arriving at a place famed for its beauty, in the darkness of night,
thus reserving for the morning hours, when our senses are refreshed by
sleep, the first impressions of the scenery. Passengers who have not
“read up” on the subject, would little imagine, as the midnight coach
takes them to the Canadian Pacific Railway Hotel, as it is called,
that they are in some of the finest mountain valleys in the world,
and that the hotel itself is as picturesquely perched on top of a
hill as any castle on the Rhine. But no castle on the Rhine boasts a
view comparable to that which is spread before them in the morning.
The best place to enjoy it is in the open rotunda built behind the
hotel, just over the precipice. Far below, the clear and rapid Bow
River winds along in graceful curves, forming on the left a series of
turbulent cascades terminating in a fall which is visible from the
rotunda, though of course at this distance less effective than from
the river-bank. Below the falls the river hastens on in the direction
of the Peechee Mountain, which forms the boundary wall of the valley
east of the hotel and, with the wide ridge on the right, is the most
interesting sight in the whole Park. This ridge seldom presents the
same appearance on successive days, and hardly two photographs of it
are alike, owing to the fact that the melting snow, after a storm,
constantly stripes and mottles it in different patterns. Though the
ridge, which is several thousand feet wide, seems to be absolutely
perpendicular, the snow still clings to it and paints it white, except
in one section, near the summit, where a black, snowless streak runs
across horizontally, dividing the snow-wall into two sections.
[Illustration: CANADIAN PACIFIC HOTEL AT BANFF.]
To the right of the hotel are some sharp-pointed peaks inclining over
each other, somewhat like the Three Brothers in the Yosemite Valley,
“playing leapfrog”; and to the left is the massive Cascade Mountain.
The most important excursions for those whose time is limited to a day,
are a trip by boat up the Bow River, as far as Vermilion Lake, in the
morning, and a drive to Devil’s Head Lake in the afternoon.
The Bow River excursion, which is made on a little steam-launch
whenever a party is ready for it, has only one drawback,—the ugly,
bristling corpses of charred pines on both sides of the river, the
effects of a recent most deplorable forest fire. Arrangements have
been made with lumbermen for the removal of these charred trunks, but
it will take years to finish the job, as there are thousands of them.
Fortunately there is already a new undergrowth, and in a few years the
vigorous young trees will have covered up the stumps. In many places,
however, the green trees have been spared, and in these sections
matchless views of the surrounding mountains may be obtained through
the loveliest green foregrounds. Winding about as it does, the Bow
River shows all the mountains included in the Park, and many others,
with endless changes of the point of view and grouping. Among the most
imposing peaks two will be specially impressed on the memory,—Mt.
Edith, a sharp, bare, rocky formation, apparently inaccessible, and the
extremely interesting Copper Mountain, shaped like a heart, whose two
sides, as seen from the upper Bow River, are surprisingly symmetrical.
In the centre is a rocky projection of a regular shape.
There are a few shallow places where one can see logs and dead trees
lying at the bottom; but generally the small river is wonderfully deep,
so that it seems more like the arm of a lake than a mountain stream.
Below the falls, however, it becomes too shallow and turbulent for
navigation, and this suggests the theory that the cascades and falls
were caused by a landslide, or rather a rockslide, which blocked up the
river and deepened the part above this obstruction.
The water of the Bow River comes direct from the Rocky Mountain
glaciers and springs, and is, therefore, as clear as a crystal, and if
you want a delicious drink, you need only dip your cup into the water
and help yourself. What a boon such a copious mountain stream, free
from the faintest suspicion of microbes, would be near a large city!
There are fish in this water, as a matter of course, and wild ducks
can be seen swimming about on it every day, from the hotel rotunda.
