Barrakunda and the river threshold

The Barracunda pilot guided Stibbs to the old port through shallows and changing channels. Just upriver, the company boats met a rocky overfall that took much of a day to pass. The episode makes river knowledge and skilled navigation central to upper-river travel, rather than treating the journey as a simple line on a map. ^{[books-stibbs-1724]}

The expedition left a sloop at Barracunda to trade while smaller canoes continued above the rocks. Stibbs's commercial purpose included purchasing enslaved people, so the navigational detail belongs to a coercive Atlantic economy. The overfall's condition in 1724 is not a present-day boating claim. ^{[books-stibbs-1724]}