BGuthrie Photos: AZ -- Glen Canyon Natl Recreation Area -- Navajo Bridge, Lees Ferry, Dam, and Lake

AZ -- Glen Canyon Natl Recreation Area -- Navajo Bridge, Lees Ferry, Dam, and Lake:

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[1] GLC_030603_003_STITCH.JPG

[2] GLC_030603_006_STITCH.JPG

[3] GLC_030603_036.JPG	[4] GLC_030603_041.JPG	[5] GLC_030603_053.JPG	[6] GLC_030603_061.JPG	[7] GLC_030603_099.JPG	[8] GLC_030603_104.JPG
[9] GLC_030603_105.JPG	[10] GLC_030603_125.JPG	[11] GLC_030603_149.JPG	[12] GLC_030603_154.JPG	[13] GLC_030603_166.JPG	[14] GLC_030603_180.JPG
[15] GLC_030603_185.JPG	[16] GLC_030603_194.JPG	[17] GLC_030603_238.JPG

[18] GLC_030604_006_STITCH.JPG

[19] GLC_030604_007_STITCH.JPG

[20] GLC_030604_008.JPG	[21] GLC_030604_009.JPG	[22] GLC_030604_015.JPG	[23] GLC_030604_025.JPG	[24] GLC_030604_055.JPG	[25] GLC_030604_061.JPG
[26] GLC_030604_074.JPG	[27] GLC_030604_080.JPG	[28] GLC_030604_081.JPG	[29] GLC_030604_094.JPG	[30] GLC_030604_096.JPG	[31] GLC_030604_098.JPG
[32] GLC_030604_105.JPG	[33] GLC_030604_109.JPG	[34] GLC_030604_139.JPG	[35] GLC_030604_142.JPG	[36] GLC_030604_148.JPG	[37] GLC_030604_155.JPG
[38] GLC_030604_157.JPG	[39] GLC_030604_159.JPG	[40] GLC_030604_178.JPG

Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. GLC_030603_061.JPG: This is the new Navajo Bridge
2. GLC_030603_105.JPG: The truck is doing an inspection of the now foot-only bridge. You wouldn't think they'd need to do this for a bridge which used to be regular bridge and is only used for pedestrians now but, yep, they do.
3. GLC_030603_154.JPG: This is where Lees Ferry would have been. It's fairly flat on both sides of the river so people could get down to it and then the ferry would take them across.
4. GLC_030604_008.JPG: This is sign outside the Carl Hayden Visitor Center for the Glen Canyon Dam. You were required to leave everything in the car. The fanny pack was out on this trip.
5. GLC_030604_009.JPG: The sign says: "This is one of several concrete buckets that poured the concrete in Glen Canyon Dam -- all 4,901,000 cubic yards of it! The first pour of concrete occurred on June 17, 1960, the start of an around-the-clock process that continued uninterrupted until September, 1963."
6. GLC_030604_055.JPG: These are the turbines. There are eight of them.
7. GLC_030604_061.JPG: The pumps in the foreground were covered by turf later on. They're the grassy area in the current photos.
8. GLC_030604_074.JPG: That's the visitor center for the dam. The bridge is US89.
9. GLC_030604_098.JPG: The cleared out area is the spillway. It was used during one period of unusually high water in the early 1980's. Each of the colored rectangles along the dam is an intake system for each turbine. You'll notice there are eight intakes, like there were eight turbines. Typically, they don't need to have them all operating at once.
10. GLC_030604_139.JPG: The smokestacks in the back are the Navajo Generating Station. It's odd that they need a generating station with dam right here, isn't it?
11. GLC_030604_142.JPG: There's the Glen Canyon Dam from upstream. Page Arizona is above to the left of it.
12. GLC_030604_148.JPG: Navajo Generating Station on the left. Page Arizona on the right.
13. GLC_030604_155.JPG: The shrouded mountain in the distance is Navajo Mountain. According to the sign, "Rising two miles above sea level, a different color from the surrounding landscape, Navajo Mountain is one of seven peaks held sacred by the Hopi and the Navajos. Black Body, Blue Body, First Man, and First Woman built Navajo Mountain with soil brought from the underworld. The Navajo creation story coincides with geologic evidence. Heaved up within the mountain is a core of solidified lava."
14. GLC_030604_157.JPG: This is Wahweap, the largest marina in the lake
15. GLC_030604_159.JPG: They were filming some motorcycle introduction. After taking this picture, they asked me to not take any more.
AAA "Gem": AAA considers this location to be a "must see" point of interest. To see pictures of other areas that AAA considers to be Gems, click here.
Wikipedia Description: Glen Canyon
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Glen Canyon, in southeastern and south central Utah and northwestern Arizona within the Vermilion Cliffs area, was carved by two rivers, the Colorado River and the San Juan River.

