An Expedition Down the “Lowest” San Juan River with Returning Rapids Project
Words and photos by Eric Balken
Last month, GCI joined the Returning Rapids Project on an expedition into a continually emerging section of the San Juan River below Clay Hills. Along with GCI and RRP, the trip included rangers from the Bureau of Land Management, US Geological Survey scientists, an archeologist from the Navajo Nation, and a couple of trusty river guides.
The focus of the trip was mostly exploratory — aiming to figure out the best way to navigate ~35 miles of a shallow, silty river, including a 20 foot waterfall, and finally comes to a stop in the middle of the reservoir. The outing was a logistical challenge, involving multiple long shuttles, a few portages, and hiking gear up loose rocks to abandoned boat ramps.
The experience of floating the river was sublime. At the beginning of the trip, it was hard to tell that part of the river was ever inundated by the reservoir. Most of the vegetation on the river banks was made up of willow bushes, much like the rest of the San Juan, with the exposed walls of reservoir sediment more populated with tamarisk.
As we made our way downstream, we were surprised to find large sections of the recovering river already lined with robust groves of cottonwood trees, some 50 feet high or more. Compared to the restoring sections of the Colorado through Cataract and Narrow Canyons, the riverside cottonwoods were much more established (probably due to a shallower gradient and less spring flooding). It looked and felt like a healthy, vibrant river.
Throughout the trip, the team worked to match a number of historical photos. This proved to be challenging, not just because the river is perched on dozens of feet of sediment left from the reservoir, but because the river has charted a new path through the new sediment deltas in the canyon. The channeling is the cause for the waterfall at Paiute farms that formed as the river chose a new path over a ledge drop.
Along the way we were able to venture up a beautiful side canyon, which displayed an impressive amount of revegetation. Similar to other parts of central Glen Canyon, the entrance was dominated by invasive species like Russian thistle (tumbleweed). Further up the canyon, with a higher elevation and therefore more time out of the reservoir, the vegetation was more diverse, and populated by natives like cattail, seep willow, coyote willow, and numerous wildflowers. We saw large cat prints circumnavigating ponds of water along our path.
This lower part of the San Juan felt like what I imagined Glen Canyon river trips used to be like: curving walls of sandstone arcing down to the river banks amidst dramatic meanders of the river corridor. Occasionally we would see alcoves that sheltered seeps, fanning over concave walls and bringing to life hanging gardens. Floating into sunset one evening, the walls seemed to come alive with a warm orange color that contrasted the previously overcast day, and the prior decades when this free-flowing river was drowned by the reservoir.
As we ventured downriver into the newly-formed delta, where the reservoir’s waters only receded in the past year or two, the landscape started to feel a lot like Mordor. The steep sediment walls continuously purged chunks of silt into the water, and prehistoric-looking fins of clay protruded up from the river. The flow of the river hastened, and in some places constricted to what felt like 30 feet wide.
As we neared the final stretch of river before meeting the reservoir, the river slowed down once again, and our group marveled at the towering Wingate sandstone corridor before us. We relished in the final miles of current before the river lost itself in the backwaters of Lake Powell. At that point our river trip ended, and we consolidated our gear and motored back to civilization.
