I was intrigued by how the land here gradually rises up to the south, ending in steep gulches and dropping down to the Colorado River. (The gulches remind me of Alpine canyons, just like you'd see in the Swiss Alps, except they're a lot dryer. Which is why they're called gulches.)
It took a bit of research on the internet before I found out the rise is called the Roan Plateau. I also found out it's the site of a dispute over whether the BLM should allow oil and gas drilling. And from the looks of things, they went ahead and allowed it, because those cleared spots in the photo contain drilling rigs and industrial buildings.
The big gulch on the left, leading down to the Colorado River Valley, is Parachute Creek Canyon; the one to the right of it is the Roan Creek Valley. As for the...gulch?...valley?...in the center of the photo, I looked and looked and couldn't find a name for it. Every gulch that branches off from it has a name, but not the thing itself. I know that Piceance Creek runs through it, so it might be called Piceance Creek Basin, but I also know that the bigger basin that contains Roan Plateau is called Piceance Basin, so I don't know, and perhaps I never will.
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