Too Many Dams, Not Enough Burros

We left Craggy Wash in the morning and continued our way up the Colorado River.  Havasu National Wildlife Refuge, a boaters paradise, was on our way, and since we didn’t have a boat, we wandered by foot a bit.

We hoped to see some wildlife, but there were none to be seen.  In fact, wildlife was very absent on this trip.

Does anyone know what this contraption may be used for?

It is going across the river and looks like it is still in use.

We stopped for lunch at Catfish Paradise

and enjoyed the views of the marsh.  Still no wildlife in sight.

Another disappointment was the Mojave Twins intaglios (geoglyphs) south of Fort Mojave. There was not much to see at ground level and there were no elevated spaces in the area.

This was all we could see, and I had to enhance the photo a bit for the figure on the left half of the photo to be somewhat visible.

This is what it looks like on Google Earth.

The twins are said to represent good and evil and are presumed to date to 900 BCE.  They are located south of Fort Mojave overlooking the river.

We continued on our way up the river and lo and behold we came across another dam.

Just like the other dams on the river system, there were a lot of plaques and information about the dam and its history.

We were also informed that masks are not required although they were closed to the public.

Although we couldn’t enjoy any of the indoor displays, the outdoors was ours to explore.

According to their website:

“Davis Dam, rising 200 feet above the lowest point of the foundation and about 140 feet above the level of the river, is a zoned earthfill structure with concrete spillway, intake structure, and powerplant. It has a crest length of 1,600 feet, and a top width of 50 feet. Its reservoir, Lake Mohave, has a total storage capacity of 1,818,300 acre-feet, and at maximum capacity extends 67 miles upstream to the tailrace of the Hoover Powerplant.”

Looking down the river this part of the world look dry and rough despite all of this water flowing through it.

We are now on the famous Route 66 and stopped at Oatman BLM, our home for the night.

There are wild burros in the area so we went looking for them, but all we could find was poop.

We did hear them bray through the night and the next morning we didn’t have to drive too far before we came across the first friendly bunch.

But more on that in the next post.

 

51 thoughts on “Too Many Dams, Not Enough Burros

  1. mistermuse says:

    Damn the dams! Where are the burros?
    Up in the rocks, or down in the furrows?
    Around the next bend, or out of the loop?
    Finally, a clue: they’re just past the poop!

  2. kagould17 says:

    I think the burros showed you what they wanted you to see. The contraption is a way for a person to cross a river or coulee. They pull themselves across manually. We saw one similar to this in New Zealand that was used for miners to cross a river before the bridge was built. Hope all is well. Safe travels. Allan

  3. Ab says:

    That contraption to cross the river looks pretty scary! I would be terrified to cross that but could be an amusement park ride. 🙂 Dams are always interesting places and provide nice scenery. I’m looking forward to reading about the burros encounter in your next post! Enjoy your long weekend, Margie!

  4. Mike and Kellye Hefner says:

    We’ve seen those contraptions before, and I think they have something to do with mining – not sure that’s what this one is though. I’m so glad you finally found the burros. As for the Mojave twins, I would’ve been right there beside you trying to figure them out!

  5. Ingrid says:

    We too were disappointed with that wildlife refuge. Usually there are bunches of burros on the CA side of the Davis Damn, but I know you encountered plenty in Oatman. Quirky little place.

  6. WanderingCanadians says:

    That contraption that goes across the river looks a bit sketch. I’m intrigued as to what it’s used for though. It’s interesting to see so much water from the dam in such a dry and barren area.

  7. rkrontheroad says:

    Perhaps if you were courageous enough to go up on that elevated platform, you could see the Mohave Twins from that vantage point. You couldn’t get me up there!

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