A reservoir, Lake Powell was created by the Glen Canyon Dam. Lake Powell emerged from a struggle over damming Dinosaur National Monument. The Sierra Club and its leader, David Brower, were instrumental in blocking the dam in Dinosaur. In exchange, they accepted a dam in Glen Canyon. Before the canyon was flooded, but after the struggle in Congress, Brower floated the canyon and realized what a tremendous resource it was. This experience transformed Brower's attitude towards environmental preservation, making him more radical and less likely to compromise. It was very similar to the experience of John Muir with Hetch Hetchy. For Brower, it steeled him for the battle over a dam in the Grand Canyon. Beginning in the late 1990's, the Sierra Club and other organizations renewed the call to drain Lake Powell in Lower Glen Canyon.

Pre-dam history and rescue archaeology:

Around 1956, archaeologists and biologists from the University of Utah and the Museum of Northern Arizona, using National Park research grants, planned an emergency excavation of Lower Glen Canyon, which was soon to be flooded by the new Glen Canyon Dam. Between 1958 and 1960, four investigative phases, combined with other surveys prior to 1957, discovered 250 sites. Beginning in 1958, the Lower Glen Canyon survey was finished. Excavations began during the summer on 16 sites.

A thesis emerged that the prehistoric people living permanently on the highlands south of Glen Canyon, and on the Cummings Mesa, farmed the Lower Glen Canyon on a seasonal basis, and gathered raw materials. To prove this thesis of seasonal habitation, criteria such as architectural units, locations of trail systems, occurrence of ceremonial structures, prevalence of burials, and position of natural and cultural strata. Four types of sites are described in the survey classified as either open sites situated on rock terraces; talus sites on broken material below cliffs; shelter sites in protected areas under overhanging cliffs; and cliff sites beneath ledges or in caves and canyon walls. Open sites are the majority on both sides of the river. The majority of sites, mostly Navajo camps, feature lithic garbage or ceramics, or both. Talus sites are rarely recorded.

Most of the cultural remains found are chipped stone tools (lithic materials), including projectile points, scrapers, drills, knives, choppers, and ground stone tools and manos (grinders). The collection of sherds are mostly Tusayan Gray Ware and Tusayan White Ware. Petroglyph panels are found throughout Glen Canyon. “Pecked and incised figures depict mountain sheep, human figures, birds, human handprints and animal tracks. Geometric figures range from circles and spirals to highly complex rectilinear patterns. The human figures have triangular bodies. Painted figures have been reported for both sides of the river.... Petroglyph panels of such quality are lacking from the highland regions adjacent to Glen Canyon” (Long 61).

Studies indicate a chronology for the Lower Glen Canyon prehistory, “from pre-A.D. 1 to the 15th century and recorded history from 1776 to the present” (Long 61). The best documented period of the canyon is between A.D. 1050 and 1225. A separate Basketmaker II culture is represented by several sites. Radiocarbon dates from charcoal material are from A.D. 250 to 440 (plus or minus 80 years). Basketmaker III is not found in the Lower Glen Canyon, but is documented in Navajo Canyon, a large left bank tributary of the Colorado River, within the geographical area of the Lower Glen Canyon (Long 62). Basketmaker III introduces fired pottery, mostly Lino Black-on-gray and Lino Gray, and some small amounts of Lino Fugitive Red and Obelisk Gray.

