Note 384 — Chapter LXXV

The valley of Yca forms a delightful contrast to the surrounding deserts. The traveller, leaving the sandy waste behind him, finds himself riding through vineyards and cotton plantations, with hedges of fig trees, jessamine and roses on either hand. Yca is a large town about two leagues from the foot of the Andes, in the middle of a fertile and beautiful valley; but it has suffered fearfully from earthquakes. The river is crossed by a bridge of ropes and willow branches, and during January and February it dashes impetuously down the valley, but it is dry for the rest of the year, and, as Cieza de Leon says, the people dig holes in its bed, to get water. There are some very extensive woods of guaranga or algaroba trees (Prosopis horrida) in the valley of Yca, generally on the skirts of the deserts.