Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1905-08-01
LETTER FROM COLORADO.

1 ..
My DEAR Mr.. THAYER,
This letter is written from the
4 Colorado Chautauqua which have been
attending for three weeks.
The assembly grounds lie to the
south of Boulder, the seat of the state
university. They are at the very feet
OF the Rocky mountains, with an indie
scribable background. To the east
and south the eye ranges over most
beautiful and fertile valley opening to-
ward Denver
The summer school work is of high
order and the entertainments, musical
and otherwise, lectures, and sermons
given at the large auditorium are of the
same high quality, William Jennings
Bryan gave us a sermon-lecture last
Saturday upon the subject, "The Prince
of Peace" and made greater i'm
preston on NE than ever before with
his sincerity and his complete mastery
OF the English Language which rightly
gives him the name of Silver Tongued
Orator
The feature ,a this Chautauqua, how
ever, which attracted me and which
one could not experience in any other
state is the provision made for regular
trips into the very heart of the Rocky
mountains
Now, Mr.. Thayer, you may guess that
| have not sighted this feature, for
which | especially came. l have seen
all kinds of mountains and valleys and
views in which some one has said nature
has been fairly prodigal in her expend-
iture of grandeur and beauty.
Last week we went with thousand
grangors over the wonderful Moffat
road which will probably be the great
scenic trans-continental line when it is
| finished. 1t was built for commercial
purposes rather than beauty, as is
evidenced by lis thirty-one tunnels in
distance of fiftysmiles; but the tunnels
are short and one looks the more eager
ly at the stupendous pile of mountains,
covered with flowers, spruce and fir
trees, and at the snow-capped peaks.
One of the lighest of these | climbed
last week, the Arapahoe peak, located
not far from Longs, and higher than
Pixies peak, though not so we'll known.
We started early Wednesday morn
ing at six O'Clock in coaches drawn by
four horses all wearing bells; drove all
day through Boulder canyon alongside
of the" beautiful mountain stream,
Boulder river, with mountains of vary
ing height on both sides. Struck camp
for dinner at Castle Rock which stands
in the very centre of this beautiful
canyon. While we were broiling bacon
and making coffee, five or six COW
punchers came through with four or
five hundred head of cattle and delayed
our dinner little. Continuing on our
journey we reached the Fourth of July
mine at the foot of the Arapahoes just
at dusk, and should have stopped there
but many of the party had gone or
ahead OF the cafehes without their bed
ding. and the drivers were obliged to
follow them. So we started up a
precipitous mountain road, walking in
the dark with nothing to be seen but
the white streams of cascades coming
from the snowy regions. These
streams ran furiously across our road
over cordurays into the canyon below,
so we were plunging through ice-water
for mile or more. Finally it began to
rain but we had reached the first ledge
and crawled into a little eight
by ten camp while the men
made two roaring fires to dry
us out. At ten o'clock P. NJ. we had
supper, and then rolled up in blanket
and made some pretence at sleeping
until Rocky Mountain Joe, the guide,
was around getting us all up to climb
to the highest peak to see the sun rise.
1t was only mile and half away and
of course, | laughed at him for starting
at one O'Clock in the morning, but
found later that he knew what he was
talking about, for it took over four hours
steady climbing to reach the top. We
plunged through more ice-cold streams,
through jumpers, over suow-b banks
and up rocky lodges. 1t was the hard
est thing | ever struck, but did not
| give out as two or three of the party
| felt like doing. matched myself with
a two hundred FOUNDER from Texas
| and think climbed rs we'll as he. Two
OF the ladies wanted to turn back but
| there was little inducement as it would
have been so easy to lose the trail and
the coyotes were screaming behind, so
their chaperones nearly carried them
| to the top rather than miss the sunrise
The climbing was done by moon un-
der clouds but the sun came out Just as
we reached the top and we all had to
admit that ii was worth the effort. All
the words of the English language
could not picture the rose colored and
then the golden glow which spread
over the wilderness of mountain ranges
of the Middle park. Off to the east we
seemed to look for hundreds of miles
over country dotted with innumerable
lakes. All around us were snow slides
and glaciers. We had gained the sum-
nit of Arapahoe Peak, over fourteen
thousand feet high, and were silently
feasting our eyes upon some of the
most stupendous works of the Master
Architect. ROsALIE BOHRER.