Pueblo I remains are found at Rock Creek in Lower Glen Canyon, and in Navajo Canyon. The pottery types are Kana-a Black-on-white, Deadmans Black-on-red, and Kana-a Gray, made from deposits found in Lizard Alcove. Pueblo I is the best documented period of Navajo Canyon, beginning in 800 A.D, lasting 200 years. Basketmaker is believed to have lasted later than Pueblo I. “Pueblo II in Navajo Canyon is represented by the absence of Kana-a Black-on-white and the dominance of Black Mesa Black-on-white” (Long 62). Pueblo II and early Pueblo III is the best documented cultural area in Lower Glen Canyon corresponding with habitation on Cummings Mesa. Pottery includes mostly Tusayan varieties, Black-on-white, Black-on-red, and Red Wear Polychromes.

In the 14th century, Hopi people from the Jeddito area came into the canyons, represented by Yellow Wares, mostly Jeddito Black-on-yellow, and Jeddito plain. This represents the entire prehistoric record for Lower Glen Canyon. Recorded history begins with the Dominguez-Escalante expedition in 1776. Cultural similarities are based on the presence, or absence, of certain types of ceramic wares. (Long 63). Group types of pottery include Kayenta (Tusayan and Tsegi Orange Ware), Virgin (San Juan Red and White Wares), with Fremont, and Mesa Verde or Anasazi types of White and Desert Gray Ware found mostly on the right bank of Colorado. Basketmaker II is characterized by a lack of pottery, and above ground and underground cists lined with slabs.

There is very little evidence of permanent occupation except at Talus Ruin, a small pueblo with a kiva, a ceremonial structure, made mostly of masonry, featuring jacal walls of sticks and reeds set in mortar in a single row of masonry. The presence of metates are evidence that campsites with slab-lined hearths being inhabited for longer periods. Agricultural structures are not found in the main lower canyon, and no formalized fields are found in the main canyon because of alleviation and slope wash burying (Long, 66). Houses, when found, were mostly sandstone slab with mortar, having one to seven rooms. “Well constructed mealing bins which usually denote permanency were lacking in the Lower Glen Canyon. In contrast, on Cummings Mesa at Surprise Pueblo, there was one entire room devoted to mealing bins…” (Long 65). In the highlands, granaries were near or incorporated into permanent Pueblos, compared with smaller ones near temporary sites in the Canyon (Long 66). “Home Base” pueblos in the nearby highlands on Cummings Mesa and Paiute Mesa are believed to support the temporary farming and the hunting parties who used an extensive trail system in the main canyon, still in use today.

“Stone tool manufacturing appears to have been an important industry for the entire Glen Canyon region, perhaps one of the major reasons for occupation” (Long 66). Cryptocrystalline rocks fill the Pleistocene gravel beds on the Carmel platforms. Scattered lithic tools and materials indicate workshops of various sizes. There is a lack of siliceous material in the highlands, but tools are found there made from the gravel beds in the river.

There are very few ground stone artifacts, such as manos, metates, and scrapers, found in the main canyon, since these tools are mainly found in the highlands. In the main canyon, a large number of chipped implements, ranging from small arrowheads to large knives, are found. Finished tools, and possibly blanks taken to the mesa, were probably used for trade. Most of the ceramic material found in the main canyon was probably made in the highlands, although it is possible some pottery was manufactured in Lower Glen Canyon. Clay deposits are found along the river, and some crude pottery specimens, that may have been made there. Only four burials were found in Lower Glen Canyon at three sites. Trash dumps are not very common at most sites. This is more evidence to suggest the seasonal occupation of hunters and farmers.
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