226 



GUIDEBOOK OF THE WESTERN UNITED STATES. 



Castilla. 



Elevation 4,912 feet 

 Denver 685 miles. 



The Triassic red beds extend nearly a mile west of the mouth of 

 Diamond Creek, to a place where they are probably terminated by a 

 fault which separates them from the Carboniferous and older rocks 

 that form the core of the Wasatch Range. The 

 rocks of the mountains are of Carboniferous age 

 but are so poorly exposed and so complicated in 

 structure that it is useless to attempt to describe 

 them. From some limestones of this formation comes the hot 

 sulphur water which has made Castilla (cas-tee'yah) Hot Springs a 

 noted resort. 



The AVasatch Mountains, although not equal in height to the Rocky 

 Mountains of Colorado or the Sierra Nevada of California, are never- 

 theless one of the dominating ranges of the continent, and their 

 peaks range in elevation from 10,000 to more than 12,000 feet. The 

 impressiveness of the range is due more to its situation than to its ele- 

 vation, but both unite to make it a noteworthy group of mountains. 

 During the great ice age this range supported a number of glaciers 

 (see the map opposite p. 244) , but the glaciers were neither so large 

 nor so numerous as those of the Rocky Mountains. 



Since leaving Canon City the traveler has been either in the Rocky 

 Mountains or in what is generally known as the Plateau country, so 

 called because it is made up of a series of plateaus of different ele- 

 vations, but when he passes through this canyon and emerges on the 

 west front of the Wasatch Range he finds himself in a country that is 

 very different from any that he has yet seen on this journey. This 



mountains on the west there is not 

 sufficient water to irrigate all the land 

 that is well adapted to farming. The 

 problem, therefore, was to bring the 

 water of Strawberry River across the 

 divide to the lands that needed it so 

 greatly. To accomplish this feat a 

 dam 72 feet high was built across 

 Strawberry River at a place called the 

 " Narrows," a constricted point in the 

 valley below a part that is open and 

 well adapted to form a reservoir. A 

 tunnel was then driven from one of the 

 tributaries of Strawberry River 

 through the divide for a distance of 

 19,897 feet (nearly 4 miles), so as to 

 allow the water of the reservoir to 

 flow through and discharge into the 

 head of Diamond Creek, a tributary 

 of Spanish Fork. The water flows 

 down Spanish Fork to the west side of 

 the Wasatch Mountains, where it is 



again diverted into a canal for utiliza- 

 tion, first for the development of elec- 

 tric power and later for irrigation. 

 The hydroelectric plant is 3i miles be- 

 low the diversion dam in Spanish Fork, 

 and the power is generated by drop- 

 ping the water to the level of that 

 stream, as shown in Plate LXXXIX, 

 B. The water is then carried to the 

 south end of Utah Lake and distrib- 

 uted to the land at that place and also 

 on the east side. This land has been 

 partly settled since 1847 but has not 

 been fully developed because of the 

 shortage of water. The supply from 

 Strawberry Valley will be sufficient to 

 irrigate about 54,000 acres of this land, 

 and thus a great addition to the pro- 

 ductive power of the State is made at 

 the expense of a very slight loss to 

 that part from which the w'ater is 

 taken. 



