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Show I One Way of Seeing Yellowstone Park By PARLEY P. JENSON II Being inveigled by the persuasive eloquence of Mr. Garrett, I who handles the finances of this paper, into believing that a trip to I the Yellowstone Park would add happiness to my days and years 9 to my life, I became one of a party consisting of J. II. Garrett, Ferd Strouse, Willard Scowcroft, Jack McCoy, Willard Weihc, Alvin A. Bcesley, Mat Thomas, Julian Bamberger, Max Bamberger and Geo. Hedrick to make a trip through the Yellowstone National Park. After carefully investigating the different important phases of making such a trip and being assured that it meant one long spell of the simple life, that all formality, red tape and Sunday clothes were to be strictly tabooed, I innocently entered into the project with enthusiasm. Gibbon Canyon and River, Yellowstone Park. HI Together with the first four named gentlemen I left the city of K Zion August 1st, in an automobile for St. Anthony, Idaho. The de- I tails of the trip I will pass over by simply saying that the roads were HI far from perfect, but that with the exception of having to climb a Mil few steep hills, fording a stream or two, plowing through stretches of sandy desert, descending a river bridge by way of the pulley and fl tackle route, we arrived in St. Anthony on the Snake river August HI 2d. Here wc were joined by the other members of the party and I we started for the Park by team. We were now equipped with nine HI horses and three wagons, together with all the canned goods that HI one of the leading stores of St. Anthony had, our caravan, in charge HI of our guide and scout E. S. Little and his son Spencer, gaily drove HI out of St. Anthony, headed for the west entrance of the Yellow- H stone Park. All the members were enthusiastic in expressing their Hj joy at having a chance to live close to nature. The first night out we camped on a stream noted for the abund- H ance of fish abounding there, here we organized our camp after the Hj order of Karl Marx. We were an ideal community, each man was Hj appointed certain duties to attend to from washing dishes to chop- HJ ping wood. A barber was brought along, but as we solemnly agreed Hj to become disciples of Esau we decided that the barber as a barber HJ would be excess baggage and we unanimously elected him cook, an HJ act that wc will ever afterward remember. And right here, before I H forget it', I want to pay an everlasting compliment to the courage, H bravery and powers of endurance displayed by all the members of HJ the party, for during the entire three weeks of camp life they never HJ rescinded their action in selecting that cook, and they all live to At this first camp we also learned who the fishermen were HJ With much gusto and eclat Messrs. Wcihe, Garrett, Beesley and HJ Julian Bamberger proclaimed their superior ' 'Mtics as fishermen H (and I have never been fully convinced but that the reason for their HJ always seeking a . stream as soon as we struck camp was not so HJ much a desire to catch fish as it was an inclination to get out of HJ doing their just amount of the apportioned work) but why go intr HJ details about this first night's fishing, suffice it to say that we hn HJ canmld goods for supper and ham and eggs for breakfast next morning. H The next day wc reached Henry's lake, about fifteen miles from H the entrance of the Park, where we camped on Targec creek, and here must be related a real fish story. This creek is literally alive with trout, there are two reasons for this, first, there is little fishing done there, because the state will not permit fish to be shipped out, and second, fishermen who are sportsmen will not fish there because be-cause there is no sport in fishing where all you have to do is throw in your line and pull out and repeat this until you are exhausted with pulling out fish. Every member of our party tried his" hand at fishing fish-ing in this stream and each man caught from fifty to one hundred fish. We had fish for every meal during the following three clays and then finding that the fish would keep no longer wc gave four bushels of cleaned trout to the soldiers at one of the stations in the Park. Ana while speaking of fish, I may as well say now that that Our Party. Taken at the Ranch in Jackson's Hole, Just Outside the Park. was the only time during the trip that any fish were caught, that is there may have been a stray one here or there, but never enough to make it an item worth recording. One of the features of this trip was our camp life, every night after the evening meal we would build a great bonfire, gather around it and enjoy an impromptu program. All the neighboring camps would be welcome guests and many are the delightful memories of Willard Weihe's exquisite violin solos accompanied by Mr. Beesley on the guitar, also Mr. Thomas' inimitable stories and the diverting stunts of the other boys. There is a certain charm in being out in the free and open nature with the star illumined sky as a canopy and to he down and gaze into the vastness of space as the harmonious strains of delightful music charms your soul. Sometimes when it was stormy, as it often was in the heart of the Rocky Mountains, we would vary our habits, and sagebrush tourists as we were, dressed m our khaki suits, we would take ourselves to one of the hotels, where Mr. Wcihe at the violin and Mr. Beesley at the piano always obtained for us a wide-open entre. Mr. Weihe scored a number of triumphs in some of the hotels. Of course we are well into the Park now, and it would be intol- crablc for me to attempt to describe the scenery of this wonderful wonderland. Brilliant pens and master minds have many times given expression in highly ornate language describing the magnificence and all inspiring grandeur of this sublime land of geysers and wonders, won-ders, so that what could so faint a pen as mine hope to do in an attempt at-tempt at descriptive writing. I might even add here that fine and beautiful as have some of the descriptions been, yet, after having viewed the wonderful r-ratic formations and the phenomena and after having seen the ublimc in the natural scenery of the Park region I think that no writer has yet even done faint justice to that surpassingly, transcendently beautiful territory. We made a complete tour of the Park, visiting all the points of interest usually seen by tourists as well as a number of places less frequented by regular travelers. ff Wc visited the Lower Geyser basin, the Upper Geyser basin where Old Faithful gives an hourly exhibition. Wc saw the Continental Conti-nental Divide with the TworOcean pond. The beautiful formations of the Mammoth Hot Springs and the peculiar pots and pools of the Norns basin were viewed by us. The ride over the Golden Gate road by the Obsidian Cliff was enjoyed. The government has dem- onstrated on this road just what can be done for the benefit of the public. This road is cut out of mountains of stone and is a masterpiece master-piece as an engineering