The first photo today is the boat we were on Monday night for the dinner cruise. Nice boat.
We started our day with a tour of the Glen Canyon Dam. We scheduled the early tour at 8:30 A.M. because we thought it would be the coolest time of the day. It was a very informative tour. Interestingly, the first thing I found out was that the dam wasn’t built for generating electricity. It was built to control the flow of the Colorado River. By controlling the water, agriculture benefitted downstream, and California, Nevada and Arizona have an ample supply of water. The electricity that the dams generates is a nice benefit that has brought in billions of dollars in revenue for the dam.
The town of Page was established when construction of the dam started. There was no town prior to 1956. The entire area was undeveloped prior to building the dam. The bridge was also built while the dam was being built. President Eisenhower pushed the button, in Washington D.C., that set off the first dynamite blast at the dam site. That was in 1956. On June 17, 1960, they began pouring concrete, and it was a continuous pour 24/7 until September 13, 1963. The dam contains 5,000,000 cubic yards of concrete. The dam is 710 feet high and has 8 turbines that generate power for many western states. Lady Bird Johnson dedicated the dam on September 22, 1966. Once the dam was completed, it took 17 years to fill.
Lake Powell, behind the dam was named after early explorer John Wesley Powell. Powell was a Civil War veteran who lost one arm in the war. Powell was the first to explore the Colorado River. He took eight men in three wooden boats down the river in 1869.
In 1972 this area was established as the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area and is managed by the National Park Service.
At 10:30 A.M. we took a boat tour and saw that portion the lake above the dam, and we went into Antelope Canyon. In the afternoon, we visited the Powell Museum in Page.
Above is the dinner cruise boat and the sign for the Glenn Canyon Recreation Area. Above is one of the views from the campground and a shot of our MH.
Our tour guide is Curtis, a Navajo who is studying to be a civil engineer, who also speaks Italian. Go figure! The bridge is the Glen Canyon Bridge.
Curtis is telling the tour about the eight intake tunnels on the dam. There is one intake tunnel for each of the eight turbines you see in the generating room.
The photo above shows the bridge, the power lines, and the Visitor’s Center.
Above is the tour boat for the lake tour and a photo of the upstream side of the dam.
These are two views of Antelope Canyon. We went as far back into the canyon as possible for the size tour boat we were on. The canyon gets very, very narrow further in, and that’s where there are some really nice pictures taken. Goggle Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ for pictures.
There are lots of small boats on Lake Powell, but this might be one of the largest collections of house boats that I have ever seen. There has to be hundreds at just this marina. With over 1,900 miles of shoreline and many other marinas, there are many, many more house boats. Lots of these house boats are very high-dollar boats. Oh well, back to the confines of our modest MH.
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