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ithilwenOn our third morning on the river, we awoke to a surprise.
The Spanish conquistadors gave the river its name, and in their day it was a very appropriate one: Rio Colorado, Red-Colored River. But ever since the building of the Glen Canyon Dam, the lower reaches of the Colorado river have made a mockery of that name. These days, the water usually varies from a deep emerald green to a faint brown.
Not this morning, though. During the night, some watershed downstream (perhaps the Paria River) had received a substantial amount of rain. The silty runoff had returned the river to its primal state: thick, silty, and RED.
The view from our camp's shore:
Here's a shot of a side spring, from which we drew our drinking water, where it merges with the main flow of the Colorado. It shows the contrasting colors of the two water sources very clearly:
All day on the river, I felt as if we'd gone back in time a hundred years. Surely Major Powell and his men were just ahead?! (I also felt like Augustus Gloop eying the chocolate river in the original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory movie, but knowing that mud tastes nothing like milk chocolate even if it looks the same, I managed to restrain myself.)
That day on the river brought more wonderful sights (besides the colored water, which was pretty wonderful in itself):
We stopped for lunch at a place we promptly dubbed "Stick Beach," for obvious reasons:
Bet you didn't know Ents live in the bottom of the canyon!
OK, so maybe it's not an Ent. It's some strange topiary recreation of a mushroom! Actually, it's ivy growing at the top of a small spring leaking out of the limestone wall. We saw a larger version of the same phenomenon later that day.
This is Vasey's Paradise (named by major John Wesley Powell after the botanist who'd traveled with him on the river the year before his great Grand Canyon expedition began):
Beautiful to look at, but the moniker of "paradise" couldn't be more ironic. Most of the vegetation growing in Vasey's Paradise is poison ivy!
Next: We finish our third day on the water with a sigh, after a long-hard spelunking expedition. (No, I am not joking!)
The Spanish conquistadors gave the river its name, and in their day it was a very appropriate one: Rio Colorado, Red-Colored River. But ever since the building of the Glen Canyon Dam, the lower reaches of the Colorado river have made a mockery of that name. These days, the water usually varies from a deep emerald green to a faint brown.
Not this morning, though. During the night, some watershed downstream (perhaps the Paria River) had received a substantial amount of rain. The silty runoff had returned the river to its primal state: thick, silty, and RED.
The view from our camp's shore:
Here's a shot of a side spring, from which we drew our drinking water, where it merges with the main flow of the Colorado. It shows the contrasting colors of the two water sources very clearly:
All day on the river, I felt as if we'd gone back in time a hundred years. Surely Major Powell and his men were just ahead?! (I also felt like Augustus Gloop eying the chocolate river in the original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory movie, but knowing that mud tastes nothing like milk chocolate even if it looks the same, I managed to restrain myself.)
That day on the river brought more wonderful sights (besides the colored water, which was pretty wonderful in itself):
We stopped for lunch at a place we promptly dubbed "Stick Beach," for obvious reasons:
Bet you didn't know Ents live in the bottom of the canyon!
OK, so maybe it's not an Ent. It's some strange topiary recreation of a mushroom! Actually, it's ivy growing at the top of a small spring leaking out of the limestone wall. We saw a larger version of the same phenomenon later that day.
This is Vasey's Paradise (named by major John Wesley Powell after the botanist who'd traveled with him on the river the year before his great Grand Canyon expedition began):
Beautiful to look at, but the moniker of "paradise" couldn't be more ironic. Most of the vegetation growing in Vasey's Paradise is poison ivy!
Next: We finish our third day on the water with a sigh, after a long-hard spelunking expedition. (No, I am not joking!)
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Date: 2011-08-10 02:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-10 02:52 am (UTC)I'm glad you like the photos. More striking ones will posted later this week, Fate allowing. *crosses fingers*