THE FERTILE REGION OF THE YUNGAS
[Illustration: STREET SCENE IN THE YUNGAS.]
The famous Yungas of La Paz is the paradise of northern Bolivia.
Nowhere does Nature smile with more bewitching candor than in these
valleys of magnificent verdure, through which rippling streams, and
sometimes raging torrents, carry a crystal tide down from the snow
mountains of the Royal Range to the tropical forests and plains of
the Amazon, bathing a region rich in the choicest gifts of a lavish
Providence. Nature’s most patrician whims find delicate expression in
the whiff of perfume which is carried on the breeze from a thousand
dainty blossoms, and in the music trilled by a host of pretty song
birds from the recesses of her wooded dells. The name _yungas_ is
given to the deep valleys which lie at the foot of the snow-covered
range, in the tropical region where the temperature never falls below
sixty degrees and often rises above one hundred degrees Fahrenheit.
The Yungas provinces of La Paz cover a territory extending northward
from the city of La Paz to Puerto Pando, at the head of navigation on
the Beni tributary of the Madeira, which is the chief affluent of the
Amazon. They are rich in production, as well as enchanting in scenery,
and the visitor to Bolivia who fails to see the famous Yungas, misses
one of the most enjoyable features of a trip to this wonderful country.
The naturalist D’Orbigny was enthusiastic in his praises of its
marvellous attractions, and, in a glowing description of its charms, he
says: “If tradition has lost the records of the place where paradise
was situated, the traveller who visits these regions of Bolivia feels
at once the impulse to exclaim: ‘Here is the lost Eden!’”
[Illustration: COROICO, CAPITAL OF NORTH YUNGAS.]
The eastern slope of the great range presents a totally different
aspect from that of the Pacific side. As seen from the west, the
landscape is grand and imposing, where the summits tower above the
surrounding heights, but the lower levels show no such magnificence
of foliage and varied beauty as the rich valleys of the Yungas on the
eastern slopes. One of the greatest surprises which the natural scenery
of Bolivia presents is experienced, when, after riding over the bare
plateau until the range is reached, the prospect suddenly reveals a
scene of tropical splendor, and out of the snows one enters immediately
a valley of perpetual summer. The rapid scenic transformation is
dazzling for a moment, as the sight dwells on the new panorama. In four
or five hours’ riding it is possible to pass from the glaciers and
the condor’s nest to sunny canefields and humming birds’ haunts, and
almost before the sensation of the stinging blast and the cold snows
has passed, one feels the midsummer heat and perfumed zephyrs of the
tropics. From icicles to orange groves in an afternoon’s _paseo_!
The province of South Yungas lies between the rivers La Paz and
Tamampaya, which join to form the Bopi River, a tributary of the Beni;
North Yungas province lies between the Bopi and Coroico Rivers, which
have their confluence at Puerto Pando. Both provinces are situated in a
rich productive belt, where coffee, cacao, coca, rice, sugar, quinine,
and all tropical fruits and hardwoods in abundance are obtained. The
celebrated coffee of the Yungas is considered by many connoisseurs
superior in quality to Mocha, and at one time this important product
was in such great demand in the European market that it sold for fifty
bolivianos per hundred pounds. The cultivation of coffee has been
somewhat neglected in recent years, the difficulties of transportation
having made it impossible for Bolivian producers to meet increasing
competition among other coffee-raising countries. But the plantations
of Chulumani, the capital of South Yungas, and of Coroico, the chief
city of North Yungas, are still in a flourishing condition.
Chulumani, a town of five thousand inhabitants, occupies a singularly
picturesque site on a tributary of the La Paz River, at an altitude of
about six thousand feet above sea level. Not only is it the centre of a
rich coffee district, but on the surrounding plantations are cultivated
cacao and sugar cane, the neighboring districts produce quinine, coca,
and vanilla, and rich cabinet woods are found here in abundance. Gold
is taken from the river in considerable quantities, by the method of
placer mining which is generally followed in all Bolivian gold fields.
[Illustration: PRINCIPAL PLAZA OF COROICO, NORTH YUNGAS.]