project. At the Obsidian Cliff the road runs through a mountain of solid black glass. In constructing this $J road at this point blasting was impossible and the government adopted the unique method of building great fires about the cliff ind when the glass was thoroughly heated cold water would v thrown upon the surface, causing the glass to crack and break into pieces so that the roadway might be cleared. We were all inspired with the revelation of beauty presented by a view of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. Travelers insist that this canyon is equalled, in point of grandeur, by nothing in all the world. There may be those who are attracted to the Yellowstone Park by the display of erratic natural phenomena, but I believe all will acknowledge after having visited the Park that this phenomena, peculiar, mysterious and awe-inspiring as it is, is secondary to the magnificence of the natural mountain scenery, and this scenery is L fittingly climaxed by having such an altogether indescribably beau-T beau-T tiful setting as the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. I am tempted in this instance to make one quotation from the pen of Dr. Wayland Hoyt: "Those are not simple gray and hoary depths, and reaches and domes and pinnacles of sullen rock. The whole gorge flames. It is as though rainbows had fallen out of the sky and hung themselves them-selves there like glorious banners. The underlying color is the clearest yellow; this flushes onward into orange. Down at thc base the deepest mosses unroll their draperies of the most vivid green. Browns, sweet and soft, do their blending; white rocks stand spectral; spec-tral; turrets of rock shoot up as crimson as though they were drenched through with blood. It is a wilderness of color. It is impossible im-possible that even the pencil of an artist can tell it. -What you would call, accustomed to the softer tints of natur., a great exaggeration, exagger-ation, would be the utmost tameness compared with the reality. It is as if the most glorious sunset you ever saw had been caught and held upon that resplendent, awful gorge." The Yellowstone Lake came in for its share of attention, this lake is chiefly remarkable for being located at so high .m altitude, being over 7,700 feet above sea level. The petrified trees also received re-ceived a visit and our fishermen tested the waters of most of the rivers and smaller streams. Volumes might be written if an attempt were made to even briefly enumerate the many wonderful things worth seeing in this wonderland and yet nothing new would necessarily be said. One of the things that gives the citizen a great deal of satisfaction satisfac-tion is the realization that in setting aside this tract of land as the perpetual heritage of the Nation, as a public recreation ground, game reserve and national watershed, the Nation has built wisely. The Park was dedicated in 1872. In 1874 when the Earl of Dunraven visited the Park he gave expression to the following sentiment : "All honor then to the United States for having bequeathed as a free gift to man the beauties and curiosities of wonderland, it was an act worthy of a great nation and she will have her reward in the praises of the army of tourists and the thanks of the generations yet to come . Great credit is due to the earlier explorers of the Park for the public spirited manner in which they gave the benefit of their investigations in-vestigations to the public. Had they been gold hunters and land grabbers the like of which we have seen in many other parts, the Yellowstone National Park would to-day be the monopoly of private pri-vate individuals instead of the greatest public park in the world. From time immemorial privileged classes have obtained and held valuable parcels of land for their own private purposes, but never before had there been so important a territory set aside for public purposes as the Yellowstone Park, and the example thus set has been widely followed, fol-lowed, as we have now the Yosemite and the Sequoia National parks in California, and numerous parks on the sites of great battlefields. New York state has a Niagara Park, and a number of other states and countries arc following example. After leaving the Park at the southern boundary we proceeded through Jackson's Hole. Mr. Garrett had been so eloquent in picturing pic-turing the great possibilities for game hunting in this region that all had been allured by these prospects into taking with them an abundance abund-ance of fire arms, so that when we visited the last station in the Park to have our fire arms unsealed, the soldiers said, "What is this, an arsenal?" The history of our hunting adventures however, arc briefly told when it is related that one of the members shot a black hawk and another one shot a sage hen, nearly. Not but that we saw plenty of game but it was in the Park or in the game reserves. The first stop we made after leaving the Park was at a ranch in Jackson's Hole. Vc had plenty of provisions and our commissary department still had plenty to do, yet on sight of this ranch everyone every-one seemed to have forgotten how glorious it was to camp and live close to nature and all were in favor of taking dinner at this ranch. This we did and enjoyed a real cooked meal. A meat called beef was served, but those who ought to know said it was elk meat, which of course the ranchman vehemently denied, as the game law was not up and as he was in the game reserve anyway. But the members of the party will all give expert testimony that it was real elk meat, because be-cause there was only one well man in the crowd next day, and he was a vegetarian. Jackson's Hole country is a high, rugged strip of land dotted with a number of beautiful lakes and streams. Its scenery is particularly par-ticularly attractive, especially the mountains and the Teton peaks. It has been regretted that all this territory, including the peaks, was not included in the Park reserve, because it naturally belongs to the Park proper. The grand Teton Pass, leading from Wilson, Wyo., to the Teton Basin, Ida., is a roadway ( ?) that everyone should take, as they would learn something of mountain climbing that they never dreamed of. We made the climb just after a heavy rain storm and the ascent covers a distance of four miles, and we we're just five hours in making the climb. The summit of the pass is 8,429 feet above the sea and we were indeed happy on reaching the top. Everybody walked up the hill except the men who drove the teams, and they were nearly stricken with curvature of the spine on reaching the summit. We reached civilization in the Teton country and donned the garb of civilization again. We were soon in St. Anthony and resumed re-sumed our homeward journey by automobile and train as we had come. We reached Salt Lake August 24th, all well arid happy, glad that we had been away; but more glad to get back. And I am convinced that if anyone wants to lead the simple life and leave behind him the strenuous, then don't take the trip we took, like we took it. |
