A few days have passed since I’ve added to the blog—I guess I’ve been trying to cram in as much exploring as I could in my last few days of solo travel. Tomorrow, Monday, I leave Moab for Dove Creek, Colorado (about a two-hour drive) to join the Open Sky Wilderness people for Zara’s graduation. I’m very excited about seeing Zara, and before moving on to my next week with her in New Mexico I want to write about what I’ve been up to.
On Wednesday, Nov. 7th, I spent the day in Capitol Reef National Park. There’s a small historic district just inside the park called Fruita, appropriately enough, as it was settled in the late nineteenth century by Mormons who planted fruit orchards. Fruits grow throughout the warm months, and the orchards are open to visitors to come and pick their own cherries, apricots, peaches, pears, plums, mulberry, almonds, walnuts, and apples. Sadly, the last apples were gone by the time I got there. It was odd seeing all those orchards planted in neat rows in the middle of the desert.
I took the self-guided driving tour through Capitol Reef to get oriented, and stopped at the Oyler Mine. This former uranium mine was dug right into the cliffs in the early 1900s. It’s closed now, and doesn’t look like a place with a very good safety record, between the radioactive uranium and falling rocks. Radiation warning signs—and steel bars—keep nutty tourists from entering the tunnels.
I learned more in Capitol Reef about rock formations than in any other park. Like water into the rocks, it’s finally starting to seep in. There are lots of colorful illustrations that look like lopsided layer cakes, pointing out the different rock formations and which period they formed in, such as Jurassic or Triassic. I asked a park ranger to explain to me the relationship between a sand dune and a rock formation, since I remembered reading that these rocks were formed from sand dunes and also that sand dunes were eroded rocks. Turns out that both are right. Sand dunes blew into the area and became hardened with salt, silt, calcium, and other minerals that acted like glue to hold the sand dune together, turning it into a cliff. Over time, wind, water, and chemicals eroded the cliffs, turning them into sand. So, there’s your science lesson for the day. I guess it's not that different from the compost cycle, in principle.
I was happy to learn a new phrase that would perhaps serve as a good epithet: Shinarump Member. It’s a category of rock that forms in between the Moenkopi Formation and the hoodoos. Pop quiz in the morning.
There was an amazing road into Capitol Gorge, where the rock walls towered up on either side. I’m in danger of developing a sore jaw and a stiff neck from walking around open-mouthed, looking up. Signs alerted visitors to the presence of desert bighorn sheep grazing up on the rocky ledges, so I drove along at about 2MPH trawling for those big curved horns. The sheep didn’t indulge me that day.
At the deep end of Capitol Gorge, I hiked a wide trail that runs through a stream bed between the cliff walls. This was a pioneer road (after it was an Indian road)—the only one crossing the Waterpocket Fold until 1962—and numerous white folks carved their names and dates of passage into the rock on a section known as the Pioneer Register.
Later in the afternoon I visited Pleasant Creek, a perennially-running creek in some lovely meadows. As one of my local friends told me, it’s a nice break from the redrock when you need one. I sat on a rock by the creek, listened to the water, and cliff-watched. I’ve discovered on this trip that looking at rocks has the same hypnotic effort for me as looking at ocean waves. There’s always more coming, and every one is different. It’s very relaxing.
Back at the inn, I met some new visitors, including a couple hailing from New York City. All of us sat in the living room enjoying Snack Time (5PM sharp!) as we watched a spectacular sunset through the windows, and the New Yorkers and I went out for dinner together at a recently opened restaurant in nearby Bicknell (pop. 346—down from 353 in 2000). The Stag and Heather had opened with high European culinary ambitions, but apparently the clientele didn’t go for it so by the time we visited, the menu had changed from glazed duck breast in a port reduction to bison steaks with baked potato.
I was delighted to have some dinner company, and my friends from the inn were good companions and quite chatty. The waitress asked us about New York and what places she shouldn’t miss when she makes a visit there, and she introduced us to her sons, 16 and 14, who were helping in the kitchen. The older one, Alex, was responsible for grilling our steaks and kept it nice and rare. Austin, the 14-year-old, seemed to be in the mood for some commiseration over the sad state of being an adolescent, and I guess he figured we’d do. He came over with a very French attitude, his hands clasped at the small of his back, asking if there was anything we needed. The ipod cord dangling down his chest added a certain je ne sais quoi. He had a pleasant, open face with wide cheekbones and tightly curly hair that he wore in a Mohawk (is this all about Maddox Jolie-Pitt?).