No product is more highly prized by the Indian than the coca. He chews
the leaves as people of other countries chew tobacco, and there is
seldom a moment when he does not have a roll of the precious stimulant
in his mouth. He will go days without food and perform marvellous
feats of endurance, often running fifty miles or more during a day,
provided he has his little pouch of coca leaves, which he sometimes
hangs at his belt, and at other times carries in the crown of his cap.
His staple food is parched Indian corn, and with his corn and his coca
the Indian is contented. As coca is the plant from which cocaine is
manufactured, it is needless to explain that the Indian uses the leaves
as a stimulant. So constantly does he resort to its use, that without
this artificial aid, he is not able to work nearly so well, but grows
apathetic and dull over his tasks. When the coca habit is indulged
to excess the effect is very injurious. It is an evil which stands
greatly in the way of the Indian’s mental and moral development, but
so fixed is the practice that there is little prospect of its being
abandoned. The coca plant grows abundantly in the tropical regions
of Bolivia and Peru, attaining a height of from two to eight feet,
according to the locality. Its leaves resemble bay leaves. It grows
best at an altitude of from two thousand to five thousand feet above
sea level and produces three crops annually. Three-fourths of the coca
grown in Bolivia is cultivated in the Yungas of La Paz, the remainder
coming from neighboring provinces and from the Yungas, popularly
called the Yuracarés, of Cochabamba. The total production of all the
_cocales_, or coca plantations, in Bolivia is about eight million
pounds annually, amounting in value to three and one-half million
bolivianos. For the privilege of gathering the coca the Bolivian
government collects a tax of two hundred and fifty thousand bolivianos
annually. A duty of two bolivianos per hundred pounds is paid in La Paz
on exportation. Indians are employed to gather the coca and to carry it
to the nearest station for shipment, and it is not unusual to see these
human freight carriers, loaded so heavily that only their legs are
visible under the huge bundles of coca, slowly making their way through
the forests. The _cocales_ of Chulumani, Irupana, Chupe, Chirca,
and other towns of South Yungas will be within convenient shipping
distance from the proposed railway now under construction from La Paz
to Puerto Pando. Two routes for this railway have been surveyed, one
of which goes through Obrajes and past the flourishing town of Palca,
entering the Yungas where the La Paz River flows through an opening in
the Andes range, and following the margin of that river and the Bopi
to its northern terminus. The other route crosses the range and enters
North Yungas at Unduavi, passing through Coroico, Unduavi, Coripata,
and other North Yungas towns.
[Illustration: CHULUMANI, CAPITAL OF SOUTH YUNGAS.]
Coroico, the capital of North Yungas, is a prosperous little city of
five thousand inhabitants. It is beautifully located on the river
of the same name, at an altitude of seven thousand feet, and is the
centre of a rich agricultural region. Flourishing fields of corn,
rice, and sugar cane are numerous in the vicinity, the corn growing
on the uplands, while the sugar cane and rice are cultivated close
to the river bank. Quinine, or _cascarilla_, is exported in
large quantities from North Yungas, where the cinchona tree grows
in abundance. The bark from which the quinine is extracted is thick
and reddish in appearance, and is shipped in small pieces just as it
comes from the tree. It is found in several departments of Bolivia,
on the eastern slopes of the Andes, where vast regions contain
_bosques_, or woods, of cinchona trees which remain untouched for
lack of facilities to transport the precious product to the shipping
centres. The quinine of Challana, a town in the neighboring province
of Larecaja, is the best in quality, a hundred pounds of bark yielding
forty-eight ounces of sulphate. The great rubber-producing region of
Bolivia extends as far south as North Yungas and Larecaja, in the
department of La Paz, a considerable amount of rubber being shipped
from Coroico, Songo, Challana, Mapiri, and Huanay through Puerto Perez
on Lake Titicaca to Puno and thence to Mollendo.
[Illustration: INDIAN COCA GATHERERS IN THE YUNGAS.]
There are few products of any zone which are not to be found in the
Yungas of La Paz. It is the rich storehouse from which La Paz is
supplied daily with the necessities and luxuries of the table, and
there are no better cereals, vegetables, and fruits than those grown
in these fertile valleys. Yet the vast resources of this region are
still comparatively unknown, and many of its valuable products are
neglected, which, if cultivated, would prove an important source of
revenue. An effort is being made by those particularly interested in
this part of Bolivia to promote the cultivation of its natural products
on a larger scale than formerly, and a thorough study is being made of
its flora with this end in view.