The part of the river below the falls is also well worth a visit. The
Spray River, almost as wide as the Bow, and even more turbulent, enters
the Bow just below the falls; and for those who are fond of listening
to the music and the babble of brooks, a finer spot than this could
not be found. Below the bridge, over the Spray, is a mountain side
rapidly crumbling away, and here a stone avalanche may be heard and
seen every five minutes. All around are groups and groves of straight,
slender mountain poplars, with smooth, pale olive bark and golden
autumn leaves. There is something fresh and delightfully healthy in
the appearance of these young mountain trees, suggestive of trout bred
in icy brooks. It is impossible to walk a hundred steps without being
arrested by the really thrilling beauty of these tree-groups,—the
blackish green pines encircling the poplars and birches, whose leaves
are resplendent in the deepest dyes, representing their transition
from fresh, light green, through a dozen shades of greenish yellow,
till a deep golden yellow is attained as the climax. While the leaves
are mostly yellow, the numerous kinds of berries—bunchberries,
mountain-ash, sweet-brier, etc.—are red, and one of the most exquisite
bits of color is contributed by the scarlet leaves of the wild
gooseberry. The berries of the sweet-brier are much larger than in
Oregon, though the bushes are only a foot in height, while in Oregon
they are eight to ten, and with their thousands of roses or berries
form a most lovely sight.
Forest symphonies like these are also to be seen in abundance on the
way to Lake Minnewonka, better known as Devil’s Head Lake. An excellent
carriage road has been constructed by the government, the distance
being nine miles. For the most part the road runs along the foot of
precipitous palisade-like mountains, in measuring which the famous
Hudson River palisades might be used as a yard-stick, or standard of
measure. These mountain sides are beautifully striped and mottled
with snow, in a manner that seems to be peculiar to this region, and
is repeated on a still grander scale on the steep cañon walls which
form the sides of Lake Minnewonka. Before reaching the lake, a most
imposing range of the Rockies—a wild jumble of snow-peaks—is seen on
the right, beyond the river. Altogether, this drive to the lake is one
of the finest in the world, and the lake itself forms a fitting climax.
It is a curiosity among mountain lakes, being fourteen miles long and
only one to two miles wide, both its sides being steep and beautifully
formed mountains. It might in fact be described as a cañon filled
with a lake—as the Yosemite Valley is supposed to have been at one
time. Its average depth is only forty feet, but owing to its peculiar
oblong shape and its vertical sides, it is greatly subject to mountain
“draughts,” which are likely, without a moment’s notice, to assume the
form of wild and sudden squalls. In the morning the surface of the
lake forms a perfect mirror of the surrounding peaks, and at certain
hours and states of the wind it is tinted with the most exquisite
shades of green, blue, purple, and violet. In this surface iridescence
it resembles Lake Tahoe; but in another respect there is a remarkable
difference between these two lakes; for although Tahoe has an altitude
of almost two thousand feet above Minnewonka, and is also surrounded by
snow-mountains, its waters never freeze, even though the snow on its
shores be ten feet high; while the Canadian lake does freeze to a depth
of two to four feet in February, and then forms an admirable surface
for ice-boats and for skating. The lake is full of large trout which
are still quite abundant, as they were not fished for till about four
years ago.
[Illustration: DEVIL’S HEAD LAKE.]
The government is so proud of this lake that it has appointed a keeper
to prevent it from being stolen. He keeps an inn on the end nearest to
Banff, and he says that so far the best catch made by a tourist in one
day was eighteen trout, weighing seventy-eight pounds. The Vanderbilt
party, in 1889, caught one weighing twenty-eight pounds, and in 1888
the keeper said that he and the cook caught one weighing fifty-three
pounds, which was probably served _cum grano salis_. (Please remember
that I am merely repeating what was told to me.) The incident will
probably recall to the reader the story of the heathen whose budding
faith was nipped when a missionary told him the story of Jonah and the
whale. “When it comes to fish stories,” he remarked subsequently
to a friend, “no one can be trusted.” I must add, however, in justice
to the keeper, that a fifty-three-pound mountain trout, abstractly
considered, is not impossible. Very large hooks are used to pull
these lake trout in, and though they cannot be young, their firm pink
flesh is of delicious flavor and not at all toughened by age. The
keeper sneered at those tourists who come from the Canadian Pacific
Railroad Hotel, and fish from noon to five o’clock,—a time when no
self-respecting trout will bite,—and then go away growling that there
are no fish in the lake. He also said that there was at present no road
around the lake, except an Indian trail, but that a road was projected,
as was the placing of a small steamboat on the lake.