We learned quickly that Austin hates cows, which is too bad since he has to take care of the family’s cattle. Apparently it is his unpleasant task to round up the cattle that jump the fence to graze near the canal outside their perfectly grassy pasture. Pigs aren't so bad. But he hates cows. Austin hates hiking, the outdoors, most sports including all sports played at his school, living on a farm, environmentalists, dirt bikers who ride roughshod over endangered cacti, the park rangers who won’t post signs telling you where the endangered cacti are—even though the bikers would probably still run over them just to piss off the environmentalists—and probably a lot of other things he forgot to mention. And, by the way, his house isn't a mansion—everyone thinks it is just because it's on top of a hill, but that's totally unfair because in reality his parents and one brother are stuffed into only five bedrooms. Music is the savior of Austin’s soul. But apparently it doesn’t always save him, because he mentioned (a bit proudly) that he has a habit of punching the wall when he gets angry, and now has five craters in his bedroom wall (but only the orange wall; he's kept the blue, green, and yellow walls intact). The last wall punch broke his wrist.
I asked if he'd considered an anger management class, and he said, well, that's okay, because I'm in counseling now. I guess the moral is you don’t have to be an overstressed New York City teenager to need counseling; Bicknell, UT holds its own challenges. Maybe the departure of disenchanted teenagers accounts for the recent 0.02% drop in population.
Eventually Austin’s mom came out and suggested with a friendly bop to his head that he go scrape some plates. He shook our hands very politely, said it had been nice talking with us, and ambled back to the kitchen, adjusting his ipod.
****
Thursday I left Capitol Reef, headed for Moab—my last stop before meeting up with Zara. Driving east on Highway 24, I passed two herds of pronghorn antelope. Since I've also seen plenty of mule deer, I am now officially home, home on the range.One of the people at Rosa’s school had told me not to miss Goblin Valley State Park along the way, so I made it a little side trip. I’d heard the park described as “a field of short chocolate mushrooms” but couldn’t really picture it. I rode over a hill and suddenly, before me, were the goblins.
The goblins are thousands of rock formations spread across a valley that looks a lot like a field of short chocolate mushrooms. Actually, some looked like potatoes, some looked like muppets. Visitors are free to wander through their midst, and as I walked out into the Valley of Goblins I burst out laughing. It was better than standup. I posted some photos of the little goblins, but it's possible you had to be there.
****
Friday turned out to be scariest day of my trip, not by design. Two national parks flank Moab: to the north, Arches; to the south and west, Canyonlands. Arches is a beautiful, user friendly place with nicely paved roads, maintained trails, and lots of signs. Canyonlands is 600 square miles of barely accessible wilderness divided into three districts (from most accessible to most remote): Island in the Sky, Needles, and The Maze. The Frommer’s Utah book pretty much tells you not to even bother with a short visit to Canyonlands because it’s impossible. But others have told me it’s beautiful and not to be missed, so I decided to take a day to visit Island in the Sky.
Yes, there is a paved road that goes there. And yes, that was my plan. But I read (or perhaps misread?) an official-looking sign on the highway pointing to Canyonlands, and I took that route. It started off on the Potash Road, which is a long, bumpy road running alongside a huge salt mine and processing plant; they used to mine potash there. A road had been cleared for trucks, and though it was a bumpy 4-wheel drive ride, I found it quite manageable. It was long though, long and slow. And then it ended at a road called the Shafer Trail that allegedly ran straight into Canyonlands. Or, I should say, straight up to Canyonlands. The Shafer Trail looked innocent at first, but it quickly devolved into a barely navigable dirt and rock path that snaked up the outside edge of a cliff. When I say barely navigable, I mean that I nearly threw up. I've gradually learned how to drive steep, narrow switchbacks slowly, but I had no experience hurtling over large boulders while doing so. Once I started climbing, there was no way to turn around.
The upside was that I finally met my desert bighorn sheep. As I crept up the inclines, I spotted a male and female on the road in front of me, grazing. They seemed indifferent to the mysterious stranger in the Ford Escape, so I turned off the car and sat watching them. The male never moved his head from the female’s behind, reminding me of a rhino couple I saw once at the Bronx Zoo. She ate, he rested his chin on her backside. She moved to another grassy spot, he repositioned his chin. When they finally decided to leave for greener pastures, they hopped one-at-a-time over the edge of the ridge in what would have been a death jump for anyone but an alpine sheep. It was like being in a scene from Bambi, without the hunters.