[Illustration: A CALLAPO, OR RAFT, ON THE RIVER LOAYZA,
REGION OF THE YUNGAS.]
The attention of agriculturists has recently been called to a very
nutritious plant, which is supposed to be indigenous to the Yungas, and
which the Indians call _jamacch’ppeke_, an Aymará word meaning
“bird’s head,” which was given because the bulbous roots resemble the
head and beak of a bird. The natives eat it as a delicacy, and it is
used as an article of food on many of the plantations of the Yungas,
its starchy properties making it a substitute for milk when boiled
with sugar and water. It is said to be extremely efficacious as a food
for invalids, and in the orphan hospitals of the Yungas it is used in
feeding even the youngest babies. This product is prepared by first
crushing the bulbs on flat stones, then washing and drying them in
the sun, a process by which all the water is drawn out and the starch
remains. It is said that eighty per cent of this remarkable tubercle is
starch. A Bolivian writer on the subject says: “The starchy quality of
this bulb is unknown to botanists, and up to the present time it has
not been well described or classified. Not the slightest information
regarding it is to be found in any book on South American flora, or in
the works of the great botanists of the world. The _jamacch’ppeke_
is a herbaceous plant which seldom grows beyond four feet in height. It
lives in the shade of trees and bushes, and on the plantations where
it is cultivated in the Yungas it is usually grown between rows of
trees in the _cocales_ and _cafetales_. It has a beautiful
flower of bright yellow color, and of the form peculiar to orchidic
plants. Its fruit is a membranous capsule, the tiny seeds of which are
preserved and planted to produce a new crop of _jamacch’ppeke_.
Nothing more clearly proves the neglect which this wonderful plant has
suffered at the hands of the Yungas agriculturists than the fact that
they have not renamed it.” The Bolivian writer referred to suggests
“Orchis,” as it appears to bear a close resemblance to the _Orchis
Morio_ of Linnæus.
[Illustration: BRIDGE OVER THE RIVER LOAYZA, IN THE YUNGAS.]
[Illustration: PALCA, ON THE ROUTE TO THE YUNGAS.]
The medicinal plants of the Yungas and other provinces of the
department of La Paz have been classified and their uses specified.
From the list published by Señor Don Belisario Diaz Romero, of the
Geographic Society of La Paz, it is seen that out of one hundred
and twenty-two medicinal plants the majority may be found in the
provinces of North and South Yungas. The classification was originally
made by Dr. Nicanor Iturralde, and includes the pharmacopœia of the
_callaguayas_, or Aymará Indian doctors of these regions. The
greatest difficulty was experienced in securing the list, as the Indian
doctors carefully guard the secrets of their cures, and their people
will never reveal anything which might come to their knowledge by
accident regarding the mysterious plants used by their medicine chiefs.
The Aymará doctors have learned the curative properties of many more
plants than those in the classified list; and though their system of
cures is not always to be recommended, every traveller who has been in
the interior knows that they have many excellent remedies.
[Illustration: CUTTING SUGAR CANE IN THE YUNGAS.]
Vegetation of every description grows in riotous abundance in the
fertile valleys of the Yungas, where the upper tributaries of the great
Amazon River are fed from a thousand streams that find their way down
the innumerable crevices of the Andean range. They form a network of
waterways for the _callapos_, or rafts, used to transport cargo
in this region, and they serve to fertilize the entire country so
completely that every foot of ground may be utilized for agriculture.
