Colorado River — Grand Canyon

About

Colorado River, Grand Canyon — 1869 John Wesley Powell Expedition. The Grand Canyon has been continuously inhabited for at least 12,000 years. The Havasupai — 'people of the blue-green water' — have lived in Havasu Canyon, a Grand Canyon tributary, longer than any other living group, and the Hualapai Nation's reservation borders 108 miles of the South Rim. For these nations, the Colorado was the lifeblood of the canyon, and their presence long predates any map that labeled the gorge unexplored.

After Powell, the canyon's fortunes turned toward mining and tourism. The Grand Canyon Hotel was founded in 1893 and the El Tovar Hotel built in 1901, both at the South Rim. Conservation followed: President Theodore Roosevelt designated the Grand Canyon a National Monument in 1908, and Congress established Grand Canyon National Park in 1919 — more than a decade after Roosevelt urged protection, and a designation that shielded the canyon from the mining and dam proposals that had already claimed Glen Canyon upstream.

The river's character changed most dramatically with concrete. Glen Canyon Dam, built between 1963 and 1966 and standing 456 feet tall, was completed 15 miles upstream from Lee's Ferry and created Lake Powell. Its effect on the Colorado through the Grand Canyon was profound — the extinction of several native fish species and the loss of sandbars made the reach one of the most studied river-management case studies in the world. Later efforts to manage that legacy include the 1996 Grand Canyon Protection Act and the 2012 Long-Term Experimental and Management Plan.

Today the Colorado runs 226 miles of park corridor, rated Class I–V, with an optimal window of 8,000 to 25,000 CFS. USGS gauge 09380000 reads an average near 12,000 CFS against a historical figure of 10,500. Boaters read the river in three moods: Lee's Ferry to Phantom Ranch is Class I–IV upper-canyon water; Phantom Ranch to Diamond Creek is the Class III–V middle canyon, home to Lava Falls; and Diamond Creek to Lake Mead eases back to Class I–III in the lower canyon.

Running it takes patience as much as skill. The National Park Service lottery for a private river permit carried a wait exceeding 12 years as of 2024, with commercial trips operating under a separate allocation. Roughly 25,000 people run the canyon each year, whether by oar or motor, tracing the same water that carried Powell's dories into the unknown.