Mount Tamalpais is the southern and terminating peak of the westerly
ridge of the Coast Range, which confronts the Pacific Ocean from the
Golden Gate to the Oregon line.
Its outliers form the bold headlands which skirt the Golden Gate
and adjacent waters to the north, and which bound the peninsula
constituting Marin County. The spurs extending to the east reach the
shores of the Bay of San Francisco, and inclose small alluvial valleys
of great fertility and beauty. In some instances these valley lands are
fringed by tidal marshes, in part reclaimed and under cultivation.
The top of the mountain breaks into three distinct peaks, each reaching
an altitude of nearly half a mile above sea level, although bounded on
three sides by tidal waters.
No land points visible from the summit, except those bounding the
apparent horizon, reach equal or greater altitude. The mountain is
therefore a marked feature from all parts of the area visible from its
summit, which area has an extent of about eight thousand square miles.
The adjoined photographic reproduction of a portion of a relief map of
the State gives a general idea of the adjacent land, bay, and ocean
areas.
The westerly group of islands, opposite the Golden Gate, are the
Farallones. The bold headland northwest of the Gate is Point Reyes;
it protects from the north and northwest winds the anchorage known as
Drake’s Bay. The strip of water between the adjoining peninsula and the
mainland is Tomales Bay.
The most westerly headland south of the Golden Gate is San Pedro Point,
and the prominent headland farther south is Pescadero Point. The whole
of San Francisco Bay is visible from Mount Tamalpais, except a few
sheltered nooks and portions behind islands.
[Illustration: VICINITY OF THE GOLDEN GATE.]
The tidal area inside the Golden Gate is about seven hundred and forty
square miles at high tide; this includes that portion which extends
east of the Coast Range into the valley of California, and known as
Suisun Bay; this bay is connected with San Francisco Bay through the
Straits of Carquinez and San Pablo Bay. Emptying into Suisun Bay at
its easterly end are the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers. Thus the
tidal waters washing the base of Mount Tamalpais are connected with the
interior valley of California, and tributary to them are about twelve
hundred miles of navigable channels, tapping the central part of the
State.
From the summit of this peak the eye sweeps the horizon of the Pacific
Ocean for nearly one hundred and fifty degrees. To the northwest,
north, and northeast lie Petaluma, Santa Rosa, Sonoma, and Napa
Valleys, the view over these being bounded by the ridges inclosing
them. To the east are the Straits of Carquinez, the outlet of the
fifty-eight thousand square miles of drainage of the Sacramento and San
Joaquin Rivers, and the only water gap in the entire perimeter.
From the east to the south lie the slopes of the Contra Costa Hills and
the ranges bounding the drainage into the Bay of San Francisco, and
including the Santa Clara Valley, thus embracing a magnificent view of
the garden spots of California, and the cities and towns around the
bay--the homes of about one third the population of the State. Three
prominent peaks mark the limits of the land view: Mount Hamilton, the
site of the Lick Observatory of the University of California; Mount
Diablo, the base and meridian of the United States land surveys of
central California; and Mount St. Helena, a volcanic peak the summit of
which is common to Napa, Sonoma, and Lake Counties, and whose spurs are
noted for their quicksilver mines, mineral and hot springs.
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING LOCATION OF RAILROAD FROM MILL VALLEY TO
SUMMIT OF MOUNT TAMALPAIS.]
The plant life of the immediate Tamalpais region is abundant and
interesting; the flowering plants are represented by about eighty
orders, three hundred and fifty genera, and from seven to eight hundred
species, of which about one hundred are trees and shrubs.[F] Some of
the Sierra forms occur on Mount Tamalpais, and it is also the locus of
the most southerly extension of certain boreal species. Owing to the
wide range of temperature, moisture conditions, and exposures, many
of these plants can be found in bloom during every week in the year.
During the warm, moist autumn and winter the hardiest species bloom
from October to April in protected areas, and in the cold, exposed
areas these same species require the heat of the season from April to
September to bring them into bloom. Thus, within a radius of four or
five miles from the summit there is not a week in the year when the
flowers of certain species can not be gathered--this in face of the
fact that during the months of December, January, and February the
summit may be covered with sleet or snow for a day or two at a time.
[F] Estimated by Miss Eastwood, curator of the Department of
Botany of the California Academy of Sciences.
Mount Tamalpais is therefore a point of great interest to the
sight-seer, the tourist, and the student of Nature.
[Illustration: View of Summit from a Point Sixteen Hundred Feet above
Tide.]
MODES OF REACHING THE SUMMIT.--For many years a trail has existed
from Mill Valley to the summit, and another from Ross Valley, both
practicable for pack mules. Later the Ross Valley trail was improved
so as to be practicable for light vehicles, but these did not answer
the needs of the increasing travel, and in 1895 the Mill Valley and
Mount Tamalpais Scenic Railway Company was organized. The purpose of
this company was bold--to construct a traction railroad from tide level
to the summit of a peak not two miles off and nearly half a mile high
appeared visionary, if not impossible, to many. But with persevering
skill a road was located upon a line 8.19 miles long, having an average
grade of five and a half per cent and maximum grades of seven per
cent, and overcoming 2,353 feet elevation in this distance. Four and
nine tenths miles are curved, the minimum radius being seventy feet.
