USA 3 - VOBS



Filmkommentar und Wortschatzliste

The United States of America (3): The Rocky Mountains

Of all the 50 states in the United States of America, Colorado is considered by many to be the best example of a Rocky Mountain State.

Denver / Rocky Mountains / National Park

Beyond the skyscrapers of downtown Denver, the capital of Colorado, the snow capped peaks of the Rocky Mountains appear on the horizon.

Denver, often called the „Mile High City“, is situated right where the Great Plains rise towards the foothills and the Front Range of the Rockies.

The Rocky Mountains are a long broken chain of mountains, rising in the western part of the continent, from Alaska all the way down to Mexico.

They were formed between 60 to 70 Million years ago, around the same time the Dinosaurs became extinct.

A short 70 mile drive from Denver, through the Front Range, brings us to Rocky Mountain National Park.

When the first settlers crossed this continent, they had little time to worry about conservation or the enviroment. Today a system of National Parks does just that. It conserves areas of outstanding natural beauty throughout the United States.

Trail Ridge Road takes visitors up to snowfields and glaciers.

The Continental divide runs along these peaks and from here the great Colorado river starts his long journey to the Pacific.

The North

Yellowstone National Park

A two day trip takes us up north to the fantastic world of hot springs and geysirs, to Yellowstone National Park.

It’s the end of October and the huge crowds have gone, but still a few hopefully sit and wait for the eruption of Old Faithful, while in the parking lot, totally undisturbed, a coyote forages for a few leftovers from lunch.

Old Faithful is true to his name.

He erupts in a great burst of steam day by day, every 60 to 90 minutes.

Yellowstone National Park was born from the fires of volcanoes. It sits on a sunken volcanic plateau.

Hot water bubbles and gushes up through fractures in the earth’s crust.

When water from the surface filters down towards hot igneous rocks, it then bursts back up to the surface to form a hot spring or geysir.

Steamclouds dance in the cold autumn air.

On its way to the surface hot water transports minerals from inside the earth. In the cooling water of these shallow pools, the minerals form colorful deposits.

Grand Teton National Park

The peaks of the Grand Teton Range glow in the early dawn light.

Below them moose nibble on shrubs and trees in the meadows of the Teton National Park.

The Park is situated in a valley known as Jackson Hole. Hole simply being the name given to high-country valleys ringed by mountains.

Moose, bison and bears once roamed the continent, Today they only survive in the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem, which includes the Teton Range and Jackson Hole.

As the day progresses the moose will leave the open meadows and will disappear in the surrounding woods for the rest of the day.

Until the snow falls, the elk and mule deer will also remain in the security of the woods.

They’ll spend the winter at the bottom of Jackson Hole Valley.

When the first settlers came and fenced in this land for their livestock, thousands of wild animals starved to death.

Today part of the valley is set aside for the National Elk Refuge, where animals are fed in the winter.

It now acts as a buffer between the wilderness to the north and the ranches to the south of Jackson Hole.

Ranchers

At the end of fall, right before the first snowfall, the ranchers take their animals off the open range, herd them back to their own land.

Sorting out sixteen hundred head of cattle is hard work even for seasoned cowhands.

This herd consist of 800 pairs, a heifer with her calf.

They belong to two ranches south of Jackson Hole. These ranches are in an area where land values have skyrocketed over the past years.

Wyoming is the ninth-largest state in the Union, but the least populated. Only half a million people live here, and yet the wasteful use of land is causing problems.

Ranchers complain that more and more of good grazing land in the valleys is used to build houses, while livestock and wild animals compete for the remaining land. This escalates the ongoing conflict between ranchers and conservationists.

At the end of October cold and humid air from the northwest brings the first snowstorm to the northern part of the Rocky Mountains.

Many ranchers sell their livestock even though prices are now at their lowest.

These calves are going to a feedlot in Nebraska.

A representative of the Rancher Organization makes sure all animals being loaded belong to the Pfizer ranch, while the feedlot manager counts them and checks whether the animals he bought are well fed and healthy.

Southwest

Zion National Park / Tourism

Heading South through the Rockies the road repeatedly crosses the Continental Divide.

The first Europeans who ventured into these mountains were prospecting for gold and silver.

Today, that’s history.

Nowadays, deserted mining camps and ghost towns bring more tourists than prospectors to these valleys.

In the long run tourism will probably turn out to be more profitable anyway.

