Lake Cahuilla

Prehistoric Lake Cahuilla (also known as Lake LeConte and Blake Sea) was an extensive freshwater lake that filled the Coachella, Imperial, and Mexicali valleys of southeastern California and northeastern Baja California during the centuries prior to Spanish entry into the region. The Salton Sea, now about long, wide, and at an elevation of 69 m (226 ft) below sea level), which was accidentally created in 1905, is a much smaller analog of its prehistoric predecessor Lake Cahuilla, that was about long, wide, and rising to above sea level, drowning the present sites of the cities of Mexicali, El Centro, and Indio.