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Nestled beneath the rock-ribbed ridges of 14,269-foot Mount Antero, protected by the panoramic panoply of the soaring Collegiate Peaks, manifesting the vast verdant valley verging ever toward the enchanting and mysterious Sangre de Cristos, the Chaffee County Sanitary Landfill may well represent the finest of reasons for you to make the Heart of the Rockies your vacation headquarters, just as it is for the thousands of discriminating herring gulls who fly in every summer.
If you think that paragraph is the silliest piece of promotion you've seen since the last Kramer commercial or Strickland brochure, I agree. But I couldn't help writing it. I was overwhelmed by an attack of local chauvinism after reading about Moab, Utah.
Moab has plenty to promote -- Canyonlands and Arches national parks, the La Sal Mountains, and other canyons and cliffs I've wanted to see ever since reading The Monkey Wrench Gang -- but none of those natural wonders attracted enough attention. So the civic leaders now claim that Moab has the most scenic sanitary landfill in the United States, and a contest is planned.
This beauty contest for garbage dumps may or may not bring tourists to Moab, but it has already improved the reputation of dumps in general. The Bible refers to a place of weeping and gnashing of teeth, a place of eternal fire called Gehenna. Gehenna, another word for Hell, was the Jerusalem municipal dump. Until now, that was the only famous dump.
Leadville apparently plans to compete; its dump ought to offer some splendid views of Mounts Elbert and Massive, the two highest peaks in Colorado. I can't say for sure, because I've never visited the Lake County Landfill. They charge $10 for non-residents. That's too much if they expect it to become a tourist attraction.
The old Greeley dump was a delightful place for boys to hunt rats with .22 shorts, but I don't recall any splendid panoramas. Sometimes the sight of the Gore Range made dumping trash in Kremmling a little less unpleasant, but most days, the distant crags and summits were dimmed by haze from the sawmill. Even so, it was better than the view from the Longmont dump -- the Front Range occasionally visible through weak spots in the Brown Cloud.
With such limited personal experience, I checked the
library. All I discovered was David Lavender's mention of
the cliff-girt Ouray dump -- probably the loveliest dump
so far as natural setting went as existed in the United
States.
That's the judgment of an eminent historian,
but he was referring to events of 1890 when he published
his verdict in 1968. I found a more recent authority.
Allen Best now writes for the Vail Trail, but he once earned an honest living. He drove a garbage truck. With his extensive travels throughout the Rockies, his experience and his fine eye for scenery, he can evaluate dumps both esthetically and professionally.
The Moab dump can certainly hold its own,
Best
explained. It's probably the finest in Utah, and I can't
think of anything in Wyoming that might touch it. In
Colorado, though, we have a lot of scenic dumpsites. Yours
in Chaffee County is surely a contender. Ours in Eagle
County is no slouch when it comes to views, right up there
under the New York spur of the Sawatch Range, but the
access road might be tricky in the winter if you're driving
a five-ton garbage truck.
Best said his favorite is the Granby dump. There's no
single special thing in the view from there, but it's good
every way you look -- Byers Peak and the Vasquez wilderness
rearing up from Middle Park to the south, Parkview Peak
rising to the north, the Front Range with the Indian Peaks
walling you off on the east, lots of rolling timbered
country to the west. Granby is likely the one I'd choose if
it were up to me.
The election comes Tuesday, and I know I should be thinking about that. But the Red Sox lost, so I was in the dumps. My pickup was overflowing with trash, so I had to visit our scenic dump. As the campaign commercials came on the radio, I kept thinking it was a pity that we couldn't enter our entire state in the Moab contest. As far as many of the candidates have been concerned, Colorado has been nothing more than a magnificent place to dump garbage.
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