The Kern River Outing of ipi2. 23 



During the day fully a hundred of our number gained the 

 top, and by noon most of us were on the homeward trail, stop- 

 ping in the meadows to lunch and rest, and to gaze back at the 

 mountain, now no less wonderful than when in the early dawn it 

 had loomed up before us, undiscovered. 



Rock Creek was a "one-night stand" and the next morning 

 found us on the trail for Army Pass. Will the pack-trains get 

 across? was the question of the hour. There was snow in the 

 pass and no party had preceded us during the season. At 

 the summit we waited for the pack-trains, in case any assistance 

 might be needed. In the hours that we spent there sheltered 

 by the rocks from the cold winds that howled through, we had 

 ample opportunity to enjoy the prospect — the great rocky walls 

 below us, carved into palisades and columns, little emerald lakes 

 nestled in the hollows, a blue sky overhead and patches of 

 snow on the mountain sides. There was much ado about the 

 trail, which was dug out of the snow with tin cups, one shovel 

 and a botany pick, and was trampled down by willing feet. And 

 then the pack-train came, floundered about a bit, and walked 

 right down the trail, we after them, and the terrible pass was 

 behind us. 



The time at Cottonwood Lakes was a playtime. All camp 

 wore a different air, the mood in which we toy with some 

 familiar pleasure which we are about to relinquish, the mood in 

 which we played with our dolls and soldiers when we knew 

 we were getting too big for them. It was in the air that we 

 were "going out." At night we had a vaudeville performance. 

 Two stately trees with blending branches served as a prosce- 

 nium arch. The green rooms stretched away behind them, a row 

 of lanterns did duty as footlights, while roaring camp-fires, 

 one on either side of the audience, threw the rear of the stage 

 into darkness, out of which the actors came, each after an 

 introduction by an unrivalled master of the ring. Violin and 

 song, story, masque and dance startled the silence of this lofty 

 pleasure ground, and one and all, beholders and beheld, packers 

 and Japanese, in various keys, but with singleness of heart, 

 joined in the final Auld Lang Syne. In every way we sought 

 to prolong each happy experience, each bit of fun and laughter, 

 each mood of the past weeks in these last days at Cottonwood 

 Lakes. 



