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Snake River, Idaho
January 9, 2008 | 31 Comments
“What makes a river so restful to people is that it doesn’t have any doubt – it is sure to get where it is going, and it doesn’t want to go anywhere else.” – Hal Boyle
Unlike famous destinations like the Grand Canyon, hordes of tourists are not a problem when one visits the many magnificent canyons carved by the Snake River. The river flows from its origin near Yellowstone National Park through a series of mountain ranges, canyons, and plains traversing Idaho, and meets the Columbia river inside Washington state.
See The Snake River near its origin at the Grand Tetons in Wyoming by Ansel Adams.
The Snake River has several deep canyons, the most famous being Hells Canyon, on the Oregon-Idaho border, where it meets the Salmon River. It is ten miles wide and 7,993 feet deep – the deepest gorge in North America, even deeper than the Grand Canyon.
Also well known is the Snake River Canyon at Twin Falls, where Evel Knievel tried to jump over the canyon (unsuccessfully) on his rocket-powered motorcycle.
The canyon at Swan Falls Dam is small in comparison, but no less breathtaking. Even though the Swan Falls Dam is barely 40 minutes from the closest urban area you’d be lucky if you saw two cars there, especially in winter. On our day trip last week through rural Idaho, we reached the dam around 4.30 p.m., a little before sunset.
From the top of the canyon, looking to the right,
Swan Falls Dam Larger picture HERE
Built in 1901 to provide electricity to nearby mines, it is a historical point of interest because it’s the oldest hydroelectric generating site on the Snake River.
To the left,
The Owyhee mountains in the backdrop. Larger picture HERE
The layers of rock carved out by the river over thousands of years.
The Snake River plain receives very little rainfall and is located in a high plain desert. It also has the highest per capita water consumption in the U.S.
Under the plain is a giant aquifer spanning 28,000 square km, that provides irrigation water to generate about 8% of the US’s food production. The Aquifer covers nearly one third of Idaho, extending from near the western boundary of Yellowstone National Park in eastern Idaho to the Idaho-Oregon border where the Snake River enters Hells Canyon.
More about the Snake River Plain Aquifer.
The Snake River plain has seen a continous series of explosive volcanic eruptions, the oldest dated to 17 million years ago. (Illustrated HERE)
See the black volcanic lava rock at the top.
The Swan Falls Area is home to the The Snake River Birds of Prey Refuge. It supports one of the world’s densest concentrations of nesting birds of prey.
Even in winter, when most of these creatures have migrated to warmer areas, one finds falcons, eagles, hawks, and owls here in unique profusion and variety.
S managed to click, through the car window,
A Northern Harrier Hawk/Marsh Hawk
and a strange-shaped rock in the distance.
On closer inspection, it’s a
Golden Eagle
The golden eagle has a wingspan averaging over 2 m (7 ft) and up to 1m (3 ft) in body length, and is one of the largest birds of prey in North America.
Twilight on the Snake River. This pic was taken in summer, 2007.
Back home,
some happy little finches on our chokecherry tree.
Pics 1, and 2 by Bee,
4, 5, 6, 8 by S,
3 and 7 by Jai.
We’re off to pour ourselves a couple of stiff drinks before we embark on some upgrades to our wordpress installation. If the site goes plummetting into oblivion, you know who’s to blame. If that happens and you don’t hear from us, we wish you all the best in life. Thank you for visiting our strange blog. And, since it’s cool to have memorable parting words, we’d like to engrave on our blog’s epitaph:
CODE SUCKS.
- Bee and Jai
Filed Under: Aquifer, Idaho, MUSINGS, Photo Essays, Snake-River, Snake-River-Birds-of-Prey-Refuge, Snake-River-Plain, Swan-Falls-Dam, TRAVEL
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31 Comments
Nice pictures.
Will look forward to seeing u guys, soon!
Lovely pics!! and Gud luck w/ ur upgrade!! See u soon
I love the photos of the volcanic rock and the finches. Thanks for sharing!
Marsh hawks are pretty cool – for raptors. Notice how the primary feathers are splayed out like fingers? you see that on some hawks and all vultures. That’s because they fly slow just above stall speed (ok, let’s see if embedded html tags work…).
Falcons and other hawks (typically fast hawks like coopers hawk) fly with their primary feathers closed since they fly fast and maneuver rapidly.
Cool, embedded tags work!
More info on aerodynamics of slow speed flight can be found here .
those are some great links. thanks for the info on these raptors. -j
The photo essays you all present are alway thought-provoking and has one’s mind wandering off… thank you.
Oh yeah, CODE SUCKS, looking forward to seeing you around for a long time though.
Gorgeous pictures! The last picture with finches is breathtakingly beautiful! Such lovely splash of color!
‘Code Sucks’ – Good luck with that
Good Luck and those pics are awesome . How true that camera makes everyone a tourist. Now I wanna pack my bags to see those canyons…
:bow:
Breathtaking pictures…hope to see you guys soon…all the best.
Those are some breathtaking pics. The last one is my fav. These little birdies always look so lively & seem to spread so much of cheer around!!
See you soon
I love finches
Love the second pic and of course, the finches. but do not disappear you two!
Beautiful pics indeed! Nature at it’s best!:)
Beautiful pics.
Hope to see you guys soon. Other wise we’ll be saying code sucks
I love the pic. of the sedimented rock in particular…
Please be sure to come back soon after your code changes.
what a beooooooootiful shot of the finches
Awesome pictures bee.
Good luck with the code. I love the last pic
hahahah to the last line! u guys crack me up! Beautiful pics!
I’ve never been here, but have read a lot about it. Would add it to my “Must-visit-when I am rich and have time” list:)
hehe .. how about hiring me as the official coder for ur site ? i won’t mind … it would be more fun than the coding i do !
Thanks for the virtual tour Bee. Our cousin is in Idaho.. So I make sure to visit this p lace when we visit him.
Oh, good to see the site is still standing.
Its a miracle. A Miracle I tell ya!
‘code sucks’…no wonder i used blogger
now I think there is something going wrong here..I can’t find the comments page in events calender!..I wanted to update my event details!..are you guys still working on the codes…ok..I might enjoy myself on the beautiful pictures meanwhile….
Good luck with the code thing.
Whew – thought Id lost you guys , logged in from my parents home and found a white screen with EXTERNAL in block letters!!! :no:
Blamed my Dads computer, the small town dial up connection – everything I could – came back yday and today first thing checked your site – whew! Code sucks indeed! hope everything is ok
The pics are great esp of the birds – hope you had a good trip!
Miri
you are right. Code sucks. Especially line 7 where an else statement is missing!
Good luck with the code tweaking guys!
[...] National Park through a series of … The canyon at swan falls dam is small in comparison, …http://jugalbandi.info/2008/01/snake-river-idaho/Snake River – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia… Reservoir, the Snake river flows northwest through [...]
[...] Snake River, that runs from the west to the east of Idaho, has carved out some spectacular canyons over the [...]