Besides the drive to this lake (which passes through the village of
Banff, about a mile from the hotel), there are other excellent roads
in several directions, notably those to the Lower and the Middle and
Upper Sulphur Springs. The Canadian National Park bases its claim to
the attention of the travelling public on the curative properties
of its sulphur springs quite as much as on its scenic attractions.
On approaching the Lower Springs, the fumes bring back memories of
Yellowstone Park, as do the curious, gray, brittle stones and the
aspect of the soil. Bathers can have their choice of a subterranean
plunge in a dimly lighted grotto or cave, which might have been the
abode of a mountain nymph, or in an open pool, framed in by the
bath-house on one side, and on the other by rocks, from which the
plunge may be made. The temperature of the grotto is 80°; of the open
pool, 92°. In the latter the hot water bubbles up from a hole in the
bottom, and the boys dive down, put an arm into it, and bring up a
handful of very coarse-grained quicksand. Hours can be agreeably spent
here, and the sulphur odor is not unpleasantly noticeable; but after
the bath one smells for hours like a walking parlor-match. In front
of the bath-house is a fountain, the water in which is so strongly
impregnated that soap cannot be used in washing in it: yet the ice
which forms on it in winter is pure from all mineral matter. Animals
are fond of this water. I saw a dog drink it (in Oregon I saw a dog
drinking sea-water, for that matter), and the keeper of the bath-house
says that the cows and horses often come up from the valley to drink
it, although there is abundant pure water below.
The Middle and Upper Sulphur Springs are farther up the same
mountain—appropriately named Sulphur Mountain. The carriage road, three
and one-half miles long, passes through a dense jungle of young pines,
no thicker than birches, crowded like Chinese in a tenement house, and
therefore looking lugubrious and unhealthy. Most of these will have
to be smothered in the struggle for existence, before the strongest
ones can get breathing-room enough to develop into full-grown trees.
The silence of a mountain forest reigns here, rendered audible by the
faint, distant babble of the Bow and Spray rivers. We pass by the
road which leads off to the Middle Springs, and soon reach the Upper
Springs, around which half-a-dozen bath-houses are grouped, whose
favorite sign-board, or trade-mark, is a pair of crutches suspended
from a tree, with this notice attached: “I came here with these, and
left without them.” A few yards above these huts the water can be
seen gushing out of the mountain side in a strong current, and so hot
that one can hardly hold his hand in it—110 to 116°. These baths are
supposed to be good for rheumatism and skin and blood diseases. I met
an old miner here who has hunted gold on four continents, and who
entertained me with stories of his adventures in Alaska, and how he
“blew up” Mr. Muir for making such a fuss over Glacier Bay, where the
glaciers were mere pygmies compared with some that he had come across
on his prospecting tours in the interior. He had offered to guide Mr.
Muir to these, but the professor seemed to be afraid of the hardships
and perils, and refused to go; whereat our miner was still so indignant
that he threatened that if he had more skill in using the pen, he would
write to the Eastern papers and expose him as a fraud. He said that he
was going back to Alaska as soon as cured, because he believes there is
untold wealth in that country, and added that if any “literary feller”
from New York wanted to accompany him, he would guarantee him material
for a book that would make Eastern people’s hair curl.
From the Upper Springs the hotel can be reached by means of a short-cut
footpath through the dense woods, following the flume which carries
the sulphur water down to the hotel. It is used, of course, only for
special bathing purposes; but all the water seems here, as in the
Yellowstone Park, to be impregnated with traces of sulphur: for if you
wash with soap and leave the water in the basin over night, curds will
be found in it in the morning; and in the men’s wash-room there are
yellow streaks in the marble basins, where the water runs into them.
