The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1880-12-02
A Railway in the Rocky Mountains.


A correspondent of the Denver Times
describing the extension of the Denver
and Rio Grande railway from Conejos
westward toward the San Juan country,
gives these picturesque bits. He says:
For miles the railway curved among
the hills, keeping sight of the plains and
catching frt quent glimpses OF the vii
lage. lis innumerable windings along
the brows of the hills seemed, in mere
wantonness, as 10th to abandon so beau
tiful a region. Almost imperceptibly
the foothills changed into mountains and
the valleys deepened into canons, and
winding around the point of one OF the
mountains it foundsitself overlooking the
picturesque valley or canon of Los Pinos
creek. Eastward was the rounded sum.
init of the great mountain of San An
tonic; over the nearest height could be
seen the top of Sierra Blanca, canopied
with perpetual clouds; in front were
castellated crags, art-like monuments
and stupendous precipices. Having al
lured the railway into their awful fast.
nesses, the mountains seemed determined
to battle its further progress. But it
was a strong hearted railway, and a.
though little giddy 1000 feet above
the stream, it cuts its way through the
crags and among the monuments and
bears onward for miles up the valley
A projecting point. too high for a cut
and loo abrupt for a curve, was over
come by tunnel. The tracklayers are
now busy at work laying down the steel
rail at a point few miles beyond this
tunnel. The grade is nearly completed
for many miles further. From the pres
ent end of the track for the next four
or five miles along the grade, the scenery
| is unsurpassed by any railroad scenery
in North America. Engineers who have
traversed every mile of mountain rail-
road in the Union, assert that it is the
finest they have seen. Perched on the
dizzy mountain side, at an altitude of
8 500 feet abo re the sea-greater than
| that of Veta pass-1, 900 feet above the
valley, with battlemented crags rising
500 or 600 feet above, the beholder is en-
raptured with the view. At one point
the canon narrows into an awful gorge,
apparently but few yards wide
anI nearly 1000 feet in depth, be-
tween almost perpendicular walls of
granite. Here a high point of granite
has to be tunneled, and in this tunnel
the rock-men are at work drilling and
bias ing to complete the passage. which
is now open to pedestrians. The fire.
quent explosions of the blasts echo and
re echo among the mountains until they
die away in the distance. Looking
down the valley from the tunnel, the
scene is one never to be forgotten. The
lofty precipices, the distant heights, the
fantastic monuments, the contrast of the
rugged crags and the graceful curves o
the silvery stream beneath them, the
dark green pines interspersed with pop
lar groves, bright yellow in theil
autumn foliage, that crown the neigh
boring summits-height. depth, dis
tance and color-combine to constitute 6
landscape that is destined to be painted
by thousands of artists, reproduced
again and again by photographers, anC
to adorn the walls of innumerable par
lors and galleries of art. Beyond the
tunnel for mile or more the scene il
even more picturesque, though of les;
extent. The traveller looks down into
the gorge and sees the stream plunging
in a succession of snow-white cascades
through narrow cuts between the per
pendicular rocks.