490 EEPORT UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY. 



well built here, much time and labor having been bestowed upon it. 

 Then it goes southward down this valley, crossing this and the Middle 

 Fork, and then following up Obsidian Greek. All this part has involved 

 but little work, the country being open and clear of timber. Some 

 marshy places have required bits of corduroy. In Obsidian Caiion, 

 however, which is very narrow, much chopping and some building were 

 required, and at its head a long section required to be cord iroyed. 

 Following this is a few hundred yards which had to be blasted out of 

 the side of an obsidian cliff and built up out of fragments of this rock. 

 Then it skirts Beaver Lake, and crosses the divide at its head, to the 

 waters of Gibbon Eiver. The ascent of this divide on the north is quite 

 steep. Then the road skirts Gibbon Lake and follows down Gibbon 

 Eiver to the Geyser Basin. Here it leaves the river and crosses the 

 Basin, reaching the stream again only at the head of its caiion, thus 

 cutting off a large bend of the river. After following the river through 

 its caiion it leaves it, gradually bearing away to the southwest, and 

 reaches the Firehole a few miles below the Lower Geyser Basin. It 

 follows this stream quite closely to the Upper Basin, where the road at 

 present terminates. 



A second wagon road within the Park was built by General Howard's 

 command, in the campaign against the Nez Perces, in 1877. This comes 

 up the Madison Eiv^r, through its upper canon, crosses Gibbon Eiver 

 at its mouth, and on reaching the mouth of the East Fork of the Fire- 

 hole it turns up it, crosses the divide, and goes down to the Yellowstone, 

 reaching it at the Mud Geysers. For a distance of about 4 miles below 

 the mouth of East Fork these roads are coincident. The Howard road 

 is an excellent one, excepting that at several places on East Fork it is 

 very marshy, and that the ascent to the divide on the west involves a 

 very long, steep hill. 



General Howard also cut a road down the Yellowstone from the Mud 

 Geysers to Gardiner's Eiver, following, in most places, the route of the 

 trail. This, however, is practically impassable. 



While numerous parties have crossed, from various points on the 

 Yellowstone Eiver and Lake, and from Heart Lake, to the Geyser Basins 

 on the Firehole, they have left little or no trail to mark their course. All 

 routes are possible, and the country is such that any one possessed of 

 ordinary woodcraft can make his own trail as easily as he can follow 

 one. 



From the Geyser Basins a well-marked trail leads up the Firehole 

 nearly to its head and crosses thence to Shoshone Greek, which it fol- 

 lows down to the Shoshone Geyser Basin at the west end of Shoshone 

 Lake. Thence it skirts the west end of the lake, and the south side, 

 crosses Lewis Fork at the foot of Shoshone Lake, and follows the latter 

 stream down to the forks of the Snake. 



Lewis Fork and the Firehole are fordable almost anywhere at ordinary 

 stages of water, and, of course, there is no trouble about the smaller 

 streams of the Park. 



The above enumeration covers all the traveled roads and trails. In 

 conclusion it may be said that there are few parts of the Park which 

 cannot be traversed easily by saddle and pack animals without regard 

 to trails. Dense living and fallen timber and marshy areas form the 

 chief obstacles to getting about, and these can easily, in most cases, be 

 avoided. 



