1901: A Canyon Odyssey - The Infamous Stringdusters

There beneath the August sun

A daring survey undertaken on the fly

Colorado would request

Divert the river water west

For The Uncompahgre Valley was too dry

There’d been one attempt before

And they needed to know more

Than what Bryant saw from base camps on the rim

When the challenge whet their thirst

Two men planned to be the first

To take the canyon floor route cut from deep within

There’s only one way the water flows

Through a passage no one knows

Heading down the Canyon Black

They could never turn their back

Staring down the Barrel of the Gunnison

The Journey started as they planned

With support from a third man

Who hiked the the old trail high above the river’s hood

'til they came upon a Narrow

At the jaws of the Falls of Sorrow

With one way out, they took the only way they could

Diving deep into the churn

Maybe never to return

The pair could only hope to breathe the air again

The angry river turned and tossed

And the two might have been lost

Deep below the surface of the Gunnison

There’s only one way the water flows

Through a passage no one knows

Heading down the Canyon Black

They could never turn their back

Staring down the Barrel of the Gunnison

Gunnison!

Now the story has been told

And while the river still runs cold

The water gets to where it once had never been

As for whether they escaped

They made it out just bruised and scraped

The two men never would forget the Gunnison

There’s only one way the water flows

Through a passage no one knows

Heading down the Canyon Black

They could never turn their back

Staring down the Barrel of the Gunnison