The Romance of the Colorado River by Frederick Samuel Dellenbaugh
page 56 of 302 (18%)
page 56 of 302 (18%)
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beginning of the long series of close canyons. The river enters
suddenly from Green River Valley, repeating on a smaller scale the conditions at the entrance to Lodore. From here on up to the Wind River Range the stream is flanked by occasional cliffs and buttes, but the country is comparatively open, and the many tributaries often have fine grassy bottoms. This was the locality of the great rendezvous of the period from 1825 to 1835, and even later. Green River Valley is an elevated region, from six thousand to seven thousand feet above sea. It stretches from the Wind River Mountains on the north to the Uintas on the south, and is bounded westwardly by the Wyoming Range, and on the east merges into the Laramie Plains. The drainage exit is through the Uintas, as noted, by means of the canyons heading at Flaming Gorge. There are here opportunities for extensive farming by irrigation. The only other chance for agriculture on the river, except Wonsits Valley, Brown's Park, and a few minor places, is below Black Canyon, in the stretches I have called the alluvial and the canyon-valley divisions. In the latter short canyons separate extensive valleys with wide alluvial bottoms capable of high cultivation, though often subject to overflow. Almost anything will grow there. Vast groves of cottonwood and mesquite exist. In the alluvial division, the last stretch of the river, from the Gila down, cotton and sugar cane would probably grow. This is the only division where the water of the river can be extensively diverted. At the mouth of the Gila an old emigrant road to California crossed, and another here in this Green River Valley. A third route of travel was by way of Gunnison's Crossing; and a fourth, though this was seldom traversed, was by the Crossing of the Fathers, some thirty-five miles above the present Lee's Ferry. In Green River Valley, Bonneville built his Fort Nonsense, and the region was for |
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