CORONADO

Grand Lake – Elevation 8380 feet. Zip code 80447: The largest glacial lake in Colorado, it’s the source of the Colorado River. So clear and cool. So . . . I’m gonna’ get you and Sine up there sometime.

AURA

It’s the source, if you’re from Colorado . . . Like, where did the water in the lake come from?

CORONADO

Oh tell us, tell us.

AURA

What I know is it starts near Moab, Utah, where the Green River from Wyoming and the Grand River from Colorado meet. After that the water starts to look red, which is why they call it the Colorado, Spanish for red, you know.

CORONADO

Uh huh.

AURA

And because the Green drains a larger area than the Grand, they say the Green is actually the start of the Colorado, which means it actually starts in Wyoming. But some Colorado politician was able to get Congress to rename the Grand River the Colorado. You’d think it was his kid.

CORONADO

So the people in Wyoming were too green to get it named right, huh.

AURA

That’s why everybody there calls their part the Green.

SINE

So it's a language thing?

AURA

Even the National Park Service, I guess because they want to stay in business, says that waters on the west side of the Continental Divide that runs down the middle of Rocky Mountain National Park, form the headwaters of the Colorado. So if they have to fight over such simple facts, it’s no surprise they fight over the water itself. You can read all about it in the link called “Colorado River Source” What a bunch of clap trap.

●Grand Lake (Chamber of Commerce, of course)

●Water competition starts from the beginning

●Then there's the real source in Wyoming

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