Dolores River - Citizendia

The Dolores River, a tributary of the Colorado, is shown highlighted on a map of the western United States]]

The Dolores River is a tributary of the Colorado River, approximately 250 mi (402 km) long, in the U.S. states of Colorado and Utah. The Colorado River (' Aha Kwahwat in Mojave) is a River in the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico, approximately A US state is any one of the fifty subnational entities of the United States of America that share Sovereignty with the federal government The State of Colorado ( or chiefly by nonresidents) is a state located in the Rocky Mountain region of the United States of America. The State of Utah (ˈjuːtɔː or) is a western state of the United States.

It rises in southwestern Colorado near Dolores Peak and Mount Wilson in the San Miguel Mountains. Mount Wilson is a fourteen thousand foot mountain peak in the U It flows southwest, past the town of Dolores, where it turns, flowing north and northwest. The Town of Dolores is a Statutory Town in Montezuma County, Colorado, United States. It flows through the Dolores River Canyon before receiving the San Miguel River (incidentally, both the Dolores and the San Miguel have their headwaters to either side of Lizard Head Pass) in Montrose County and crossing into Utah, where it joins the Colorado in Grand County near the Fisher Towers. The Dolores River Canyon is located in southwestern Colorado USA west of the town of Naturita and north of the town of Dove Creek. The San Miguel River is a tributary of the Dolores River, approximately 90 mi (145 km long in southwestern Colorado in the United States. Lizard Head Pass, elevation, is a Mountain pass in Colorado traversed by State Highway 145. Montrose County is the 16th most populous of the 64 counties of the State of Colorado of the United States. Grand County is a County located in the US state of Utah. As of 2000 the population was 8485 and by 2005 had been estimated at 8743

The river was explored and possibly named by Juan Maria Antonio Rivera during an 1765 expedition from Santa Fe. Juan Maria Antonio Rivera (also spelled Ribera) was an 18th century Spanish explorer who explored southwestern North America, including parts of Southern Year 1765 ( MDCCLXV) was a Common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Santa Fe ( Navajo: Yootó is the Capital of the state of New Mexico.

The Dolores is navigable by rafts and kayaks (up to class IV)from Macphee reservoir to its confluence with the Colorado. When water is restricted from the reservoir it may be possible to boat down stream from the San Miguel River. However the river is extensively used for irrigation and during low water years is wholly unnavigable.

In high-runoff years, the section from Bradfield Ranch near Cahone, Colorado down to Slickrock, Colorado, offers outstanding scenery, excellent camping, and terrific rapids for inflatables and kayaks. The section from Slickrock to Bedrock, Colorado goes through the goosenecks of a spectacular sandstone canyon with several mostly class II rapids.

See also