The Columbia River: Its History, Its Myths, Its Scenery, Its CommerceLyman, William Denison
History
The Columbia River: Its History, Its Myths, Its Scenery, Its Commerce
Lyman, William Denison
Columbia River; Columbia River -- Description and travel; Columbia River -- History
At the upper edge of this zone, at an
elevation of probably seven thousand feet, beside some dashing stream or
some clear pool, fed from the snows above, is the place for the camp. And
such a camp! Oh, the beauty of such an unspoiled spot!
[Illustration: On the Banks of the Columbia River, near Hood River. Photo.
by E. H. Moorehouse.]
It is from such a camp at the upper edge of the paradise zone that a party
sets forth at the four o'clock hour to attain the highest. So the march on
the great day of a final climb carries us at once into a fourth zone. This
is the zone of avalanche and glacier, the zone of elemental fury and
warfare, a zone of ever-steepening ascent, thirty degrees, a zone of
almost winter cold at night, but with such a dazzling brightness and
fervour in the day as turns the snow-banks to slush and sends the
fountains tearing and cutting across the glaciers and triturating the
moraines. Vegetation has now almost ceased, though the heather still
drapes the ledges on the eastern or southern exposures, and occasionally
one of the tenacious mountain pines upholds the banner of spring in some
sheltered nook. This wind-swept and storm-lashed zone is also the zone of
the wild goats and mountain sheep. On the precipitous ridges and along the
narrow ledges at the margin of glaciers they can be seen bounding away at
the approach of the party, sure-footed and swift at points where the nerve
of the best human climber might fail. This zone carries the climbers to
ten or eleven thousand feet of elevation on the highest peaks. And here
is the place for the Mountaineers and Mazamas to take the half-hour rest
on their arduous march. A sweet rest it is. We pick out some sheltered
place on the eastern slope, and stretch ourselves at full length on the
warm rocks, while the icy wind from the summit goes hurtling above us. And
how good the chocolate and the malted milk and the prunes and raisins of
the scanty lunch taste, while we rest and feel the might of elemental
nature again fill our veins and lungs and hearts.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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