|
| |
Route of the Empire Builder
(Continued from page 10)
From Fargo across North Dakota and Montana to Glacier Park, The Empire Builder
gives the traveler a glimpse of that picturesque "out west" which
Theodore Roosevelt loved-and which the Indian tribes and buffalo herds
stubbornly relinquished not so long ago. All this time your Empire Builder has
been climbing - but so gradually, so imperceptibly - that you are amazed to find
yourself at Glacier Park station, at the very threshold of Glacier National Park
and the Rocky Mountains. Here the Rockies were pushed up from the bottom of an
ancient ocean eons ago, and they tower overhead, a massive barrier.
Glacier Park is where you take the famous Logan Pass Detour, a twenty-four hour
trip compassing some of the grandest mountain scenery on the western continent.
The trip is by automobile on the Going-to-the-Sun Highway, You reach
Going-to-the-Sun Chalets for a night of rest, continuing the auto trip next
morning and catching the Empire Builder again westbound from Belton. (Eastbound
passengers start the Logan Pass Detour at Belton, resuming the train journey at
Glacier Park Station.) The Logan Pass Detour and other trips in this great
National playground may be taken during the Park Season-June 15th to September
15th.
The Empire Builder makes its way through this rugged disarray of
nature-following the southern boundary of Glacier National Park for sixty
breath-taking miles and the tumbling middle fork of the Flathead River from its
source to Columbia Falls. The Continental Divide is crossed through Marias Pass.
This is the lowest of all transcontinental passes in the Northwest United
States. Lewis and Clark heard of it but could not find it.
Other explorers and engineers sought it for decades. It was finally discovered
by John F. Stevens, then a young engineer sent out by Mr. Hill. Thus it was
promptly utilized by the original "Empire Builder" for the Great
Northern. A monument to Mr. Stevens is visible from the right of way at Summit,
Montana.
After Marias Pass, your train speeds through the picturesque Flathead Valley and
over a low watershed to the Canyon of the Kootenai. All this the Empire Builder
passes in daylight-in both directions-so that you scarcely know which way to
look as the exciting scenes change with each fleeting mile.
Next comes Lake Pend Oreille. Then Spokane and the beautiful valley of the
Inland Empire, then the cliff-lined Columbia River, and the fertile Wenatchee
apple orchard country.
Electrified from Wenatchee, your Empire Builder traverses the Cascades by easy
grades and an eight-mile tunnel. This is the longest railway tunnel in America.
It is lined with concrete, electric lighted, and air conditioned throughout.
Then comes Skykomish, and soon the tranquil charm of Puget Sound-where the
rugged Olympic Mountains and the snowcapped Cascades stand guard over Seattle
and Tacoma, the western termini of the Great Northern. Here ships leave for
Alaska, the Orient, the South Seas, the Panama Canal. Here the Great Northern
Coast Line runs north to Vancouver, B. C.
Or if your destination be Portland ("City of Roses") or California,
you swing south and again westward from Spokane and follow the Columbia River
for two hundred miles, pass "The Dalles" and "The Bridge of the
Gods," which alone are worth the journey.
It has been a fascinating trip-this travelogue aboard the Empire Builder. You
have been as comfortable as in a luxurious hotel. You have been surrounded by
courteous attendants, interesting fellow passengers. You have enjoyed a sense of
refinement and well-being. You may not have realized what made this journey so
pleasant. May we tell you a few of the Great Northern secrets?
Super-powerful locomotives that maintain a smooth, uniform speed, up grade or
down grade. They start and stop without jerking or "grabbing"-Oil
burning or electric power for 1,600 clean cinderless miles through the finest
mountain scenery-Mammoth steel rails laid in rock ballast-Gradual curves, and an
absence of sharp turns Easy grades-Steel and concrete bridges-Concrete
tunnels-Automatic block signals all the way-We say it modestly-and we believe
you will agree-the Route of the Empire Builder is worthy of this splendid train!
 
 
|
