CASCADE AT OURAY.
LEANING TOWER, PERRY PARK.
The eastern end of the gorge is at Cañon City, and after leaving this place the valley widens rapidly and spreads out into an arid plain that joins the prairies of Kansas. The change from a weirdly wild and savagely astounding cañon, to the pale landscape of a verdureless desert, is very sudden, and there is no variation in the passionless monotony of alkaline plain that lies between the mountain and Pueblo, a distance of forty miles. The Arkansas loses much of its volume and activity in struggling through the parched lands, becoming a listless stream, and murky with sediment that is gathered from its fast-washing banks.
We had to double upon our route very often in order to reach the numerous points of interest and charming scenery which is accessible by railroad, but in many cases much time was saved by dividing our party, though we refrain from wearying the reader with the uninteresting particulars of these movements. In the present instance, however, two of our photographers, with the camera car, proceeded southwest from Pueblo, over the Denver & Rio Grande R. R., to Wagon-Wheel Gap, while the others of our party returned, by way of the same route we had just traversed, to Montrose, thence to Ouray, and from that terminus, by stage, to Ironton, a distance of seven miles. From this latter point they followed the sweep of the same road, called the Rainbow route, around to Alamoso, where a junction was made with the two photographers on their return journey from Wagon-Wheel Gap.
THE TRAIL ALONG THE BREAST OF SAN JUAN MOUNTAIN.—It appeared to many impossible to connect the towns Ouray and Silverton by stage road, on account of the tumultuous mountains, riven by mighty chasms, and scarred by eroding streams, that lay between; but skill, patience and great expenditure of money accomplished what was undertaken with misgivings. A roadway was blasted and carved along the rocky breast of the peaks; chasms were bridged, rents were filled, and our photograph shows a portion of the result, a wildly picturesque stage road, over which it is a delightful experience to travel.