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Show 137 - with ; a little blasting would be needed about 200 feet below the summit, and some catting and filling, with two or three small bridges, would be ail required. On the second route little additional difficulty would be experienced, except south of Ojo Naestra SeQora. A line of bluffs running nearly east and west would necessitate a very careful selection of route in this vicinity. One of these, in connection with a proposed wagon- road from Fort Garland, crossing the Rio Grande at Colonas or Myers Ferry, thence to San Antonio, from there by the southern or Brazos branch of the Chama to Tierra Amarilla, would make a very direot route to Northern Arizona. The distances on these routes will be found in tables of distances to be published from thiB office. It is not intended to convey the idea that these routes are now practicable, for they are far from being such; but that they are possible routes, necessitating work. There is at present a good road as far as San Antonio, Colo.; from there but a horse- trail; in many places not even that. No traverse- line was run from Pueblo to Garland, as that portion of the country had already been surveyed in previous years by your parties. From the summit of Sangre de Cristo Pass the San Juan range was seen enveloped in smoke of burning forests; and upon leaving Fort Garland there was still no more than a few suow- capped points visible. It certainly was not encouraging for tri angulation, as we were dependent upon Banded Peak in the center of this section for the developing of the work to the south and west, the connection with Mount Taylor being very necessary, and only to be well obtained with a clear horizon. Two miles out from Garland, June 19, we crossed Trinchera Creek, a clear mountain-stream, as yet but little utilized for irrigating purposes, but capable of supplying water for quite a tract of land now almost barren. Further on, the Culebra was reached, with its Mexican ranches scattered along its banks. Flowing through low ground, with several channels, it makes much marshy land in its broad valley which could be easily reclaimed and cultivated. As we approach the Rio Grande the bare basalt crops in places, and a few hundred yards below Myers or Colonas Ferry the canon of the Rio Grande heads, here but a few feet deep, gradually increasing till it reaches 800 or 1,000 feet in depth- a narrow black gorge in the eruptive rocks- the great outlet of what has once been a large lake, gradually drained by its outlet cutting deeper, till finally the sandy plain of disintegrated lavas was left, rich in soil but unproductive for the want of rains or economic distribution of its present waters. The ferry is a small flat- boat swung from a cable stretched from bank to bank, the boat being propelled by the action of the current. At this point, or possibly a little farther north, would be the best railroad- crossing for a route to follow the Rio Grande, forced as it would be, in order to be built at a reasonable cost, to follow the plateau on the west bank, to come down the river agaiu by the Ojo Caliente Creek and Rio Chama. The route of the party from Myers Ferry was up a short valley, thence passing over a low divide down into the drainage of the San Antonio Creek. Here the country had been overflowed by the San Antonio and Conejos Creeks, which unite a few miles below where we made our camp, having between them a large marshy flat which could easily be drained, and quadruple the land now under cultivation could be devoted to agriculture had the people the necessary enterprise. At the southern end of this valley the San Antonio Mountain, a great wooded dome of eruptive rock, rises hijjjh above the surrounding country. Isolated as it is it would be a fine natural triangulation- point were it not for its wooded crest. A built station on the tree- tope would make it a fine central point to carry the triangulation from the eastern or main rocky range to the west The Conejos, up which lay our route for the morrow, is a broad mountain- stream, at this season difficult of crossing, swollen as it was by the melting snows of the mountain. Several promising Mexican plazas attest the appreciation of the agricultural advantages of the section, and the many sheep in the valleys near the mouth of the canon speak well for the grazing. The Prospect Peaks, standing as sentinels over the entrance to the country beyond, rise up from the plain just north of the mouth of the canon. The forests were still smoking, giving promise of muoh waiting. We left the main road 4 miles above the town of Guadalupe, and commenced our work in the mountains. Without the serrated outlines of granite- formations the range is none the less beautiful in its many inclosed valleys and canons. Originally a great plateau of eruptive rock over the Cretaceous sandstones, it falls gradually, with trend to the southeast, extending from the main San Juan range in the northwest till it disappears in the foot- hills and low mesas in the vicinity of Ojo Caliente. Broken up by many canons and small valleys which have been carved out in long ages, there is left in this section but a system of narrow tables, here and there a half- mile across, generally but a few hundred feet, frequently but a ragged edge along which a man cannot C s . It is not a mountain- system, but a succession of steppes, narrow flats, and small ins with vertical rims. With summit above timber- line, bare of vegetation, in the day- time warm and pleasant, at night freezing, the year round, with slopes covered with snow, stands Banded Peak in the center of this region, the southern prominent point |
