Cordona Lake

This long lake is the highest point of elevation of the Channel Lakes, located on a plateau on the eastern edge of the Zorinos Mountains. Just to the west is a low pass through the Zorinos Mountains, along which the Upper Sangre River begins a descent to the hills and plains beyond. Alcaldar engineers dug a winding channel through the pass so the waters of Cordona Lake could empty to the west to join the Upper Sangre River. Here they built a water gate and the first of the locks providing passage for ships. To the west, more locks were constructed along the course of the Upper Sangre, which eventually empties into Lake Odraga.
Water also flows out of the lake to the south via the River of Gold into Lake Aur. Beyond that, another series of locks completes the connection to the Great Ocean Ûthaf. Part of the genius of the Alcaldrich engineering is ensuring that the waters of Cordona Lake are always sufficiently high to keep water flowing through both the Upper Sangre and the River of Gold. This is helped by the fact that the lake is fed by many streams flowing from the northern Zorinos Mountains. Several small villages along its shores fish as well as grow crops, but they do not produce a tradable surplus.
An overland trade route exists from Cordona Lake to the Great Ocean Ûthaf, which was built and used for 140 years before Alcaldar gained the engineering knowledge and experience necessary to build the river locks that make the Channel Lakes so valuable. The Coast Road takes the shortest route from a tiny port village at the east end of the lake to the cliffs leading down to the sea. A series of tight switchbacks takes the road down to sea level where the small port town of Arenzana still clings to the edge of the ocean.

Type

Lake