The only car I encountered on the Shafer Trail was one pulled over on the side; two mountain bikers were gearing up. I couldn’t believe they were going to bike this mountain. “Yeah,” the guy said, “we’re just gonna scope it out.” Keep those helmets on!
The views were extraordinary, and I stopped frequently to savor them. Also to delay getting back in the car and driving any further. At long last I reached the top and went straight to the visitor’s center, where I was ready to lodge a complaint with the ranger. I told him breathlessly that I’d just come up on the Shafer Trail, and had nearly collapsed with fear. He looked at me calmly, perhaps a little pitifully, and said, “Well, ya made it, didn’t ya?”
I was absolutely mortified to glance at a backroads guide book in a local bookstore yesterday and find the Shafer Trail marked “Easy.” Easy! Sure, if you’re driving a jeep with a parachute attachment. Van Brundt Street in Red Hook seems to be my threshold for uneven roadways, and there I have the incentive of Fairway at the end of the route.
Fortunately, Island in the Sky was worth the trouble. It got its name because it’s attached to the closest land by a thin neck just wide enough for a road. Once you cross the neck, it feels like you’re on top of the world, crossing golden meadows higher than all the mountains in the distance. The views are outrageous; you look down onto two distinct levels. The bottom level is the Colorado River and its basin; the middle one is the White Rim Mesa, named for the salty white surface that colors the entire rim. (According to the park literature, this area has been turned into an inland sea 29 times already.) There’s a path popular with cyclists that runs 100 miles along the White Rim; sometime I’d love to try it. On my way out of the park I stopped the car when a coyote stepped out in front of me. He looked blithely at me, probably hoping for some prosciutto-on-ciabatta scraps. I yelled at him to get out of the road, because he was really acting stupid, but he didn’t move. I did the only thing I could: took pictures.
The last stop on my drive was a state park called Dead Horse Point. Around here they like to call it their mini Grand Canyon. The official name, of course, came from an event in which a lot of horses ended up dead. Like Island in the Sky, you can only reach Dead Horse Point by crossing a narrow neck. Cowboys used to take advantage of this to trap wild palominos; they’d herd them out to the point, build a fence cutting off the only route out, and then pick and choose the horses they wanted to keep. (My question: who kept the horses amused while the other guys were building the fence?) One year the cowboys left the horses on the point and went down to the valley; for some reason they didn’t return soon enough. Although the horses may have been gazing down at the Colorado River 2000 feet below, they had no water and died of thirst. It certainly makes a catchy name for a park, and the views were splendid. My (paved) route back to Moab took me past a turnoff for “Horse Thief.” It’s a shame the Horse Thief didn’t get to Dead Horse Point before the horses died; he would have been a hero.
****
Saturday I rested, proving that I really am Jewish.
****
Today I hiked the Devil’s Garden trail in Arches. They really seem preoccupied with the dark side out here; so many places are named Hell’s This and Devil’s That. This trail is the longest maintained trail in the park, which isn’t saying a lot as it’s only seven miles with all the little optional detours (if you want to go the extra mile to see Partition Arch, Navajo Arch, Pine Tree Arch, Tunnel Arch and of course, Dark Angel Arch). Unlike the four other national parks in Utah, this one doesn’t have a lot of accessible back country. It's surrounded by beautiful land, though: the La Sal Mountain Range to the southeast and the Salt Valley to the north.
Ironically, after my humiliation at discovering Shafer’s Trail described as “Easy,” Devil’s Garden was marked “difficult” and posted with signs alerting hikers to dangerous, steep, primitive trails. I found it Easy, which suggests that I am a hardier hiker than I am a driver. It’s a good thing I live in a walking city.
I ate lunch at a picnic table in the Colorado River Recreation area, overlooking the green waters. The sky was gray and cloudy and a wind came up; after all the hot, blue-sky days, it was pleasant.
*****
Tomorrow morning my destination is the Shell station in Dove Creek, Colorado. There I’ll rendezvous with folks from Open Sky and ride with them in a caravan out to the wilderness. I would never find my way on my own, as the dirt roads are unmarked and fairly incomprehensible to me. A guide will be coming from Durango with the parents of the two other graduating students.
