This
morning we took field showers and headed out back to Boulder then west on CR
106 (county road) Boulder South Road, then #351 west toward Marbleton
(population 1,100) and Big Piney (population 552). Big Piney is the oldest
permanent white person settlement in Sublette County, WY. I kid you not, white
person settlement. Today these towns owe their existence to natural gas
extraction, the new economy out west. Big Piney was established in 1879 by
cowboys who discovered their cattle liked the sweet native grasses in the
riparian areas along the Green River.
Small
they may be but each had ample numbers of saloons. We saw big time natural gas
well heads, storage pipes and even a pipe laying crew at work. Ultra-Resources
Inc. logos and signs everywhere. Google reveals them to be a subsidiary of Ultra
Petroleum Corp. which is an independent exploration and production company focused
on developing natural gas reserves in the Green River Basin of Wyoming – the
Pinedale and Jonah Fields. Ultra-Petroleum is also at work developing an oil
project in the Uinta Basin, Three Rivers area in Utah. They also are positioned
in the heart of the Marcellus shale in the Appalachian Basin of Pennsylvania.
Lots of pipelines out here in this hot, dry country. Take away natural gas and
oil out here and lots of money leaves.
We crossed
over the New Fork River, tributary to the Green River, whose course we are generally
following as it winds its way southwestward from its headwaters in the Wind
River Mountains through some of America’s most spectacular canyon country, Flaming
Gorge and Desolation Canyon to name a couple, and finally to a confluence with
the Colorado River in Canyon Lands National Park where one can walk a mile to
the confluence overlook and gaze down seventeen hundred feet at the exact spot
where the rivers come together. The green waters of the Green and the sediment laden,
brown waters of the Colorado flow separately and distinctly for several miles
down-river from the confluence. Finally, the Green is overpowered by its cousin
the Colorado and, bound together forever, they rush onward toward man-made Lake
Powell, the Glen Canyon and finally the grandest canyon of then all, the Grand
Canyon, which would be grander yet if not for the Fontenelle Dam, Flaming Gorge
Dam, Glen Canyon Dam, Hoover Dam and many others.
For us
it’s on to La Barge (population 551) then to Fontenelle (population 13), then
to the Slate Creek Camp Ground, a BLM (Bureau of Land Management) facility not
far from Fontenelle. The Bureau of Land Management has jurisdictional
responsibilities for lots of public land primarily in the west and manages for
many uses including recreation. Most BLM lands are open to free camping where
one can get to, which out here usually means having a four-wheel drive vehicle.
BML is
not to be confused with the Bureau of Reclamation, a federal agency with a controversial
past as detailed in Marc Reisner’s excellent book, Cadillac Mountain, The
American West and Its Disappearing Water. I strongly recommend it for anyone
who may be interested in learning about what corrupt government regulators in
cahoots with greedy capitalists can wrought in the name of progress. The book
is a little dated and Mr. Reisner is a bit of a cynic, but, what the hell, so
am I. The Bureau of Reclamation has oversight for and operation of dams it has
built throughout the western states for irrigation and hydroelectric power
generation. The Bureau is responsible for all the dams on the Colorado River
pursuant to the Colorado River Storage Project Act of 1956, a grand scheme to
harness the power of the Colorado River to provide electricity to a fast-growing
western population, mostly in Los Angeles, at the time Hoover Dam was built, but
also to provide irrigation (very expensive Irrigation) for highland farming
throughout the basin.
The
signs at facilities like this campsite will say that revenues from electricity
and water sales have paid for dam construction and maintenance and construction
of vast irrigation works. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, the
American tax payer has always subsidized these projects and conservative, gun
toting, get the government out of my business farmers and ranchers in this high
dry country have always paid a fraction of the cost and the American tax payer
has subsidized the rest. Thus, many conservative, independent minded ranchers
and farmers aren’t so independent after all.
Nice
camp ground though, situated on a beautiful creek, with roosting common
nighthawks, northern flickers and a great blue heron. Emily is taking a walk,
I’m writing while sipping a 9.5% Detour IPA by Uinta Brewing Company out of
Salt Lake City, the wind is whistling through the cottonwoods and willows and I
have no knowledge of what out idiot president has vomited forth lately. Life is
good.
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| Slate Creek, Green River Tributary |
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