bran and flour per day. Crespi named the camp San Luis Beltran, while the soldiers called it La Canada de Salud. On the 23d, they again moved forward, passing Punta de Ano Nuevo and, traveling two leagues, camped probably on Gazos creek, where was a large Indian rancheria, whose inhabitants received them kindly. This camp, which was about opposite Pigeon Point, they named Casa Grande, also San Juan Nepomuceno[27]. The next jornada was a long one of four leagues, and their camp was on San Gregoria creek. It began to rain and the command was prostrated by an epidemic of diarrhoea which spared no one. They now thought they saw their end, but the contrary appeared to be the case. The diarrhoea seemed to relieve the scurvy, and the swollen limbs of the sufferers began to be less painful. They named the camp Vane de los Soldados de los Cursos, and Crespi applied the name of Santo Domingo to it. Unable to travel on the 25th and 26th, but resuming the march October 27th, they pressed forward. The next stop was Purisima creek, two short leagues distant, but the way was rough, and the pioneers had to make roads across three arroyos where the descents were steep and difficult for the transportation of the invalids. On the bank of the stream was an Indian rancheria, apparently deserted. The Spaniards took possession of the huts, but soon came running forth with cries of "las pulgas! las pulgas![28]" They preferred to camp in the open. The soldiers called the camp Rancheria de las Pulgas, while Crespi named it San Ibon. On the 28th they camped on Pilarcitos creek, site of Spanish town or Half Moon Bay. They named the camp El Llano de los Ansares--The Plain of the Wild Geese--and Crespi called it San Simon y San Judas. Every man in the command was ill; the medicines were nearly gone and the supply of food very short. They contemplated killing some of the mules. That night it rained heavily and Portola, who was very ill, decided to rest on the 29th. On Monday, October 30th, they moved forward. Half Moon Bay and Pillar Point were noted but no names given. Several deep arroyos were crossed, some of which required the building of bridges to get the animals over. They proceeded up the shore until a barrier of rock confronted them and disputed the passage. Here in a rincon (corner) formed by the sierra and sheltered from the north wind they camped while Ortega and his men were sent out to find a passage over the Montara mountains. A little stream furnished them with water and they named the camp El Rincon de las Almejas, on account of the mussels and other shell fish they found on the rocks. Crespi calls it La Punta del Angel Custodia. The site of the camp is about a mile north of the Montara fog signal. By noon of the next day, October 31st, the pioneers had prepared a passage over the bold promontory of Point San Pedro, and at ten o'clock in the morning the company set out on the trail of the exploradores and made their painful way to the summit. Here a wondrous sight met their eyes and quickened their flagging spirits. Before them, bright and beautiful, was spread a great ensenada, its waters dancing in the sunlight. Far to the northwest a point reached out into the sea, rising abruptly before them, high above the ocean. Further to the left, west-northwest, were seen six or seven white Farallones and finally along the shore northward they discerned the white cliffs and what appeared to be the mouth of an inlet. There could be no mistake. The distant point was the Punta de los Reyes and before them lay the Bahia o Puerto de San Francisco. The saint had been good to them and with joy in their hearts they made the steep and difficult descent and camped in the San Pedro valley[29] at the foot of the Montara mountains.

Some of the company thought they had left the Port of Monterey behind but would not believe they had reached the Port of San Francisco. To settle the matter, the governor ordered Ortega and his men to examine the country as far as Point Reyes, giving them three days in which to report, while the command remained in camp in the Vallecito de la Punta de las Almejas del Angel de la Guarda, as Crespi calls it, combining the two names of the camp of October 30th and transferring them to the camp in San Pedro valley.

The next day, Thursday, November 2nd, being All Souls day, after mass some of the soldiers asked permission to go and hunt for deer. They climbed the mountains east of the camp and returning after nightfall reported that they had seen from the top of the mountain an immense estero or arm of the sea, which thrust itself into the land as far as the eye could reach, stretching to the southeast; that they had seen some beautiful plains thickly covered with trees, while the many columns of smoke rising over them showed that they were well stocked with Indian villages. This story confirmed them in the belief that they were at the Port of San Francisco, and that the estero described was that spoken of by Cabrera Bueno, the mouth of which they imagined they had seen from the Montara mountains[30]. They were now satisfied that Ortega would be unable to reach Point Reyes, and that three days was not sufficient time to go around the head of such an estero. The exploring party returned in the night of November 3d, discharging their fire-arms as they approached. They reported that they found themselves obstructed by immense estuaries which ran extraordinarily far back into the land[31], but what caused their rejoicing was that they understood from the signs of the Indians that at two days journey from where they were there was a port in which a ship was anchored. On this announcement, some thought that they were at the port of Monterey, and that the supply ship San Jose or the San Carlos was waiting for them. Crespi says that if they were not in Monterey, they were certainly in San Francisco.