Dispatch #41 - The Amargosa Wild and Scenic River
If I were to tell you about a “wild and scenic river,” what kind of images would that conjure? Raging rapids careening through granite boulders? A broad tributary sliding beneath evergreen forests? That is what I used to picture when I heard the phrase. My grandiose idealism defined wild as untamed and scenic as the kind of picturesque beauty that is universally praised and accepted.
But the reality of what qualifies as “wild and scenic” is far more surprising.
There are only ten federally designated, BLM-managed wild and scenic rivers in California — just 124.2 miles in total length.
The second longest of these runs through the heart of the Mojave Desert, past a famous valley named Death and a mountain range named Funeral, where summertime temperatures hover in the triple digits for months on end.
The diminutive Amargosa River.
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