At sunset, with only a scattering of stars in the sky, birds and beasts cried out through the forests and fields, and the jungle along the tropical coast brimmed with life. The group lit bonfires, made camp before the magnificent iron belt, brought out the wine and food they had carried, and celebrated without restraint until dawn. Starting from the second day, however, came the careful and busy work of surveying.
Under Priest Mekat's guidance, they roughly determined the surface range of the Mayari Great Iron Mine belt. To be honest, the scale of this great open-pit iron mine truly exceeded everyone's expectations. The northernmost end of the iron belt was actually only thirty li from the nearest coast. Its southern end, meanwhile, already reached deep into the mountain forests, covering an extremely vast area. The outcrops visible on the surface alone stretched at least twenty or thirty li.
After all, the Mayari Great Iron Mine belt was one of the largest shallow iron ore belts in the world. The iron ore here ranked among the world's best in both reserves and quality. And what would be even more precious in later generations was the "chromium" abundant within the iron belt, a key element indispensable to specialty steel.
Along the way, six richly stored mineral deposits—nickel, cobalt, manganese, chromium, iron, and copper—were all concentrated in the eastern part of Cuba's Snake Island, in the four-hundred-li snake-head region. Add to that the tungsten ore sleeping on Scale Island and the oil offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, and the name "Cuba's rich mines" was truly deserved.
"Praise the Lord God! Praise His Highness! The reserves of this iron belt are enough for the entire Alliance to mine for an epoch! And the quality of the ore here is likewise far higher