Evening star., 1932-07-10

the countries Of the New World
and to see and appreciate the beauty
spots of all but five of the States
OF the American Union, still find
my greatest joy in rambling around the Shen-
andoah Valley of Virginia and the mountains
which girt it about and make 1t Walled Eden.
The skyline scenic highway, As miles long,
atop the Blue Ridge Mountains, connecting the
Lee Highway and the Spottswood Trail Is
fast approaching completion As I have trav-
eIed over it, it is to realize that the Federal
Bureau of Roads has done one of the most
superb jobs, in mountain scenic highway build
ing that is to be found anywhere in the world
Indeed think that it safely be said to
be without counterpart either in America or
Europe.
In all of our great West there are many
magnificent mountain highways. But what
the new boulevard in the Shenandoah National
Park possesses which can be duplicated no.
where else in the world, is the reSplendent
valley at ones feet to the West and the stir
ringly beautiful Piedmont just below him to
the East.
I cannot help but believe, with the poet OF
Killarney, that angels, often pausing there,
doubt IL Eden were more fair.
The thrill that Gov Spottswood and his
bold knights of the Golden Horseshoe must
have felt they climbed to the top of the
Blue Ridge at Swift Run Gap and looked
down over the Shenandoah Valley with such
enthusiasm that they called it the Euphrates
the one who looks down upon the valley as
It is today.
Men often have said that one cannot gild
the lily or add colors to the rainbow, but he
who looks down upon the thouSand-and-one
moSaics made up of beautifully titled fields and
well-kept wood lots the coursing Shenandoah
and the winding highways, the delightful farm
houses and the splendid country estates, real
lies that the touch of man has added a gor-
geous lure to the primitive beauty OF the valley.
THE skyline scenic boulevard will be COM
pleted within the next few months and
probably will be thrown open about the time
that Jack Frost gets in his matchless artistry
and paints the rainbow on every landscape.
Step by step the dream of the Shenandoah
National Park-the playground of the East
within days journey of 100000 persons Is
coming to realization. More than score have
been the times when the whole park project
seemed to be standing knife-edge balance,
when feathers weight might have spelled a
turn downward to the side of disaster and
defeat. But every time thanks to the great
faith of the National Park Service in the
project, the unTelenting work of the Virginia
Conservation and Development Commission, far
more than feathers weight has gone on the
other side, and Eastern America is to have a
playground par excellence where 40 600 900
Americans can come for their recreation among
scenes unrivaled and diversions unapproached.
But vacation time in the Shenandoah Valley
merely begins in the Shenandoah National
Park The Shenandoah National Forest is the
parks twin sister as the land of great open
spaces. Virginias most beautiful highways run
through and across it. Camp sites galore and
fishing streams without number abound In the
Shenandoah National Forest area and the con-
ttguous districts. In the Hot Springs country
the laurel and the rhododendron of the late
Springtime, the verdant forests of the Sum-
ner, and the rare foliage colorings Of the Fall
will awaken the imagination Of the most stolid
soul
Then, there is the valley itself where one
may roll along highways famed for their STIR
ring history noted for the charms of their
landscapes, and resplendent with the most de-
hghtfully bucolic scenes the traveller can
imagine.
Many have been the times when have mo-
tored from the Dan of the Shenandoah Valley
which Is Martinsburg. to the Beersheba, which
Is Roanoke, and have rejoiced that this SOUL
renewing area now thanks to good roads
be the Canaan of the millions OF tired and
weary folk who would seek respite from the
tolls and cares Of the wilderness OF the Winters
grind.
I long have debated which is my favorite
gateway to this land of a thousand lures
The Williamsport gateway leading from Har-
risburg and through the Cumberland Valley
brings one into the historic area that made its
bid as the site of the Nations Capital and that
saw the Armies of Northern Virginia and OF