Note III-8 — Chapter III · ITINERARY, CONCLUDED: IN THE MOUNTAINS OF COLORADO ON HEADWATERS OF THE ARKANSAW AND RIO GRANDE, DECEMBER 1ST, 1806-FEBRUARY 26TH, 1807.

Between Arkansan and Missourian waters, in a broad sense; between the Oil Creek branch of the Arkansaw and the South Platte r., in a stricter sense; more exactly still, between West Oil or Ten Mile cr. and one of several small spring runs that make into the S. Platte. Pike makes the pass between Ten Mile mt. (right) and Thirty-nine Mile mt. (left), at an elevation of something over 9,000 feet. The difference between this Oil Creek way into South Park and the way by Currant cr. is that, had he come up the latter, he would have made Currant Creek Pass, 9,550 feet, between Thirty-Nine Mile mt. (right) and Chalcedony Buttes (left); it is simply a matter of "cotoying" (flanking) Thirty-nine Mile mt. E. or W. By the way he came, he strikes the South Platte r., in South Park, Park Co., at the very nearest approach it makes to the point he left on the Arkansaw—that is to say, at the elbow it makes where, after flowing S. E. through South Park, it turns sharp N. E. and enters what is called the Upper or Eleven Mile cañon. These particulars are assured: for Pike finds that the river "ran northeast." Camp of Dec. 13th is set in the hills 2 m. south of the river, near the head of the cañon just said.

Pike's route from Cañon City and back to that place has been a subject of much doubt and discussion, in which some very wild notions have been indulged by those who had any opinion whatever as to where he went on this round trip. It has even been mooted whether he was ever on the South Platte, or even in South Park at all. A cautious and tentative statement is ventured in the 1889 Denver reprint of the London ed. of the Travels, where my friend Mr. Maguire says in his new Preface: "The exact line of march of the party from the time it reached the foot of the Grand Cañon ["Royal Gorge"] of the Arkansas is not easy to trace. It is likely that it reached the Platte in the South Park, and quite possible that it penetrated to the headwaters of the Gunnison." I do not profess to be able to trail a mosquito over a granite bowlder, but I think we shall be able to discover precisely where Pike went on this trip, where he entered South Park, his course through it, the place where he left it, and how, after ascending the Arkansaw for two days, he descended this river to Cañon City. Every one of Pike's camps can be fixed within 2 or 3 m., and some of them with absolute precision. He was never on the Gunnison, or any other Pacific waters. One who wishes to satisfy himself on all these points needs only to study Pike's text with Sheet vii. of Hayden's Atlas of Colorado.