„.. in the nobility and beauty of the sculptures there is no comparison“ a geologist wrote in 1880 while travelling through this wild and rugged country of little-known canyons and plateaus.

The startling red and orange sandstone formations which have eroded into fantastic shapes and the spectacular cliff- and canyon landscape draw thousands of visitors to Zion National Park every year.

Spring break kicks off the travelling season, when Americans all over the country pack up the family and hit the roads.

„Where ‘re you going, man?“ – „Don’t know, but we got to go.“ Wrote Jack Kerouac in „On the Road“ and expressed the state of mind of an entire nation.

Heading southwest through the Rockies the land changes, from high peaks to flat mesas. Dry land too poor to support even a few head of cattle.

Often people have to drive a hundred miles and more to get from one little town to another.

When you get there, sometimes all you find are a few houses, a gas station, a motel and a quiet main street.

In a town like Sedona on the other hand, travelers crowd the sidewalks.

This small town has become a popular stopover on the trip through the canyons.

Hotels, motels and houses have filled the valley and they’re still building.

Space is not yet the real problem in the Southwest.

The problem in the Southwest is water.

Irrigation / Phoenix / The Desert

The first extended irrigation system in the Salt river valley was built by a native tribe called the Hohokam hundreds of years ago. Irrigation and this hot sub-tropical climate made it possible to bring in a harvest twice a year: corn, beans, pumpkins and cotton.

Farmers here still use irrigation to assure rich harvests, but fields are not what the valley of Phoenix is all about.

The water of the Salt River is used for fountains and in condominiums.

Phoenix, the blob that is eating Arizona, as the writer Edward Abbey called it, is today the sixth largest city in the USA and still growing.

There are now 2.8 million people living in the „Valley of the Sun“.

People come here on vacation, move here to retire and more and more companies move their operations to the Sun Belt.

Communities with names like Paradise Valley or Carefree have filled the valley and are now growing up mountains and into the desert.

1000 liters of water per day reportedly are used in an average household. This area is not home to the flower beds, but rather to the towering Saguaro cactus.

The saguaro prefers slopes, where water trickles down after a rainfall to the flat desert.

It grows so slowly, a sixty year old saguaro will reach only six feet.

It takes about a lifetime, 75 years for the characteristic arms to develop.

Grand Canyon / Lake Mead / Hoover Dam

Our flight over the desert at the western edge of the Colorado Plateau brings us to one of the earth’s great natural wonders, the incomparable Grand Canyon, carved by the Colorado River flowing below us.

The colored layers of rock reveal the fascinating geological profile of the earth.

The youngest layers at the top, the oldest ones, one mile below us, at the bottom of the canyon.

Because of human intervention, the river running along the bottom of the Grand Canyon is not the same river that flowed here just a few decades ago.

Back then, the river water varied tremendously over a yearly cycle.

Now the Glen Canyon Dam controls the water upstream, while downstream the water of the Colorado river flows into Lake Mead, an immense reservoir in the middle of the desert.

This man-made lake contains the water supply for Southern California and the communities of the Southwest.

The over seven-hundred-foot high concrete wall of the Hoover Dam was completed in 1935.

Hailed as one of the wonders of the world, the Hoover Dam controls the waters of the Colorado river and its seventeen gigantic generators supply electricity to Arizona, Southern Calfornia and to Las Vegas, Nevada.

Las Vegas

Las Vegas is more than a gamblers paradise today. It has become a theme park, a shop ‘til you drop destination just right for a family holiday.

In bright daylight, Las Vegas is a not very pretty city with enormous hotels where one million people live and work, many of them in the entertainment industry.

The gambling industry brings thirteen billion dollars a year. New casinos are springing up in the surrounding desert, along with golf courses.

Twenty-eight million Americans play golf.

Casinos and golf.

Will this be the future of the Rocky Mountains?

Indian Reservation

We head back to Arizona, to the small Kaibab Paiute Indian Reservation.

Much of the land in Arizona is owned by the native tribes. Reservations are self- governed tribal land.

Here we meet Ben Pikyavit.

„My name is Benn Pikyavit. I am a member of the Kaibab-Paiute tribe. I live here on the reservation. I, like a lot of people, live off the reservation at times.“

Like many other members of his tribe, however Ben has returned to live on the reservation, because there he can find everything he needs.