Sulphur water is supposed to be good for the stomach, but I have on
several occasions found it to be just the opposite.
The Central Pacific Railroad Hotel has electric lights in every room,
and is well managed, and its terms reasonable. For those who have to
study economy, there are smaller inns and a sanitarium not far from the
hotel, with a few stores and a row of tents.
Summing up on the Canadian National Park, we may say that it has not so
many natural wonders as the Yellowstone Park,—no geysers, steam-holes,
gold-bottomed rivulets, paint-pots, nor anything to place beside
the Yellowstone Cañon and Falls. But the Minnewonka Lake may fairly
challenge comparison with the Yellowstone Lake, and the mountain
scenery is grander in the Canadian Park, and the snow and glaciers are
nearer, though not so near as at the Glacier House, where the air is in
consequence cooler and more bracing in summer than even at Banff. As
the Canadian Park is only twenty-six miles long and ten wide, while the
Yellowstone Park is about sixty-two by fifty-four miles, the former can
be seen in much less time than it takes to do justice to the latter.
When we get ready to leave Banff we have to take the midnight train, so
there is no chance to say good by to the mountains. But we have seen so
much of them since leaving Vancouver, that we have felt almost tempted
to cry out to Nature, “Hold, enough—less would be more!” Now we get
ample opportunity to ruminate in peace over our crowded impressions.
When we get up we are on the prairie; we go to bed in the prairie,
after traversing a territory larger than a European kingdom; again
we rise on the prairie, and again go to bed on it; and not till Lake
Superior is approached does the scenery once more become interesting.
There is little local traffic west of Winnipeg, towns being few
and far between. A dining-car is attached to the train, and on the
following day is replaced by another. The train makes a bee-line for
Winnipeg, as there are no more “loops” to climb mountain sides on,
no more puffing engines pulling in front and pushing behind, no more
noisy bridges and trestle-works to cross. We are moving along at the
rate of half a thousand miles a day, yet the view is always the same,
varied only by the sight of buffalo tracks,—the autographs of departed
herds,—a few coyotes, and some begging squaws with their pappooses at
the stations—only this and nothing more, except the prairie itself,
on which it is said a rider who sets out on a day’s journey can see
before starting the place where he will be in the evening. The train
stops a few hours at Winnipeg, where some of the passengers use this
first opportunity to branch off to the United States; then on we
speed again over the prairie. There is an occasional stretch of dark,
ploughed soil in the distance, which causes you to look twice to make
sure that it is not the ocean; and when finally the train suddenly
plunges into a tunnel, you are almost as much startled, after all this
prairie monotony, as if an Atlantic steamer on the way to Liverpool
took you through a tunnel; in fact, you are at first disposed to fancy
that this tunnel had been artificially created by the engineers as a
practical joke on the passengers. It is only a prelude, however, to the
Lake Shore scenery, which, with the wild rocks and cliffs on one side,
and an occasional glimpse of the lake on the other, forms one of the
most fascinating fifty miles of the whole road. Instead of going along
this north shore of Lake Superior in a wide curve, passengers have the
option of taking the steamer from Port Arthur to Sault Ste. Marie, and
thence rejoining the transcontinental road.
As a general thing, it is no doubt wiser to take the Canadian Pacific
Railway westward than eastward, as the scenic climax is on the western
side. However, it is quite possible to avoid the feeling of anticlimax
on going east, if we conclude the trip with the Thousand Islands and
the Rapids of the St. Lawrence, together with Montreal; or with Niagara
Falls and the Hudson River. The Pacific slope no doubt is scenically
far more attractive than the Atlantic; still, there are some things in
the East which even California would be proud to add to her attractions.
XVII.
THROUGH YELLOWSTONE PARK
AN INDEPENDENT JOURNEY ON HORSEBACK—GEYSERS AND
PAINT-POTS—WAITING FOR AN ERUPTION—YELLOWSTONE CAÑON AND
FALLS—THE LAKE AND ITS TROUT—A TENT HOTEL—MYSTERIOUS SOUNDS.
