Northeastern coast of Cuba, Gibara Bay, estuary of the Gibara River.
The surging river rolled with silt, rushing down from the brown hills and plains upstream to the south. Where the Great River flowed into Gibara Bay, the seawater was a turbid emerald green, and the mudflats were silted yellow-white. The freshwater estuary brought nutrients from upstream, depositing fertile fields along the lower banks and drawing schools of fish that swarmed around the bay. And between the river mouth and the bay lay a continuous stretch of tribal villages, as well as broad expanses of farmland around them.
Put simply, this was a place rich in resources and abundant in food, and it had naturally gathered a large Taino tribe of two or three thousand people: the Spider Cave Tribe, one of the Palm Hill tribes.
The Spider Cave Tribe was located on the northeastern coast, roughly at the snake's neck of the long serpent that was Cuba. Two hundred li farther east from here was the Mayari Tribe of the Snake Head of Cuba. A hundred li to the southwest was the great Palm Hill tribe, situated in the inland center of the snake's neck. The Spider Cave Tribe and the Palm Hill Tribe were extremely close; the two large tribes not only shared the same origin and ancestors, and intermarried between their peoples, they also shared the fertile Brown Soil Belt.
If the eastern snake head of Snake Island of Cuba was a mineral zone rich in iron, copper, chromium, and nickel, then the snake's neck of the long serpent was the most bountiful agricultural zone: the flat and fertile Brown Soil Belt! The brown soil here had a very high humus content, its fertility approaching that of black earth, and could ensure the long-term, stable high yield