OCR Text |
Show oo INDIANA'S SAND DUNES. The heart of Indiana's" sand dunes is to bo plcrcc'd by p gravel road, An old trail thirteen miles in length that once linked Miller and. Chesterton, was- last used by the Detroit-Chicago stage coach line fifty years ago. The route will becomo tho roadbed of a modern highway, and before a year has passed automobiles will speed over the stretch the post horses once used r Since the last stage Tvent over the trail, during the Civil War, very few vehicles have traveled over It, The trail has almost been forgotten, even by the old settlers, for the route lead3 through Indiana's most lonesome territory, ter-ritory, lit tho forty square miles between be-tween Miller and Chesterton there are less than a dozen farmB. Yot several sev-eral hundred people find their llvlns In the dune country. -They Gsh, ship sand and pick berries, but moat of them make their living- by trapping, for hero Is one place in this part of tho country whore the smaller fur-bearing fur-bearing animals abound. To the north of the dune country lies the lake, a stretch of three or four miles oJand and the meandering Grand Calumet river, the south bank of wh'ich marks jthc-' beginning of the black soil 'Country "ivhlch "extends southward to tho Ohio. Tt Is the strip between tho lake and the rUer Ufat Is almost primitive In Its character. Part of it Is densely wooded. Then come almoBt Impenetrable marshes, the shores of some having sand bluffs 200 and 300 feet high. Nearer to the lake are the sand dunes. .No road will ever pierce them because of their nature. Travelers have declared the sand plateauB lo be the nearest American Am-erican replica of the Sahara. On what little vegetation thoro Is nature na-ture plays queer tricks. The action of the shifting winds makes a valley of one snot today, to-i to-i morrow It may be a small mountain. When tho sand whirls around tho green spots and stays there for a while a dreary and monotonous scene Is presented when it Is removol. Thore 1b nothing to bo seen but the uninviting ajea of sand wastes and tho skeletons of the blasted pines. On summer days tb.6 region pro-sonts pro-sonts all of tho "appearance of tne Sahara. Thore are the scorching sands, the merciless Jiun and the paucity of water. Occasional vegetation vegeta-tion and scanty clustery of trees give the effect of the oases. Addad realism Is also given to' the scone, for side by side with the fauna of Indiana there grows the cactus of tho desert and the Mexican plains.-This! anomaly i 4 I V in plant life attracts many botanists who como to study the Btrange phenomenon. phen-omenon. The winter days present pictures none the less interesting In tho vicinity vi-cinity of Dune Park in January the scones resemble the Alps. If ononis able to make his 'way through The dunes and risk the dangers of the snow and Ice crevasses he tvIH find himself well rewarded As the lake in approached the whitened landscape presents a striking appearance The shore lino is ragged, for as tho wakes dafah against the now hardened sand cliffs the water freezes. Out In the lake thore Is to be seen "vfist snow flqlds, broken here and there by huge cakes of floating ice, some of which are large enough 'to suggest icebergs. Standing on ono of the snow-capped peaks the visitor will command a view of many miles. The lake offers no variety sac tho small Ice packa that dot the snow landscape. On land thero Is one continual succession of whitened dune crests, and If the highest ono Is mounted five miles farther far-ther to the south will be seen a Xalnt ' black line. That is tho beginning o the timber lino of tho black soil coun- try. Civilization disappears, and oven tho telescope will uot bring a hablta- i lion In sight. The silence Is tho same as that of the Arctic regions. Cor- j ? respondence of the Indianapolis News. "f 'I |