18943 T'he Tahoc Region 



clearly expressed his resolve never to be caught that 

 way again. 



At the inn one evening I was trying to explain 

 to some acquaintances the geological origin of the 

 glacial lakes around. But Tahoe did not well fit 

 into my story, in the course of which a vigorous, 

 roughly dressed young fellow, just in from a hard 

 pull over the Divide, took a seat at the dining table. 

 After a little he modestly explained that the ancient Thr 

 and deep valley of the Truckee River now holding J^/""^ 

 the great lake was at some time blocked at its outlet 

 by a long dyke of lava which formed a permanent 

 dam near Tahoe City. The polite and intelligent 

 frontiersman I soon found to be Waldemar Lindgren 

 of the United States Geological Survey, one of the 

 highest authorities on economic geology. Later he 

 became an acting professor on our own staff at 

 Stanford. 



The superb mountain region southwest of Tahoe 

 is not so well known as it deserves to be, although 

 in these days the automobile has penetrated to 

 many a California fastness. But one stretch of 

 road can scarcely have been made available for 

 motorists even now. This leads from Rubicon up and 

 Springs (at the head of Rubicon River, a branch of ^g^^^^^^^ 

 the Middle Fork of the American) almost perpen- 

 dicularly up and over the bare slicken granite of the 

 Rockbound Range, a continuation of Desolation 

 Valley. As a matter of fact, the approach to the 

 Rubicon from McKinney's on the Lake over the 

 narrow and bony Continental Divide must still 

 daunt the chauffeur. But the way up Rockbound 

 — I ought not to call it a road — is or was the most 



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