As the glaciers moved down their valleys they carried, imprisoned in their bodies and heaped upon their backs and sides, the plunder from their wreckage of the range. This they heaped as large moraines in the broad valleys. The moraines of the Rocky Mountain National Park are unequalled, in my observation, for number, size, and story-telling ability. They are conspicuous features of the great plateau upon the east, and of the broad valley of the Grand River west of the park. Even the casual visitor of a day is stirred to curiosity by the straight, high wall of the great moraine for which Moraine Park is named, and by the high curved hill which springs from the northeastern shoulder of Longs Peak, and encircles the eastern foot of Mount Meeker.
From a photograph by Willis T. Lee
From a photograph by H.T. Cowling
These and other moraines are fascinating features of any visit to Rocky Mountain National Park. The motor roads disclose them, the trails travel them. In combination with the gulfs, the shelved canyons and the scarred and serrated peaks and walls, these moraines offer the visitor a thrilling mystery story of the past, the unravelling of whose threads and the reconstruction of whose plot and climax will add zest and interest to a summer's outing, and bring him, incidentally, in close communion with nature in a thousand happy moods.