This location, The Hole in the Rock, was the reason for my 60-mile trip across the desert today.
Thank goodness we had a big 4-wheel drive vehicle. Sure, I could have come here on a boat on Lake Powell--but the way I did it, I feel I much better understand the Mormon achievement.
My Guide, Sean, is very knowledgable guide whose stories helped me understand this achievement. Getting 83 huge wagons down this slot in 1879 strikes me as in the league with Ernest Shackleton's 'Endurance' saga in Antarctica in 1911.
To top it off, that water you see wasn't there in 1879. This water level rose behind the Glen Canyon Dam, built after the Second World War. Those wagons had to go down 600 more feet to the level of the original Colorado River!
Again--how in the world did 225 Mormons, half of them children, get 83 big wagons down that slot?
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