The tour leaves the open bottom lands and passes through thin forests that have been cut over, bordering the road. In the 1940s, just off the road, small tie-cutting outfits, were operated by crews of two or three, and found it possible to compete with large-scale production. At the base of the foothills or on their slopes, pyramids of yellow sawdust or piles of freshly cut ties mark the locations of the small saws; huge sawdust piles, turned the color of copper with age, indicate locations that have been worked out and abandoned.