In desperate search for a crossing of the Colorado River before winter storms further weakened them, Fathers Dominguez and Escalante led their starving expedition past this point on October 26, 1776. They spent five days near the present site of Lee's Ferry, four miles to the east, where two young members swam naked across the frigid river but returned barefoot and cold after their bundled clothing was swept away and they did not explore the canyons on the far side. Another attempt to cross on a log raft failed three times in the powerful current. Sustained only by the meat of one of their horses, the party followed a treacherous route above the Paria River and through a notch in the Echo Cliffs that Escalante described as impassable. On November 7, the expedition finally forded the river at the Crossing of the Fathers, now beneath Lake Powell. These first known Europeans to see this canyon country returned to Santa Fe in January 1777 after failing to find an overland route to Monterey, but their experience and detailed records broadened knowledge of this remote land on the edge of Spanish territory now called the Four Corners Region.