Diary of a voyage from New York to California and return trip by train, 1874-1875

The diary records an 1874 voyage from New York via Panama to California. The unidentified author describes the weather, the ship's progress, shipboard life, Aspinwall (Colón), Panama, the train trip across the Isthmus, the landscape and villages, Acapulco, and the voyage to San Francisco. There is a detailed description of San Francisco and more information on California towns, agriculture, mining, flora and fauna. The diary also chronicles a train trip from Rocklin, California to Reno, Nevada, where the author found work on an alfalfa farm. The author continued overland by train through Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska to Chicago and then Detroit. The author traveled to New York by way of Niagara Falls

The volume includes illustrations of California, Nevada, and Niagara Falls as well as maps of the railroad routes. There is a list of the illustrations and a list of plants identified. The author also created an abstract of the diary in the back of the volume