Owing to the rough and ravine-cut topography, twenty-five trestles were
necessary, the curvature and grade being maintained over these.
In order to reduce the cost of grading and to develop sufficient length
to overcome the elevation, the grade contour was followed as closely
as possible. The very short radius employed permitted this to be done
without tunnels and with but two through cuts.
The accompanying map, prepared from the United States Coast and
Geodetic charts and the maps and profiles of the company, gives a
general idea of the location and main features. To the student of
railroad location it forms an interesting exhibit of the extreme
flexibility of railway location.
The rails are steel, fifty-seven pounds to the yard, laid to standard
gauge upon the ordinary redwood ties in use on the Pacific coast.
Grading, trestle work, and laying cost about $55,000. The entire road
cost $136,746.44, or practically $16,700 per mile.
The equipment consists of one thirty-ton geared locomotive (Heisler),
one twenty-ton geared locomotive (Shay), six open canopy-top
observation cars, one half-closed passenger car, and two flat cars.
Cost of equipment, $22,450.[G]
[G] The writer is indebted to the officers of the Mill Valley
and Mount Tamalpais Scenic Railway for the above accurate
statistics.
[Illustration: VIEW FROM SUMMIT OF MOUNT TAMALPAIS HOTEL AT TERMINUS.]
The locomotives and cars are very thoroughly provided with brakes:
first, the Westinghouse automatic air brake; second, a water brake;
and, third, a powerful hand brake to each locomotive and car. The
efficiency of this equipment is attested in the operation of the road
without accident or injury of any kind. The locomotives are always
operated on the lower end of trains, and the maximum speed allowed is
eight miles per hour.
The ride up the winding cañons and through the superb scenery traversed
by this road is a treat of which one never tires. The point of view,
the direction, and the character of the landscape are continually
changing. With no deep cuts, no tunnels, facing first one and then the
other and finally all the points of the compass, sweeping around spurs,
with distant views of land and sea, and near views of great beauty;
then facing the steep sides of the mountain, its geology and flora
affording interesting pictures; then over trestles with the branches of
the bay, redwood, madroño, oak, and manzanita just out of reach--all
these form beauties and attractions possessed by no other road known
to the writer. A faint idea of the appearance of the road and of the
scenery may be had from the appended photographs.
[Illustration: THE DOUBLE BOW.]
THE METEOROLOGICAL STATION.--The advantages of Mount Tamalpais as a
meteorological station have long been recognized, and many efforts
have been made to utilize them. It frequently projects many hundreds
of feet above fogs which cover the adjacent shores, and during these
periods one can look out upon an ocean of rolling, fleecy clouds which
break upon the mountains around its base and visible from its summit.
This freedom from obscuring conditions gives an opportunity to more
freely observe and study meteorological phenomena, and caused the
Weather Bureau to make a series of preliminary observations in 1897,
and, these resulting favorably, a fully equipped permanent station was
subsequently built. The results have fully equaled expectations. The
advantages of the location may be briefly summarized as follows:
1. It is close to the coast line, and is so elevated that it is not
seriously affected by the local indraught of air through the Golden
Gate and adjacent gaps in the Coast Range. This local indraught is a
disturbing and often a misleading factor in all observations taken
near and south of the Golden Gate for at least a score of miles. The
elevated station on top of the peak eliminates the source of errors
based upon observations at lower stations, and enables the forecast
official to determine the effects of the local disturbances, and thus
to give observations taken at or near sea level their true weight at
the proper time.
2. No station in the United States has so full and free a projection
into the lower third of the vapor-bearing stratum as has the station on
this peak. No other station furnishes, as it does, an opportunity to
study the distribution of vapor in the lower third of that stratum of
the atmosphere, the physics of which is most important to human life
and industries.
3. In studying the phenomena connected with the occurrence of fog, this
station furnishes highly valuable data that could be obtained from
no other; and, again, enables the student of weather lore to correct
misleading impressions and deductions based upon observations taken
below the one-thousand-foot contour above sea level.
On the 16th of June, 1899, the observations taken on Mount Tamalpais
marked a difference of about thirty degrees in temperature over those
around its base. In San Francisco, at Point Lobos and at Point Reyes,
the temperature was down to 48°, while on Mount Tamalpais it was
79°, thus marking an approaching change in weather conditions, and
giving the Weather Bureau the first opportunity of using the vertical
temperature gradient in forecasting.
As a station for furnishing the data for a study of the problems of the
physics of the atmosphere Mount Tamalpais is of further importance, as
it stands near the easterly limits of the great area of high pressure
which, during summer, lies over the North Pacific and which dominates
the climatic phenomena of California for the greater portion of the
year.
Stations on the Hawaiian Islands to the south and others on the
Aleutian Islands to the north of this area of high pressure will still
further aid in the solution of the great and vital problems now before
meteorologists. These stations are the most reliable ones which can
surround on three sides the two great “weather breeders”--the “summer
high” and the “winter low” of the North Pacific.