Well into the first half of the 19th century, the lonely land just east of the Sierra Nevada remained an enigma. While some explorers returned with stories of snow-covered mountains, pine forests, and rushing trout streams, others described the land as hell’s antechamber.

People also wondered what became of all the snow from the Sierra Nevada when it melted. The first Spaniards to arrive in the region believed the snow drained into a mighty river that crossed present-day Nevada and linked the heart of the continent with the Pacific Ocean. But the hoped-for waterway, which they called the San Buenaventura, was never found. It was left to John Charles Fremont, assigned in 1844 to chart the desolate land between the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevada, to discover the disappointing truth. Instead of feeding a great river, the snow from the Sierra Nevada drained onto the salt flats below, creating instant lakes and small rivers, many of which evaporated by summer. Left behind were shallow depressions filled with spiraling alkali dust. The enigma, it seemed, was solved: this land was little more than a forbidding desert.

Cathedral Gorge State Park, Nevada