Like all the other transcontinental railroads, the Northern Pacific
has its grandest scenery on the western half of its course. On the
eastern section, between Livingston and St. Paul, the train traverses
monotonous prairies, suggestive of the ocean, but less exhilarating,
on account of the dust, and less uncertain and exciting, and with only
a few prairie dogs, herds of cattle, grain-fields, and ugly little
villages to vary the view from the car windows. But on its western
section there is the magnificent scenery of the Cascade Division, with
Mt. Tacoma, or, for those starting east from Portland, the romantic
Columbia River route. As both of these have been described at length
in preceding chapters, we can here pass at once to what is the climax
of the Northern Pacific route—the Yellowstone Park, although reference
must be made in passing to the rare beauty of Lake Pend D’Oreille, the
shores of which the train skirts for hours. At Livingston the tourist
leaves his comfortable Pullman and takes the branch road, which in a
few hours lands him at Cinnabar, where stages have to be taken, as no
railway is allowed within the limits of the Yellowstone Park.
This little branch railroad reminded me of some of the so-called
“passenger trains” in Southern Europe. For slowness it would certainly
get the first prize at a national exhibition of time-tables.
“Gentlemen,” I once heard a conductor exclaim, as he entered the
waiting-room of a railway station in Southern Germany,—“Meine Herren,
hurry up with your beer; it is time to start.” But local color varies.
On the Yellowstone Road the train was stopped for ten minutes in one
place to leave a box of merchandise in the middle of a field, and to
dispose of a bucketful of buttermilk which a nut-brown maiden had
brought there for the trainmen and passengers; and shortly afterwards
the train was again stopped, apparently because the engineer had espied
a couple of prairie-chickens on the hill-side. He pursued them with
his revolver, bagged one of them, and after that the train stubbornly
proceeded to its destination, notwithstanding the polite request of
one of the passengers to the conductor to stop until he had caught a
string of trout in the adjacent Yellowstone River. A week later, when
I returned over the same road, the train stopped for a quarter of an
hour at one place while the conductor, engineer, and brakeman amused
themselves with a game of base-ball.
The gateway through which the train enters the fertile Paradise Valley
and the National Park is bounded east and west by lofty mountains, on
which, however, only a few specks of snow remained in the first week
of August. Indeed, throughout the Park I saw much less snow than the
guide-book had led me to expect; but for this an uncommonly warm
summer may have been responsible. Yet even without snowy summits the
Yellowstone mountains are picturesque, and must appear sublime to those
who have never been in Switzerland. In ruggedness and grotesqueness of
outline they are unrivalled, and the colors are often unique, the rocks
being sometimes so white that they present the appearance of slightly
discolored snow, such as is seen in the lower portions of glaciers; and
this partly atones for the absence of real snow.
After a dusty stage ride, lasting several hours, and very much uphill,
the passengers are landed at the Mammoth Springs Hotel, where a fair
supper and good beds await them. Although this hotel is conveniently
located near the foot of the remarkable many-storied, snow-white
terrace-mound, built by the calcareous deposits of the hot springs, and
adorned with the most brilliant colors, its site is nevertheless badly
chosen; for there is no view from either the front or back windows, or
from the piazza; whereas, if the building had been erected only a few
hundred yards to the front, visitors might have enjoyed an extensive
and delightful mountain view on all sides. This error is possibly
responsible, to a large extent, for the fact that fewer visitors than
had been expected make this large hotel their home for a week or
two. With the exception of that at the Upper Geyser Basin, all the
Yellowstone Park hotels are placed in like manner, though in each case
a picturesque situation might have been found within a short distance.
Perhaps the builders calculated that visitors, after their wearisome
stage ride of forty or fifty miles and a subsequent brief inspection of
the geysers, would hardly look upon the hotels as anything else than a
place for providing them with meals and beds.