Evening star., 1925-04-16
Twenty-Eighth Day.
EloNuTR5 At ottAN1AIkheo
- wan.mAde ujeNass a IL World.

OLLANTAITAMBO, Peru. Febru-
ary 22.-We left CuZco early this
morning in an auto-carill-an auto on
| rails-that brought us up the valley
of the Urubamba River. The waters
of thhs river eventually flow into the
Amazon and into the Atlantic. more
than 5000 miles away. Strange as
it may seem, one of the sources of
the Amazon is within 100 miles of
the Pacific Ocean.
Nature offers few more beautiful
rides than this trip up through the
gorges of the Urubamba. Ancient
Inca aqueducts, terrace farms, stone
granaries and ruined forts line the
mountainsides around us. The sun
is shining brightly, birds are singing.
and 1 never felt so good after a bad
night before. Now and then, high
above us, strolls a herd of llamas
and vicunas along an ancient rock
cut highway.
A strange animal is the vicuna.
They are the things they turn into
coats for us men to pay for. Other
wise they are of no value. They
live only at such high attitudes as
this-about 10000 feet-where they
feed on the short tufts of grass that
grow on these rocky highlands. Their
teeth are so formed that they can
eat only short grass. II you placed
them in a field of clover they would
StarYe to death.
Ollantaitambo was once a great
fortified palace or fortress arranged
on several terraces. the first plateau
800 feet from the valley floor. Today
its ruins are considered by some to
be the most remarkable in this
hemisphere.
The most striking feature of this
great megalithic fortress is wall of
six huge blocks Of reddish granite
weighing many tons. How they were
brought up here from the quarry sew
eral miles across the river is a mys-
terry. The building of the fortresses
of Ollantaitambo and Sachsahuaman
rivals anything their contemporaries
the ancient Egyptians-ever did.
The pyramids along the Nile may be
more imposing, but they are no more
wonderful than these stupendous eX-
amples of labor wrought bv the early
American man.
Twenty miles farther on is the
famous hidden city of Machu Picchu,
discovered by Hiram Bingham in 1911
and described 10 the American public
through the pages of the National
Geographic Magazine,
1 had intended going there. but
found it impossible to do so and catch
the biweekly train TO Lake Titicaca.
SO we retraced our steps down the
huge stone terraces from Ollantaitam-
bo and mounted our auto-cartll 20
CuZco, 40 miles away.
l found a crowd of about Is of the
chattering young "gente decente"
awaiting me. The only word l could
understand was Jazz"
They want to see you dance" ex-
planned Subprefecto Limo de Ia Bar
rera.
They had heard that a "Yanqui"
was in town, and every Yanqui is
supposed to know how to dance
that great national dance of ''Estados
Unidos," called 'jazz." Possibly they
had read the morning paper. 1t said;
NoTAs SoCIALEs
| Hace Cos dias es huesped nues tro el
periodista norteamericano Mr.. Reply.
corresponsal del II diaros de la Gran
Republica i que ha xenido viaje de
tur1smo.
Another banquet-much 'unamas"
was drunk-and amid many 'vivas"
l was led to a dance place presided
over by Blanquita.
| A squeaky phonograph was wound
| up and l led forth the naughty lady
amid a salvo of "vivas" and hand
claps. l wouldn't fool you, readers