United States or Svalbard and Jan Mayen ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !


And ever as they went the air grew keener and more biting, the aspect of the country wilder and more desolate, the quebradas more appalling in their fathomless depth.

This arises from the peculiar geological structure of these mountains. Vast clefts traverse them, yawning far into the earth. In South America these are called quebradas. You may stand on the edge of one of them and look sheer down a precipice two thousand feet!

And all communication between the parts of the long- extended territory might be thought to be precluded by the savage character of the region, broken up by precipices, furious torrents, and impassable quebradas, those hideous rents in the mountain chain, whose depths the eye of the terrified traveller, as he winds along his aerial pathway, vainly endeavors to fathom.5 Yet the industry, we might almost say, the genius, of the Indian was sufficient to overcome all these impediments of Nature.

Between us and the first snow-covered slopes, however, lay more than twenty miles of volcanic desert intersected by deep canyons, steep quebradas, and very rough aa lava. Directed by our "guide," we left the Cotahuasi road and struck across country, dodging the lava flows and slowly ascending the gentle slope of the plateau. As it became steeper our mules showed signs of suffering.

The tremendous fissures or quebradas, so frightful in this mountain chain, yawned open, as if the Andes had been split asunder by some terrible convulsion, showing a broad expanse of the primitive rock on their sides, partially mantled over with the spontaneous vegetation of ages; while their obscure depths furnished a channel for the torrents, that, rising in the heart of the sierra, worked their way gradually into light, and spread over the savannas and green valleys of the tierra caliente on their way to the great ocean.

The Russian fur trade Kruzenstern appointed to the command of an expedition Noukha-Hiva Nangasaki Reconnaisance of the coast of Japan Yezo The Ainos Saghalien Return to Europe Otto von Kotzebue Stay at Easter Island Penrhyn The Radak Archipelago Return to Russia Changes at Otaheite and the Sandwich Islands Beechey's Voyage Easter Island Pitcairn and the mutineers of the Bounty The Paumoto Islands Otaheite and the Sandwich Islands The Bonin Islands Lütke The Quebradas of Valparaiso Holy week in Chili New Archangel The Kaloches Ounalashka The Caroline Archipelago The canoes of the Caroline Islanders Guam, a desert island Beauty and happy situation of the Bonin Islands The Tchouktchees: their manners and their conjurors Return to Russia.

This arises from the peculiar geological structure of these mountains. Vast clefts traverse them, yawning far into the earth. In South America these are called quebradas. You may stand on the edge of one of them and look sheer down a precipice two thousand feet!

«Cette excavation est, en petit, une modèle des vastes Quebradas ou profondeurs, et fait comprendre leur origine: elles ne pouvoient être que semblables

The crews bid each other good-bye, and thenceforth the two vessels took different directions. The first excursion of the officers and naturalists of Lütke's party was to the celebrated "quebradas." "These," says the explorer, "are ravines in the mountains, crowded so to speak with the little huts containing the greater part of the people of Valparaiso.

The most densely populated of these 'quebradas' is that rising at the south-west corner of the town. The granite, which is there laid bare, serves as a strong foundation for the buildings, and protects them from the destructive effects of earthquakes.