A LOG CABIN ON BAILEY’S MOUNTAIN
This afternoon we expect to stop at Bailey for some provisions and horse feed, and then make camp as near Denver as possible, so as to be sure to reach there by Monday night. Bailey is at the foot of a mountain by the same name, and we pulled in there about 2 P. M. After stopping only a few minutes, we left the river and started up over Bailey’s Mountain, going, as it seemed on paper, across lots to Denver, but in reality across mountains. We found no water; all the streams were dried up. We passed a number of summer “shacks,” all vacant, and met no one for miles. Evidently the lack of water has kept the people out this summer.
We camped for the night near a vacant summer house, that had a spring in a log house by the road. It was getting late and we had been looking for water, and probably would have missed this place but for a lone horseman who came along and told us about it. He said he had driven this road many times and this was the dryest time of all, and we had no reason to doubt his word. Every little mountain stream we had passed since leaving Bailey was dry as a bone. We made twenty-seven miles to-day with a late start, and some long climbs, so we think we are pretty sure to reach Denver Monday night. We were busy until bedtime with the horses and supper, besides shooting a few rabbits and doves.
The last thing we did was to take one of our hind wheels off, block up the wagon, dish the wheel and take it down to a water hole we had found, tie a rope to it and throw it in to soak all night.
We left in the morning, Sunday, at eight-thirty, drove through Shaffer’s Crossing, on over another pass and down to Conover, about ten miles. Here we found an old-fashioned well with two buckets, in the middle of the road in front of a country hotel, where we watered the horses. The office of the hotel contained a store and long distance telephone exchange. The people here asked us a number of questions regarding the rainfall back in the mountains. Every one is talking about the drought. There has been no rain on this side of the range and very little snow last Winter.
Leaving here we pass a number of empty houses, large roomy affairs, formerly used as hostelries when the road was used by freighters from Denver to Leadville. It is thirty-two miles, they tell us, to Denver, and we drove on about three miles farther before stopping for lunch.
NEARING CIVILIZATION
We made what we call a dry camp near a ranch house. We stopped our wagon under a big tree beside the road. There was a splendid breeze, but no water in sight. The boys took a pail and went over to the house for water, but were gone so long we began to worry about them. When they finally returned they said the well at the ranch was dry, and they had gone about half a mile to a spring where the family had to go since the brook went dry.
All the vehicles we have met so far to-day are three autos and two teams. The other road along the North Platte, which we left at Bailey, has the water, and the summer resorts, they tell us.