From this star, xi Eridani, the river begins the first of its many descents, rushing toward the two omicrons: binoculars.

I think of the river as passing through the 'narrows' here, and plunging wildly even more southward, to Zaurak, gamma Eridani.

Some cartographers omit this stop at xi, instead having the river immediately flow toward the omicrons after nu. Their reason perhaps is that xi Eridani is much fainter, a 5.2 visual magnitude star, thus shouldn't be included. It's true that xi Eridani is the faintest of all the stars I include along the way, but by using this star it's easier to starhop to the next stop along the way -- which is to the two stars omicron, to the southwest.