Welcome back! And welcome 2010! As I ruminate about the holidays and tie up loose ends from that last Crazy year, I marvel at some of my holiday adventures and what they say about the strange and altered waterscape we live in, in California. A little story for you about my Christmas travels.
Tuolumne River as it passes through Tuolumne Meadows
A few days before Christmas, I got up early to catch a plane to San Diego. Before I left my apartment, I drank Tuolumne River water from the tap in my apartment, water from Yosemite, four or five hour drive east of where I was standing. As soon as I got to San Diego, my mom picked me up and drove me to my dad’s house so that we could pile into another car and drive two and a half hours to Palm Desert to visit friends.
Before we left, I had a drink from my dad’s tap. Strangely I was sipping on water, some of which was from a river way North of San Francisco- the Feather River- where I had just come from. The other part of the well-traveled water I was drinking came from the Colorado River, far to the east of me, making up the southern boundary between California and Arizona, with its watershed far to the North in the Rocky Mountains.
After a drink of the strange not-so-good tasting elixir that is San Diego water, my family and I piled into a car and drove through the arid hills of Southern California, through Escondido and Temecula, through Anza and Pinon Flats, past many dry riverbeds and only a few running rivers, down into the seriously parched land of Palm Desert. That night, as I drank a glass of wine to mellow out from the long journey of the day, I filled a glass with water from the tap- water supplied from the local groundwater of the desert.
Needless to say, if it already hasn’t come across from other things I mentioned, we live in a highly altered waterscape in California. One where water from hundreds and hundreds of miles away makes our lives possible, especially if you live in any of the three large cities of Los Angeles, San Diego, or San Francisco.
So what river are you drinking from everyday? I’ll give a list of some major areas and the major rivers that provide
Feather River Crossing at Milsap Bar, Butte County
their water. If I don’t mention a place you’d like to know about, post a comment and I’ll do my best to find out what river supplies that area.
If you live in the city of San Francisco or on the Peninsula in the South Bay, you drink water from the Tuolumne River in Yosemite. In terms of other places in the Bay Area, if you live in the East Bay your water is from the Mokelumne River, from the mountains east of Stockton. If you live in Marin, your water comes mainly from the Russian River, but also from the Eel River.
For those of you who live in Los Angeles, your water comes from the aforementioned Feather River, north of San Francisco, and also the Colorado River, the Owens River, which drains part of the Eastern Sierras, a little groundwater, and don’t forget recycled wastewater. And San Diegans, you drink water, as mentioned before, from the Feather and Colorado Rivers supplemented by a very little bit of local stream and reservoir water.
Owens River South of Poverty Hills
Next week, I will tell the story of the first water fieldtrip of the year- going this weekend to watch salmon spawn in the Lagunitas watershed, North of San Fran. Have a great week hatching plots to take over the world this year! 2010!
Tuolumne River and Feather River Pics- licensed under Creative Commons 3.0.
Owens River Pic by Richard E. Ellis