And tomorrow night, I’ll be sleeping outside with Zara. The nights have been going down to the low twenties, and Zara assures me that Open Sky’s winter-weight sleeping bags are nice and toasty, a treat as long as you don’t have to carry their weight on your back. I don’t, so that’s fine. I brought two pairs of long underwear, just in case.
I hope to write again here later in the week. Zara and I push off after graduation Tuesday afternoon and drive south to New Mexico, where neither of us has even been before. We’ll spend our first night at The Parlor Car B&B in Chama, a tiny town just over the border, and there Zara will have her first hot shower in ten weeks. We can only hope the water table will not have dropped precipitously by the time she’s dried off.
Thanks to all of you who've written to say you’re enjoying the blog and photos. I’ve enjoyed creating them, and it’s nice to keep in touch.
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
The Waterpocket Fold
I gained a whole new respect for the BQE today.
To travel the forty miles or so from from Boulder, UT (pop. 180) to Torrey UT (pop. 171), I had to make a choice. Take the obvious, well-paved Highway 12, location of North America’s most spectacular scenic vistas or go the backway via "Utah’s most popular back road", the Burr Trail Road. Highway 12 runs north and then east; the Burr Trail runs east and then north, intersecting with our old friend, the Bullfrog-Notom Road, straight into Route 24 near Torrey. I was torn; Route 12 would take me over Boulder Mountain, elevation 11,317 feet, through forests and canyons. The Burr Trail Road would take me via unpaved roads through the high desert wilderness, leading into Capitol Reef National Park. There I would pick up the Bullfrog-Notom Road and drive for nearly forty miles right up against the wall of the Waterpocket Fold, an amazing geological phenomenon in which the earth split open and created two shelves, one above the other, forming a 95-mile-long wall running north and south. Of course I was tempted by the Burr Trail, but I felt slightly imperiled by descriptions in the guidebooks of the “extremely steep, snaking switchbacks” which are “not for the fainthearted” because of the “vast dropoffs” from their unguarded, unpaved heights.
Hmmm. A young lady working at the lodge suggested that I take the Burr Trail only as far as it was paved, which would allow me great views, and then turn around and drive up to Boulder on lovely Route 12. It sounded like a perfect solution.
I headed out first to fill the tank, clean the windshields (a futile effort just before driving into the desert), and get some breakfast. I went to a little house with several gas pumps out front, called the Hills and Hollows. A truly old-school hippie establishment, they served delicious, homemade breakfast burritos and stocked all manner of organic foods and petroglyph refrigerator magnets in their grocery. I nuked a burrito and ate it at a little picnic table outside in the sun, to the accompaniment of two cats whining for black beans. They got nothing, but I saw them leap into the trash can after I tossed out my empty plate.
Heading out on the Burr Trail, I was filled with a sense of anticipation. It was, as always around here, very quiet. The scenery quickly became spectacular. It must seem like I’ve been gurgling about rocks for weeks now, which is true, but they really are amazing. As Charlie pointed out, it’s a geological wonderland out here. Each place has a different look and feel, even though the descriptions sound like a whole lotta rock.
I drove for about twenty miles to the end of the paved section, where I pulled over and looked over the edge of a mountain pass. The first car of the day, a small RV, chugged up the switchbacks. It seemed to be moving impossibly slowly. The RV made it to the top and the driver gave me a happy wave; it couldn’t be that bad. So I plowed forth, down the mountain, expressing out loud my gratitude that no one approached from the opposite direction, because there was no way I was moving any closer to the edge. From there on out the road was unpaved for a good forty miles. Much to my surprise, I hit a much larger mountain pass, with even more extreme switchbacks – this one called Muley Twist allegedly because even mules could get twisted up in it. An owner of the Boulder Mesa Grill, where I’d eaten yesterday, had told me that when I got to this overlook I had to get out of the car and yell as loudly as I could so I could hear the five echoes. I did as I was told. Standing on top of a big rock, I looked out for what seemed like a thousand miles and screamed at the top of my lungs. As promised, I screamed back five times, once from each facing cliff. It was pretty cool so I did it a few more times. Had I actually been screaming for help, the echo probably wouldn’t have been very reassuring, but in this circumstance it was exciting.
