We trudged back to the dam entrance. This time there was no hitch. We zigzagged up the back of the dam to the top. What we saw there was an immense artificial lake, several kilometers wide and many kilometers long. The amount of concrete used to hold it there could cover all Philadelphia.
Steep mountains rise directly out of the lake.
The overwhelming impression is that of a moonscape. The mountainsides are bare and brown, and as they erode they are sending dirt and debris into the lake. But it means that the lake is silting up. Barely 15 years old, the dam is predicted only to last another 20 years. We drove along a ridge over the lake and then descended to the lakeside.