Two Lanes, Top Down, Green Dots: Day 38: Placerville, CO to Ely, NV

Day 38

Miles 522 (10,977)
Two Lanes 418 (7,929) 72%
Top Down 385 (8,961) 82%

Today we headed through out of Colorado, into Utah and then to Nevada. After 35 days out of the Pacific Time Zone, we crossed back into it about 8:30 pm.

This is the Colorado Plateau, Navajo Sandstone that is sculpted by wind and rain. We crossed fantastic vista after fantastic vista. We even found time for an IPA at the Moab Brewery, where I purchased another T-shirt (last one was 2003 when we were through here). After lunch in 100-degree weather and a full belly, we took a thirty-minute walk through the “Park Avenue” section of Arches National Park (with a liter of water!).

At Green River, Utah, we slipped into the John Wesley Powell River Museum. Powell was a civil war veteran (captain in the Union Army) who lost his right arm above the elbow at the Battle of Shiloh. Undaunted, he received special permission from General Grant to stay in the Army.

Before his war career, he was a geologist. After the war he returned to Illinois Wesleyan College to teach. But the vast area of the Colorado plateau still said “Unknown” on all maps. Further, the transcontinental railway was being built. By the spring of 1869 it had reach Green River, Wyoming. Powell, along with eight others, mostly mountain men/frontier men, put four specially made wooden boats on flatcars, and rode to Green River. On May 24, 1869, they put in on the upper Green, headed for the Colorado River, a river whose course was unknown. None of the men had any white water experience.

Three months later Powell and five of his men had conquered the river, floating out of the Grand Canyon on August 29, 1869.

The other three, frustrated, tired, and scared, chose to leave the canyon on foot because the rapids they faced, they were certain, would kill them. They hiked out, and were never seen again, thought to have been killed by Indians who had had hostilities with Mormons out on the plateau. They left the river on Aug 28. Those who stayed survived the rapids, saying that they were not the worst they had traversed.

So on August 29, the day after the three walked out to their death, the remaining six floated out of the canyon to safety.

Much is known of this incredible journey. Powell was a scientist, who with one arm, lead this expedition, and kept a meticulous journal. Two of his men did also. These works are all in the Library of Congress.

Powell often climbed hundreds of feet up the cliffs to study flora, fauna and geology, or to try to anticipate the course of the river. Once he got himself out precariously on a ledge and could not retrace his steps. He was rescued when one of his men took off his trousers to use them as a rope, and Powell, holding tight with his one arm, was pulled up to safety.

Powell later became the first head of the U.S. Geological Survey, and because of the respect he had earned with his dealings with Indians, he became the head of Ethnology for the Smithsonian Institution. He in fact negotiated the peace treaty between the Mormons and the Indians on the Colorado Plateau.

I will let the photos tell the rest of the story of the Colorado Plateau.

Leaving the Plateau we entered the Basin and Range of western Utah and Nevada. Driving into the west at dusk brought some awesome vistas and sunsets.

We arrived in Ely at about 915 PDT, about 13 hours after leaving Placerville, CO. We checked in and went to look for dinner. We were told that the only place open was the 24 hr restaurant at the Nevada Hotel. This place is a classic. Opened in 1929 just months before the stock market crash and during Prohibition, this hotel and casino has all of the funky charm Vegas doesn’t have. In the small main casino room are stuffed wolves, bobcats, bison, snakes and more. In cases there were pistols from the mid 1800’s. And in the bar was a collection of folks from eastern Nevada who were missing at least one chromosome.

Blue Jay Lodge, Placerville, Colorado