Then I took off down the switchbacks, holding my breath and exhaling after each hairpin.
At the bottom, I turned north onto the Bullfrog-Notom Road and bounced along through stretches of road buried in sand, rough areas that the highway patrol officially refers to as “washboard,” and a few more comfortable miles with gravel. The four-wheel-drive Escape hummed along, undeterred. That's when I had a vision of the potholed BQE, on the Brooklyn side of the Kosciuszko Bridge, and realized how I'd taken it for granted.
At the Notom Road I came face-to-face with the Waterpocket Fold, which I’d heard about but never seen. It looks a bit like a construction site dug by giants. There’s a lower wall on the west side of the fold, a much higher wall on the right, and a narrow opening in between. About 65 million years ago, the earth’s surface heaved and buckled, creating this surface wrinkle that runs almost 100 miles through south-central Utah. The earth opened up, pushed the rocks out, and left them there, This formation is called a monocline, which is a stairstep formation. Apparently, the Waterpocket Fold today is a sneeze compared to what it used to look like, due to the erosion of all these millennia. Billenia. Whatever. (I posted some photos on my Flickr site; they offer an understated idea of what the Fold looks like.)
Eventually a forest ranger passed by, but otherwise I passed only one other car during the three-hour journey. On "Utah’s most popular back road"!
*****
I stopped at the Capitol Reef National Park visitor center (Capitol for the capitol-like white dome monolith in the park; Reef as a name that 19th century pioneers gave to craggy land.) After picking up some maps and trail guides I headed for the Sky Ridge Inn, my destination for the night. The inn is a big house sitting atop a rise overlooking Torrey, and its windows offer glorious views and horizons on all sides. I was shown upstairs to my cozy room, The Pinon, decorated with Navajo rugs, a big animal pelt on the floor, and ironwork hangings representing petroglyphs, popular symbols in these parts. The innkeeper opened a door that looked to be a closet but instead gave on to a hot tub resting on a deck in the open air. Wow! The entire side was open, so that when I took a soak after sunset, I was able to lay in the hot water, locate the Big Dipper (pretty much the limit of my astronomy talents) and enjoy a sky full of stars.
We'd stayed at this inn on last June, when we were driving Rosa from Open Sky Wilderness to Falcon Ridge Ranch in southeast Utah. The innkeepers had seemed uptight and not very friendly, so I was a bit guarded today. The man, who calls himself “Jerr,” invited me to join them for snacks at 5PM.
I did wander down to the dining room a little after 5, where Jerr appeared to be sleeping in an upright position on the sofa, facing the sunset. I said hello, hoping not to startle him, and he showed me to a little sideboard of meatballs and several dips. His wife, Shauna, appeared, looking a bit nervous about having to stir up conversation with a lone guest.
I asked her how long she’d been here, and she said six years – she’d grown up near Salt Lake, left the state at 25, and expected never to come back, yet here she was. I was anticipating one of those glowing “how can you stay away from southern Utah” stories, but to my surprise when I asked her if she was glad to be back she said, “No, I don’t like it here. The inn’s for sale and we’re moving. I want to retire.” I immediately warmed to her. I asked her why she didn’t like Torrey, and she said it's too conservative. “The people here call their church ‘The Church,’ she said, referring to the Mormons. She then spoke scathingly of St. George as a “sweet little Mormon town” that she hated.
She went on to tell me that she and Jerr are a blended family with seven children (none in common) and eleven grandchildren ranging from mid-twenties to eighteen months. Before long, she mentioned that their daughter, mother of the eighteen-month-old baby, has a “partner,” which was code. “Yep,” she said, “this baby has two moms.” I congratulated her on her new grandchild, and she promptly pulled out a picture of little Sofia, mentioning that the sperm donor was Russian, which accounts for the child’s blond hair (?), although both moms are dark-haired.
When I mentioned my daughters having been part of a wilderness program, she asked if I meant Aspen, a wilderness therapy program in nearby Loa. I told her that they’d been at Open Sky, near the Colorado border. “Is this a program for at-risk kids?” she asked. I told her that it is, and she explained that she teaches a parenting class at the local school and God only knows how her children survived her, as she hadn’t the tiniest idea what she was doing while she was raising them.
After a little while she excused herself to attend to her and Jerr’s dinner and I retired to my cozy room with cup of chamomile tea.
