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| Mining Road |
Room 236 contains a scale model revealing a section of the foothills during a drought, with large rocks and all but the most recently fallen trees--oaks, gray pines, sycamores, buckeyes, red-buds--accurately positioned. The reservoir is so low that the river resembles its former self. The slopes of the canyon, however, are stripped of life, except for a rusty crop of cockle-burs, which flourishes underwater, the seeds brought in by the first herds of cattle. If you examine the terrain carefully with a magnifying glass, you can even see ancient Native American trails stretching from one abandoned village site to another, where moss-covered pestles still protrude from the mortars of a few pounding stones. You can also still see in the floodplain the last crumbling asphalt of a road traveled before the dam was built, as well as old abutments where bridges spanned the river and its tributaries.
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| Bottom of a Reservoir |
Buried under water for sixty years, a stone chimney still stands erect near pounding stones. Preserved by the cold water, dead trees still tower, stripped bare, almost black. Overgrown mining roads, sometimes built over ancient trails, wind around the hillsides above the denuded slopes, and in some places the collapsed mines can be still be found, often near Native American village sites. Below the dam are canals and ditches that spurred one of the first water wars in the valley, but no obvious signs of conflict remain. Not far from the river is a creek whose water irrigated the first bumper crop of wheat that attracted the railroad. Around the tracks, the city continues to grow. Not far away from the creek new houses are popping up, the city slowly leapfrogging into the foothills.
There are four other doors in Room 236. Choose one:
There are four other doors in Room 236. Choose one:
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