This is not the sandy, red-mud-colored Cimarron River that so many of us know from northwestern and central Oklahoma, and which also drains a small part of southeastern Colorado. Instead, it’s Colorado’s other, far more scenic watercourse of the same name, rife with cobbles eroded out of the northern San Juans as sharper rocks, then smoothed in tumbling through its springtime, snow-melt floodwaters. The same roiling waters also move logs distances from feet to miles—some of them riverbank trees directly toppled by the undermining action of the ever-evolving river course. By the time early autumn rolls around, most area streams are at a relative minimum flow rate with summer melting complete, cooling temperatures in the high country, and winter accumulations yet to grow.
13 ENE Ridgway CO (1 Oct 18) Looking NE
38.205, -107.5199Autumn in the Northern San Juans
This is not the sandy, red-mud-colored Cimarron River that so many of us know from northwestern and central Oklahoma, and which also drains a small part of southeastern Colorado. Instead, it’s Colorado’s other, far more scenic watercourse of the same name, rife with cobbles eroded out of the northern San Juans as sharper rocks, then smoothed in tumbling through its springtime, snow-melt floodwaters. The same roiling waters also move logs distances from feet to miles—some of them riverbank trees directly toppled by the undermining action of the ever-evolving river course. By the time early autumn rolls around, most area streams are at a relative minimum flow rate with summer melting complete, cooling temperatures in the high country, and winter accumulations yet to grow.
13 ENE Ridgway CO (1 Oct 18) Looking NE
38.205, -107.5199