Here the Beni River receives its chief tributary, the Bopi, which rises
in the Cordillera Real, fifteen miles north of the city of La Paz,
flows southward through the city, and waters the valleys of Sopocachi
and Obrajes, under the name of the La Paz or Chuquiapu River. A few
leagues southeast of La Paz the river receives an affluent which enters
it from the north near the town of Palca, and at the point where it
crosses the Royal Range through a deep cut south of Mount Illimani,
an important stream, the Caracato, joins it, in the province of
Loayza. From this point the river turns northward and is reinforced
by several tributaries, among others the Tamampaya, Miguilla, and
others with their many small affluents, such as the Loayza and similar
picturesque waterways. Though South Yungas is watered chiefly by the
Bopi, the valleys of North Yungas depend for their fertility and for
the transportation of their products chiefly on the Coroico branch of
the Beni and its innumerable small tributaries. Not only the Yungas
provinces, but those of Inquisivi, Larecaja, and Muñecas, which adjoin
them and are sometimes included in the general term of “the Yungas,”
are abundantly supplied with water by the Beni system. The Coroico
River, which flows northward from its source in the Royal Range, has
many tributaries navigable for small boats and _callapos_. In
North Yungas the Songo River, on the banks of which are important
rubber forests, is one of the largest branches of the Coroico. The
Mapiri flows through the province of Muñecas, and the Tipuani and
Challana through Larecaja to join the Coroico River a few leagues south
of Puerto Pando. Along the course of all these rivers rubber is found
in abundance, and in some of them placer gold mining is carried on with
most satisfactory results. The Tipuani River has long been celebrated
for its rich gold washings. Rising in the Andes, on the eastern slope
of the celebrated snow mountain Sorata, it flows northeastward and
joins the Mapiri at Huanay, near the junction of the Mapiri and the
Challana with the Coroico. This is one of the most celebrated gold
bearing regions of Bolivia, and has been under exploitation since the
time of the Incas, who received from their subjects in this part of the
empire tribute paid in gold dust. According to historians, the Incas’
emissaries collected sixty pounds of gold dust every four months from
the section now known as Larecaja. As early as 1560 some Portuguese
miners got large quantities of gold here, and a few years later the
Spaniards established the industry on a permanent basis. Marvellous
stories are related of the riches of this region, where gold was so
abundant that sacks of precious gold dust were piled up around the
walls of the miners’ huts to serve as beds and chairs. Hundreds of
negro workmen were brought from Brazil by the Portuguese, and the whole
district was a busy hive of industry. It was at this time that Sorata
became famous as a city of wealth and luxury. In 1780, one of the mine
owners obtained six thousand pounds of gold washings from this river.
The variety of mineral and vegetable products everywhere found in the
valleys of these rivers makes this a favorite field for speculation,
and few instances of failure in any enterprise undertaken in this
region have yet been recorded.
[Illustration: TOWN OF IRUPANA, IN THE YUNGAS.]
So varied are the attractions of the Yungas that the scientist goes
there to study botany, the speculator to make a fortune, and the
tourist to see the sights, and each one returns enchanted with the
success of his mission, and usually broadened in mind by having
enjoyed the trip from the standpoint of the other travellers. The
botanist grows enthusiastic over the commercial possibilities of his
newly discovered “specimen,” the fortune seeker has looked around him
while on his way to the gold fields, the rubber forests, or the fruit
farms, and cannot help feeling a glow of interest in the wonderful
secrets of the forests and the mountain sides; and the tourist, who
goes merely to enjoy the scenery and to learn something of the customs
of the country, finds that there is more to see than magnificent
mountains and picturesque valleys, and that the quaint types that
pass him on the road tell more than the contour of the face or the
curious style of the dress reveals; and he often returns with all the
enthusiasm of the student and the speculating spirit of the gold hunter
combined.
The proximity of the Yungas to the highways of travel gives this region
an advantage over others of great promise, which, though abundant in
natural resources, are more difficult of access. With the conclusion
of the La Paz and Puerto Pando Railway, this territory will be brought
into close connection with La Paz, and will, at the same time, have
convenient access to the great Amazon waterway. Some day it will be one
of the richest and most popular resorts of Bolivia, where fashionable
society will make its annual visit. The Yungas hillsides will be dotted
with the handsome country homes of wealthy Paceños, and merry outing
parties will throng its valleys. The foreign tourist will find his way
more frequently to this part of the world, for there is an irresistible
attraction in the prospect of a comfortable trip in a railway train
which carries one in an hour or so from the Alpine splendors of the
snow range to the blossoming hedges and balmy groves of the fertile
region of the Yungas!
[Illustration: TYPICAL INDIAN OF THE YUNGAS.]
[Illustration: THE PLAZA, COCHABAMBA.]