Precious Cargo

At sunrise, as the mutineers packed the gold and provisions, Pizarro told the men how they would be the rulers of their own domain.
It would be like having their own country. The would breed with the native women, producing their own obedient army and workforce.
They were somewhat mystified, however at the rocky coastline, large pine trees and distant mountains.
All accounts of Christopher Columbus and Ponce de Leon described a flat landscape with citrus and palm trees in a tropical climate.
Pizarro told the men not to worry, that just beyond the mountain range, the terrain dropped away into lush, fertile valleys.
As they hiked west, natives were occasionally seen spying on them from a distance, but never approaching.
Travel was slow. Two, and sometimes three men were required to carry the gold in sturdy hemp sacks.
The others carried provisions which they thought would sustain them until the came upon the bountiful valleys of berries and fruit.
But within a few weeks, each mountain pass was steeper than the one before, and lower temperatures brought snow flurries.
By the time they reached Flagstaff Mountain, the food supply was getting dangerously low, and a major snowstorm was moving in.
Angel quit trying to convince the party that things would be fine just over the next pass.He no longer believed it himself, if he ever did.
The early October storm was of a magnitude not seen for years.

The pair of Abenaki were following deer tracks in the melting spring snow, anxious for the taste of fresh meat.
It had been a long winter subsisting on fish and venison, smoked, dried and preserved in the snow.
When they came upon the campsite, they shook their heads at the poorly made shelter.
Even if the light skinned men had had enough food, they would have never survived the cold.
It was obvious the corpses had been scavenged by wolves, but further inspection revealed a difference in five of the bodies.
There were no remains of boots or clothing. Surely the wolves didn't undress the bodies and set the clothing aside before feasting upon them.
No, it wasn't the wolves who did this, not all of it, anyway. Just as the Donner party, three centuries later, these men delayed their own deaths by the most extreme means possible.

 

This is only fiction, but you are correct.