7/13/1869

This morning, we have an exhilarating ride. The river is swift, and there
are many smooth rapids. I stand on deck, keeping careful watch ahead,
and we glide along, mile after mile, plying strokes now on the right
and then on the left, just sufficient to guide our boats past the rocks
into smooth water. At noon we emerge from Gray Canyon,
as we have named it, and camp, for dinner,
under a cottonwood tree, standing on the left bank.

Extensive sand plains extend back from the immediate river valley, as far as we can see, on either side.
These naked, drifting sands gleam brilliantly in the midday sun of July. The reflected heat from the glaring surface produces a curious motion of the atmosphere. Little currents are generated, and the whole seems to be trembling and moving about in many directions, or, failing to see that the movement is in the atmosphere, it gives the impression of an unstable land. Plains, hills, cliffs, and distant mountains seem vaguely to be floating about in a trembling, wave-rocked sea, and patches of landscape will seem
to float away, and be lost,
and then re-appear.
--John Wesley Powell
journal entry for July 13, 1869

LOOKING WEST FROM HORSESHOE MESA
THOMAS MORAN: GRAND CANYON OF THE COLORADO
ELVIS SIGHTING OUTSIDE UTAH FLATS
ELVIS HAS LEFT THE CONFLUENCE

Mountain Man: Animal Tracks