Palouse Falls, Lower Monumental Dam
Twelve hundred years ago at the site of Palouse Falls State Park in southeastern Washington, the scene would not be quite what it was today. Instead of one majestic waterfall cascading 200ft. over the basalt cataracts, the landscape would have sounded and looked more like that of Niagara Falls, times 10! Without the help of as many as 40 catastrophic floods since the last ice age, derived from glacial lake Missoula, the deep channels and plateaued vistas we peered over today would have retained their pre-flood geography of soft, rolling, loess covered plains. Thanks to this roughly 50-year cycle of flooding, however, we were witness to the deep, rugged remains of hydro-geology at work and its resulting grand canyon-esque splendor.
After a brief local history by our naturalist and a trip down memory lane in our yellow school bus, we re-boarded the M/V Sea Lion and continued our journey west towards the Pacific Ocean. Upon reaching Lower Monumental Dam, most of the guests and crew alike were treated to a rare opportunity. To help offer an even greater perspective for the engineering feat that includes Lower Monumental Dam and all the other dams along the Snake and Columbia Rivers, both the lockmaster and our captain gave the go-ahead to allow us to enter the lock via Zodiacs. For the first time this trip, four Zodiacs and the Sea Lion entered Lower Monumental separately. If the 675 x 86 ft. lock chamber was not impressive enough from the ship, the 100 ft. descent in a rubber raft was truly humbling.
Twelve hundred years ago at the site of Palouse Falls State Park in southeastern Washington, the scene would not be quite what it was today. Instead of one majestic waterfall cascading 200ft. over the basalt cataracts, the landscape would have sounded and looked more like that of Niagara Falls, times 10! Without the help of as many as 40 catastrophic floods since the last ice age, derived from glacial lake Missoula, the deep channels and plateaued vistas we peered over today would have retained their pre-flood geography of soft, rolling, loess covered plains. Thanks to this roughly 50-year cycle of flooding, however, we were witness to the deep, rugged remains of hydro-geology at work and its resulting grand canyon-esque splendor.
After a brief local history by our naturalist and a trip down memory lane in our yellow school bus, we re-boarded the M/V Sea Lion and continued our journey west towards the Pacific Ocean. Upon reaching Lower Monumental Dam, most of the guests and crew alike were treated to a rare opportunity. To help offer an even greater perspective for the engineering feat that includes Lower Monumental Dam and all the other dams along the Snake and Columbia Rivers, both the lockmaster and our captain gave the go-ahead to allow us to enter the lock via Zodiacs. For the first time this trip, four Zodiacs and the Sea Lion entered Lower Monumental separately. If the 675 x 86 ft. lock chamber was not impressive enough from the ship, the 100 ft. descent in a rubber raft was truly humbling.
