DENVER & EIO GRANDE WESTERN ROUTE. 43 



day expand the rocks and melt some of the snow, and the water so 

 formed sinks down in cracks and crevices and during the ensuing 

 night freezes. The expansion and contraction of the rocks due to 

 changes in temperature and the freezing of water in joints and 

 fissures soon break to pieces even the most massive granite, as shown 

 on the summit of the peak. 



The first raih-oad that was projected up Pikes Peak was an ordi- 

 nary steam road. It was planned to follow a circuitous route with 

 a maximum gradient of 250 feet to the mile and to reach the summit 

 in a distance of 30 miles. Construction was started in 1884, and 

 about 8 miles was graded when the scheme failed through lack of 

 financial support. Surveys for the present road were begun in 1888, 

 and the golden spike was driven on October 20, 1890. The maximum 

 gradient of this road is 1,320 feet to the mile, and the length is 9 

 miles. 



The automobile road reaches the same point on the summit that is 

 reached by the Cogwheel Eoad. The length of the road is 18 miles ; 

 its average grade is 370 feet to the mile, and its maximum grade is 

 654 feet. The view from the automobile road is even more impressive 

 than that from the Cogwheel Koad, for, owing to the numerous 

 bends, the traveler can see the ever-widening landscape on all sides. 

 The route passes through Manitou and up the narrow defile of L"te 

 Pass, at first over the edges of the eastward-dipping quartzite and 

 then over the underlying granite. The road as well as the contact 

 between the quartzite above and the granite below is well shown in 

 Plate XXIV, B. At the village of Cascade the new road turns and 

 climbs the west wall of the canyon, and as it rounds the point directly 

 above Cascade the traveler can look down the pass to Manitou, far 

 in the distance. The road follows Cascade Creek for some distance 

 in a canyon hemmed in by granite walls, but these grow less and less 

 steep as the automobile moves on until finally the road passes by a 

 gentle grade from the head of the valley to the divide between Cas- 

 cade and Catamount creaks. At this height, about 9,250 feet, the 

 traveler gets a wide view, particularly to the north, and he may note 

 that the sky line, as shown in Plates XV, A, and XXIV, 4, is as level 

 as that of the plain about Colorado Springs, except that here and 

 there low knobs rise island-like above the level surface, and far away 

 in the hazy distance he can just make out the blue outline of Tarryall 

 and Mosquito ranges. Could the traveler, however, cross the ap- 

 parently level plain at which he is looking he would find that it is 

 smooth only in appearance from a distance, for it is really cut up 

 into numerous ravines much like the one followed by the automobile 

 road. Another feature which the traveler will probably notice on the 



