The Book of the National ParksYard, Robert Sterling
History
The Book of the National Parks
Yard, Robert Sterling
National parks and reserves -- United States
Thirty miles south of this rolling volcanic interlude the pristine
Rockies, as if in shame of their moment of gorgeous softness, rear in
contrast their sharpest and most heroic monument of bristling granite.
Scarcely over the park's southern boundary, the foothills of the Teton
Mountains swell gently toward their Gothic climax. The country opens and
roughens. The excellent road, which makes Jackson's Hole a practical
part of the Yellowstone pleasure-ground, winds through a rolling, partly
wooded grazing-ground of elk and deer. The time was when these wild
herds made living possible for the nation's hunted desperadoes, for
Jackson's Hole was the last refuge to yield to law and order.
At the climax of this sudden granite protest, the Grand Teton rises
7,014 feet in seeming sheerness from Jackson Lake to its total altitude
of 13,747 feet. To its right is Mount Moran, a monster only less. The
others, clustering around them, have no names.
All together, they are few and grouped like the units of some fabulous
barbaric stronghold. Fitted by size and majesty to be the climax of a
mighty range, the Tetons concentrate their all in this one giant group.
Quickly, north and south, they subside and pass. They are a granite
island in a sea of plain.
Seen across the lake a dozen miles which seem but three, these clustered
steepled temples rise sheer from the water. Their flanks are
snow-streaked still in August, their shoulders hung with glaciers, their
spires bare and shining. A greater contrast to the land from which we
came and to which we presently return cannot be imagined. Geologically,
the two have nothing in common. Scenically, the Tetons set off and
complete the spectacle of the Yellowstone.
[Illustration: _From a photograph by Charles D. Walcott_
THE TETON MOUNTAIN FROM JACKSON HOLE, SOUTH OF YELLOWSTONE]
[Illustration: _From a photograph by Haynes_
THE LAVA LANDSCAPE OF THE YELLOWSTONE AND GIBBON FALLS]
XI
THREE MONSTERS OF HAWAII
HAWAII NATIONAL PARK, HAWAIIAN ISLANDS. AREA, 118 SQUARE MILES
If this chapter is confined to the three volcano tops which Congress
reserved on the islands of Hawaii and Maui in 1917, wonderful though
these are, it will describe a small part indeed of the wide range of
novelty, charm, and beauty which will fall to the lot of those who visit
the Hawaii National Park. One of the great advantages enjoyed by this
national park, as indeed by Mount McKinley's, is its location in a
surrounding of entire novelty, so that in addition to the object of his
visit, itself so supremely worth while, the traveller has also the
pleasure of a trip abroad.
In novelty at least the Hawaii National Park has the advantage over the
Alaskan park because it involves the life and scenery of the tropics. We
can find snow-crowned mountains and winding glaciers at home, but not
equatorial jungles, sandalwood groves, and surf-riding.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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