![]() Katie Lee was one of those river runners, describing the canyon as “One-hundred and eighty-four miles of pure Eden. In the early 1950s, a recreation industry began to blossom with river runners flocking to the canyon to enjoy its calm, riffled water. Along the way, there were a few disappointing attempts at gold and mineral extraction. Later, in 1776, came the crossings of the Spanish friars Domínguez and Escalante, and the migration of Latter-day Saint settlers on the Hole-in-the-Rock Expedition in 1880. According to the National Park Service, 19 American Indian tribes and bands have an association with Glen Canyon - including contemporary descendants of the people who left behind the thousands of archeological sites in the canyon. Thousands of years ago, ancestral Puebloan people inhabited what would someday be called Glen Canyon, farming in its side canyons and building granaries. But given the hydrologic outlook of what’s to come for the parched West, we can’t do nothing.Īnd at the physical and metaphorical heart of this issue is Glen Canyon, home to one of the most contentious dams in the world. Every option seems to have immense challenges, with seven states invested in the matter and 40 million people who are directly affected by the Colorado River system’s water. Now that the reservoir is below 3,525 feet, it has officially crossed the “hydropower buffer” - which forces policymakers to start working on a solution. Under the pressures of overuse and climate change, the fate of the entire Colorado River system is being redetermined in real time, amid what scientists think is the worst drought in over 1,200 years. In fact, in March, it withered below 3,525 feet above sea level, the lowest it’s been since before it was filled in May 1968. It ends with Lake Powell, actually a reservoir, which has been dropping precipitously in recent years. ![]() The reason a waterfall has been missing from the Colorado Plateau for 54 years isn’t a simple story, but more of an embroiled history of water use in the western United States. But even in that moment, I know that from a different perspective the changes happening here are reason for unease, not revelry. Dumbfounded, I take it as a good omen - another sign of life finding its way again in the vast labyrinth in the rocks. No way in or out, except via the water or by rappelling down the falls. Seeing a fully grown deer here is stunning, not just because this part of the canyon only recently emerged, but because it’s almost completely isolated. A massive six-point stag is staring down at me. It’s also a complicated thing.Īs I crane my neck to take in the scale of the walls around me, something moves and catches my eye. After rounding one last corner of the canyon, there it is: a 60-foot cascade bellowing into a clear pool. ![]() It gives me chills, knowing that this sound hasn’t been heard since 1968. Not far from here is Cathedral in the Desert - a famed grotto in the heart of Glen Canyon. Somewhere between Bullfrog, Utah, and the Hole in the Rock trailhead, I’m following the distant rumbling of a waterfall, echoing between 500-foot walls of Navajo Sandstone.
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