„...and this is where we all need to be. We need to listen. We need to slow down. We need to be able to grasp, what Mother Earth has provided for us.“

„To grasp what Mother Earth has provided for us“ - isn’t that something we should consider? It rings true, not only for National Parks and Indian reservations.

Vocabulary List / Wortschatzliste

Denver / Rocky Mountains / National Park

to consider - betrachten, erwägen, der Auffassung sein

beyond - jenseits, hinter (etwas)

skyscraper(s) - Hochhäuser

snow capped peaks - Schnee bedeckte Gipfel

to appear - erscheinen, auftauchen

Front Range - erste aufsteigende Gebirgskette

extinct - ausgestorben

conservation - Erhaltung, Bewahrung, Umweltschutz

to conserve - konservieren, erhalten

environment - Umwelt

glacier(s) - Gletscher

continental divide - kontinentale Wasserscheide

The North

Yellowstone National Park

geyser(s) - Geysir

eruption(s) - Ausbruch

parking lot - Parkplatz

undisturbed - ungestört

to forage - auf Futtersuche gehen

leftovers - Essensreste

to erupt - ausbrechen

volcano(es) - Vulkan

sunken volcanic - vulkanische Senke

plateau - Plateau

to bubble - sprudeln, blubbern

to gush - sprudeln, sich ergießen

fracture(s) - Bruch, Spalte, Riss

surface - Oberfläche

igneous rocks - Eruptivgestein

steam cloud(s) - Dampfwolke(n)

shallow pool(s) - flacher Teich

deposit(s) - Ablagerung(en)

Grand Teton National Park

Grand Teton Range - Grand Teton Massiv

to nibble - knabbern

meadow(s) - Wiesen

situated - gelegen, befindlich

hole - Loch, (i.d.F. Hochtal)

valley(s) - Tal

moose - Elch, Elche

to roam - umherwandern, umherschweifen

to include - beinhalten

progress, to progress - Fortschritt, voranschreiten

to remain - bleiben, bestehen bleiben

security - Sicherheit

starved to death - verhungern

wilderness - Wildnis

rancher(s) - Farmer, Viehzüchter

open range - offenes Gelände,

- i.d.F. staatl. Weideland

seasoned - i.d.F. erfahren

heifer - Kuh

to complain - sich beschweren

grazing land - Weideland

livestock - Vieh

to compete - wetteifern

humid - schwül, feucht

Southwest

Zion National Park / Tourism

to venture - unterfangen

prospecting - schürfen (Gold etc.)

deserted mining - verlassene Minencamps

camps

ghost town(s) - Geisterstadt

prospector(s) - Goldschürfer

profitable - ertragsreich, gewinnbringend

nobility - Adel, i.d.F. erhebend

comparison - Vergleich

rugged - hart, ausdauernd

to erode - abtragen

spectacular - überwältigend

travelling season - Reisesaison

entire - gesamt

main street(s) - Hauptstraße

traveler(s) - Reisender

stopover - Zwischenstopp

space - Platz

Irrigation / Phoenix / The Desert

to extend - erweitern

irrigation system - Bewässerungssystem

native - Einheimischer

native tribe - Indianer Stamm

irrigation - Bewässerung

harvest - Ernte

corn - Mais

beans - Bohnen

pumpkin(s) - Kürbis

cotton - Baumwolle

condominium(s) - Ferienhaus, Apartement

blob - Fleck, Haufen

average - Durchschnitt

to trickle - tröpfeln

Grand Canyon / Lake Mead / Hoover Dam

desert(s) - Wüste

incomparable - unvergleichlich

to carve - schnitzen, aushöhlen

human intervention - menschliche Eimmischung

varied tremendously - Schwankungen unterworfen sein, sich verändern

upstream - stromaufwärts

downstream - stromabwärts

reservoir(s) - Speichersee

to contain - beinhalten

community(ies) - Gemeinschaft(en), Wohnanlagen

concrete - Zement

to complete - fertig stellen

to hail - begrüßen, i.d.F. gesehen als

Las Vegas

gambler(s) - Glücksspieler

shop ‘til you drop - Einkaufen bis zum Umfallen

destination(s) - Reiseziel

entertainment(s) - Unterhaltungs(branche)

industry - Industrie, Geschäft

gambling industry - Glücksspielbranche

Indian Reservation

native tribe(s) - Indianischer Stamm

tribe - Stamm

to grasp - nehmen, benutzen, verstehen

to provide - zur Verfügung stellen

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