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Every one is anxious to attend the fair, which is an occasion for seeing one's friends, an opportunity for jollification, carousing, and general enjoyment like a large county fair at home. Except for this annual fair week, the basin of Parinacochas is as bleak and desolate as our own fair-grounds, with scarcely a house to be seen except those that are used for the purposes of the fair.
What could give it such a curious color? Nothing but flamingoes, countless thousands of flamingoes Parinacochas at last! Flamingo Lake The Parinacochas Basin is at an elevation of between 11,500 and 12,000 feet above sea level. It is about 150 miles northwest of Arequipa and 170 miles southwest of Cuzco, and enjoys a fair amount of rainfall. The lake is fed by springs and small streams.
Our second camp was near the village of Incahuasi, "the house of the Inca," at the northwestern corner of the basin. Raimondi visited it in 1863. The representative of the owner of Parinacochas occupies one of the houses. The other buildings are used only during the third week in August, at the time of the annual fair.
After the great knot of mountains of Cuzco and Parinacochas, in 14 degrees south latitude, the Andes present a second bifurcation, on the east and west of the Rio Jauja, which throws itself into the Mantaro, a tributary stream of the Apurimac.
Notwithstanding my disappointment at the depth of Parinacochas, I was very glad that we had brought the little folding boat, for it enabled me to float gently about among the myriads of birds which use the shallow waters of the lake as a favorite feeding ground; pink flamingoes, white gulls, small "divers," large black ducks, sandpipers, black ibis, teal ducks, and large geese.
The great extent of shallow water in Parinacochas offers them a splendid, wide feeding ground. We wondered where they all came from. Apparently they do not breed here. Although there were thousands and thousands of birds, we could find no flamingo nests, either old or new, search as we would. It offers a most interesting problem for some enterprising biological explorer. Probably Mr.
These are marketed, as so often happens in the outlying parts of the world, at a great annual fair, attended by traders who come hundreds of miles, bringing the manufactured articles of the outer world and seeking the highly desired products of these secluded towns. The great fair for this vicinity has been held, for untold generations, on the shores of Lake Parinacochas.
In past geological times the lake, then very much larger, had an outlet not far from the town of Puyusca. At present Parinacochas has no visible outlet. It is possible that the large springs which we noticed as we came up the valley by Puyusca may be fed from the lake.
Their relative fearlessness also testified to the remoteness of Parinacochas and the small amount of hunting that is done here. Vicuñas have never been domesticated, but are often hunted for their skins. Their silky fleece is even finer than alpaca. The more fleecy portions of their skins are sewed together to make quilts, as soft as eider down and of a golden brown color. After Mr.
The next day we entered a region of mountain pastures. We passed occasional swamps and little pools of snow water. From one of these we turned and looked back across the great Cotahuasi Canyon, to the glaciers of Solimana and snow-clad Coropuna, now growing fainter and fainter as we went toward Parinacochas.
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