The
dresses of the Indian squaws are also very picturesque, and, as far as I
can remember, red, green, and bright yellow were the dominating colours.
But I am getting away from the main subject.
Right ahead of us there is the gigantic Illimani, silent and majestic,
with its perpetually white crown rising 22,000 feet above sea-level. One
begins to wonder where La Paz can be, as the plain seems to extend right
to the foot of the mountain. Keeping steadily on, however, the coach
eventually arrives at the brink of a hitherto unnoticed hollow, and the
scene that here awaits the traveller is magnificent in the extreme. To
describe the view baffles my limited vocabulary. There you are looking
down on the roofs of the houses in La Paz, which lies snugly 1,200 feet
below you. It just seems that you could drop a stone on to them, so
precipitate are the cliffs; but it is the enormous drop that deceives
the eye, because, of the route over which the coach passes, six miles
have yet to be traversed before getting into the town. I have seen La
Paz from the top of the "Cuesta" both by day and night, and the latter
effect, while losing much of its grandeur and magnificence, on account
of the darkness, almost surpasses in beauty that of the daylight vision.
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