This cosmopolitan metropolis at the gateway to the Orient possesses now as it always has during the past thirty years, that fascinating variety in its life which has made it a place of great attraction for people from all over the earth. Hither come ships of all the seven seas with the flags of all the maritime nations flying over them; here, too, come the peoples of every land from far Cathay to Alaska, from Siberia to the Isles of Greece. Every nation favors California with immigration and every nationality of importance is represented by a colony in San Francisco of which the customs and manners help make up the cosmopolitan life of the ever growing city.
The great out-of-door attractions, such as Mount Tamalpais, lifting its volcanic crest 2596 feet above the city, the great Golden Gate Park with its animal and plant life drawn from all quarters of the globe, the Seal Rocks and Sutro Heights, Museum and Baths, the beautiful military reservation of the Presidio commanding the Golden Gate, the islands of the bay and the wooded Mann shores, the Muir woods, the old Mission Dolores built more than a century ago, and the neighboring valleys within short excursion distance laden with fruit and flowers; all these and many other attractions help make San Francisco a lodestone for the pleasure seeker.
The main line of The Overland Route ends at San Francisco where the great liners of the Pacific Mail, Toyo Kisen Kaisha and other steamship companies take up the work of transporting travelers by sea trails made pleasant by the sunshine and blue, placid waters of the mid-Pacific, to the islands of the South Seas and the great countries of the Orient.
THE OVERLAND LIMITED ENTERING THE YARDS OF THE OAKLAND STATION
OAKLAND IS A CITY OF BEAUTIFUL HOMES, MANY OF THEM CLUSTERING AROUND THE SHORES OF LAKE MERRITT
Nearly four thousand miles of lines northward to Portland, Oregon, and southward to Los Angeles and beyond, carry Overland Route passengers to all important cities of California and Oregon. Indeed, the end of the transcontinental trip is at the open door to wonderland. North and south are the attractions of mountains, shore and valley; the greatest of coniferous forests, our highest mountain peaks outside of Alaska, the deepest and wildest of mountain canyons, the oldest and greatest of giant trees, the largest and most beautiful of mountain lakes; the long beaches with wooded uplands and mountains beyond marked here and there with resorts, flower embowered, delightful winter and summer; the semi-tropic fruit orchards of a sunshiny country surpassing in extent and variety those of any other section; altogether a wonderland not to be matched in all the world.
“Lo! here sit we by the sun-down seas
And the White Sierra. The sweet sea-breeze