Page:The Tourist's California by Wood, Ruth Kedzie.djvu/204

 168 THE TOURIST'S CALIFORNIA plain. At the base are forests, then woods and meadows creep up to the lava furrows which thrust their skeleton ridges through drifts of perpetual snow. The ascent is more tedious than perilous. It is usually made in July, a new route being offered from Sisson by rail to Pierce (9 m.) on the Mc- Cloud River Railroad. Many climbers prefer to leave by horseback from Sisson (3500 ft.). For each member in a party of ten the cost for guide and a night in camp is about $5.00, or $20.00 for a person alone. Starting at noon from Sisson the timber-line is reached before dark. Very early in the morning the departure is made from the over-night camp on foot; in seven or eight hours, the summit (14,- 400 ft.) is achieved. Here are steaming springs among the loose stones, and an iron shaft scratched with vainglorious autographs. The snow about the crater, which is a mile wide and 2500 feet deep, is stained with sulphurous yel- low. Sometimes cavernous rumblings warn us that the grizzly volcano is not dead, that it but slumbers heavily, and snores. Some day, will it rouse and drown in a molten flood the villages at its feet? The crest of the Fuji-yama peak surveys all Northern California from Mt. Diablo, 246 miles away, to Oregon, from Lassen and Black Buttes to