D. and I reached this place day before yesterday. I saw Fred Sprague yesterday. He had already learned of our presence in the Park, having seen our characteristic hob-nail tracks, and, as his mother tells me, he remarked upon seeing them that "God's people had come," meaning the Kansas boys with whom he became acquainted in '86 and '89.
We have passed thousands of flowers since leaving Loveland, white poppies, cactus, blue bells, columbine and others more than I can tell. The blue bells are of the same kind that you and I found near Bloomington several weeks ago. It would be very nice if you and I could make some of our Saturday excursions in this country.
I wish I could tell you more of our trip. Of course it is scarcely begun as yet, but I know pretty well what it will be; hard, for one thing, and lonesome, but strangely fascinating. We are beginning already to have that attitude towards nature which I imagine Indians have, namely, the desire to get something to eat out of everything we see. [M. had written her brother D. at Moraine post office of the pies and cakes they were making at home.] This is by no means greediness, for a measured appetite is essentially incompatible with the conditions of Indian life. In fact the only wild animals which are not gourmands on occasion are those which eat grass. Of course, we are at best only Agency Indians, but we shall soon be off our reservation.
Few people realize the utter desolation of many parts of the Rocky Mountains; and often on my mountain trips, hungry and foot-sore, my fancy has turned to what my friend 'Gric [8] has told me of the utterly desolate Funeral Mountains that border Death Valley in southern California, and of the infinite sunshine there. What would you think, my little friend, even now amid the comforts and joys of home, if you could hear a trustworthy account of an actual trip over those dreadful Mountains and into that awful Valley?
I hope that the map with the accompanying description will help you to a knowledge of the geography and geology of this country. I send kind regards to your father and mother.
Starting from Estes Park for the Grand River country we stopped over night at Camp Desolation in Windy Gulch, an enormous amphitheater rising above timber line on the north, east, and west, and opening to the south into Big Thompson Canyon. The mouth of the Gulch is dammed by the lateral moraine of an ancient Thompson glacier and behind this dam is a level, marshy stretch with a few green spruce and thickets of aspen, black alder and mountain willow. Near timber line also is a scattered fringe of green with dots of white. All the rest is a desolate stretch of burned timber.
Trailing to the head of Windy Gulch in the morning we gained the summit of Thompson Ridge which we followed in a northwesterly direction for about twelve miles; then we circled around the head of Big Thompson river and went down to Camp at the head of the Cache la Poudre river, precisely on the Continental Divide in Milner Pass about two hundred feet below timber line with Specimen Mountain immediately to the north of us.
Specimen Mountain Camp