i ed 
DENVER & RIO GRANDE WESTERN ROUTE. lll 
against the east bank. As the roadbed is cut in the hillside it ex- 
poses some quartzites and limestones, the beds of which are parallel 
with the railroad and dip to the east. These beds probably rest on 
the granite that forms the foundation of the earth’s crust in this part 
of the country, and they are visible for some distance along the rail- 
road track. On the south side of Tennessee Pass, however, the beds 
are so poorly exposed that the traveler on a passing train can get 
only momentary glimpses of them. 
At milepost 281 the slopes of the valley are gentle, and it seems but 
a little way to the Continental Divide. When the narrow-gage rail- 
road was first built it climbed over the summit of Tennessee Pass, 
but now it saves about 250 vertical feet of this climb by a tunnel 
2,572 feet long. The station of Tennessee Pass is at the south end 
of this tunnel. After running a short distance into 
Tennessee Pass. the tunnel the engine ceases tc labor and finishes 
rebar feet. the long steady climb from Pueblo. So far as the 
~ " vailroad can carry him toward it the traveler has 
now attained the crest of the continent. 
The heaviest grade on the main line on the east side of the Con- 
tinental Divide is 1.42 per cent, or 75 feet to the mile. This grade 
extends with few interruptions from Buena Vista to Tennessee Pass, 
a distance of 41 miles. The heaviest grade on the west side is 3.3 
per cent on the westbound track. This grade is maintained for a 
short distance above Minturn, but throughout most of the distance 
from Minturn to the summit the maximum grade is 3 per cent, or 158 
feet to the mile. 
After emerging from the tunnel the traveler may look back and 
see the apparently low summit of Tennessee Pass. If it were not at 
the backbone of the continent and the parting of the waters of the 
Atlantic and Pacific it would not attract attention, for it is only a 
low, flat cross ridge against which the streams head that flow in 
opposite directions to the two oceans. The Arkansas drainage has 
become familiar to the traveler, and now the drainage of Eagle 
River and Colorado River will become equally familiar as the train 
descends these streams on its way to the western border of the State. 
Some travelers may find the Continental Divide disappointing, for 
they may have pictured it as the sharp summit of a single mountain 
ridge; but the Rocky Mountains form a great system of interlocking 
and parallel ranges, only a few of which have sharp, nar row crests, 
most of them having rounded summits that are not particularly 
imposing, ; 
North of the tunnel the railroad is at the headwaters of Piney 
Creek, down which it winds and twists to maintain an easy grade 
to the main stream, which heads on the flanks of Homestake Peak, 
on the west. This valley is generally covered with forest except 
