"August 10 - We have been traveling through some very rocky places. It was so hot today that we picked some lemita to make a cool drink. Dominguez is sick with the rheumy flow. Another man has stomach trouble. Tonight we will make camp on the Mancos River."

"November 7 - For more than a week, we have been looking for a place to cross the Colorado River. It is just too wide. Today we finally found a spot. We had to cut steps down the side of the rock wall so the horses could climb down."

His journal tells about his explorations from Santa Fe to California in 1776-77. He never wrote when he was born, about his family, and, of course, he could not say when he died. His secretary copied his journal but now they don't know where the original is. The copy is in the Chicago Museum.

Many places were named after him. The things that were named after him are the Escalante Ruins of western Colorado, Escalante, Utah, the Escalante River, the staircase that they made for the horses is now the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

Escalante took fourteen men on the journey to horse-back ride to California. It was very cold so after a few months they turned around and went back. During the journey they took a route that was through the four corners.

So as you can see Silvestre Velez de Escalante is a very important person.

If you would like to learn more about Escalante's journey click here.

We got our information from:
Hispanic Colorado by Eleanor Ayer
an article in Colorado Kids Dig Up The Past by Christopher Puter
and from this Internet site.