To travel the forty miles or so from from Boulder, UT (pop. 180) to Torrey UT (pop. 171), I had to make a choice. Take the obvious, well-paved Highway 12, location of North America’s most spectacular scenic vistas or go the backway via "Utah’s most popular back road", the Burr Trail Road. Highway 12 runs north and then east; the Burr Trail runs east and then north, intersecting with our old friend, the Bullfrog-Notom Road, straight into Route 24 near Torrey. I was torn; Route 12 would take me over Boulder Mountain, elevation 11,317 feet, through forests and canyons. The Burr Trail Road would take me via unpaved roads through the high desert wilderness, leading into Capitol Reef National Park. There I would pick up the Bullfrog-Notom Road and drive for nearly forty miles right up against the wall of the Waterpocket Fold, an amazing geological phenomenon in which the earth split open and created two shelves, one above the other, forming a 95-mile-long wall running north and south. Of course I was tempted by the Burr Trail, but I felt slightly imperiled by descriptions in the guidebooks of the “extremely steep, snaking switchbacks” which are “not for the fainthearted” because of the “vast dropoffs” from their unguarded, unpaved heights.
Hmmm. A young lady working at the lodge suggested that I take the Burr Trail only as far as it was paved, which would allow me great views, and then turn around and drive up to Boulder on lovely Route 12. It sounded like a perfect solution.
I headed out first to fill the tank, clean the windshields (a futile effort just before driving into the desert), and get some breakfast. I went to a little house with several gas pumps out front, called the Hills and Hollows. A truly old-school hippie establishment, they served delicious, homemade breakfast burritos and stocked all manner of organic foods and petroglyph refrigerator magnets in their grocery. I nuked a burrito and ate it at a little picnic table outside in the sun, to the accompaniment of two cats whining for black beans. They got nothing, but I saw them leap into the trash can after I tossed out my empty plate.
Heading out on the Burr Trail, I was filled with a sense of anticipation. It was, as always around here, very quiet. The scenery quickly became spectacular. It must seem like I’ve been gurgling about rocks for weeks now, which is true, but they really are amazing. As Charlie pointed out, it’s a geological wonderland out here. Each place has a different look and feel, even though the descriptions sound like a whole lotta rock.
I drove for about twenty miles to the end of the paved section, where I pulled over and looked over the edge of a mountain pass. The first car of the day, a small RV, chugged up the switchbacks. It seemed to be moving impossibly slowly. The RV made it to the top and the driver gave me a happy wave; it couldn’t be that bad. So I plowed forth, down the mountain, expressing out loud my gratitude that no one approached from the opposite direction, because there was no way I was moving any closer to the edge. From there on out the road was unpaved for a good forty miles. Much to my surprise, I hit a much larger mountain pass, with even more extreme switchbacks – this one called Muley Twist allegedly because even mules could get twisted up in it. An owner of the Boulder Mesa Grill, where I’d eaten yesterday, had told me that when I got to this overlook I had to get out of the car and yell as loudly as I could so I could hear the five echoes. I did as I was told. Standing on top of a big rock, I looked out for what seemed like a thousand miles and screamed at the top of my lungs. As promised, I screamed back five times, once from each facing cliff. It was pretty cool so I did it a few more times. Had I actually been screaming for help, the echo probably wouldn’t have been very reassuring, but in this circumstance it was exciting.
Then I took off down the switchbacks, holding my breath and exhaling after each hairpin.
At the bottom, I turned north onto the Bullfrog-Notom Road and bounced along through stretches of road buried in sand, rough areas that the highway patrol officially refers to as “washboard,” and a few more comfortable miles with gravel. The four-wheel-drive Escape hummed along, undeterred. That's when I had a vision of the potholed BQE, on the Brooklyn side of the Kosciuszko Bridge, and realized how I'd taken it for granted.
At the Notom Road I came face-to-face with the Waterpocket Fold, which I’d heard about but never seen. It looks a bit like a construction site dug by giants. There’s a lower wall on the west side of the fold, a much higher wall on the right, and a narrow opening in between. About 65 million years ago, the earth’s surface heaved and buckled, creating this surface wrinkle that runs almost 100 miles through south-central Utah. The earth opened up, pushed the rocks out, and left them there, This formation is called a monocline, which is a stairstep formation. Apparently, the Waterpocket Fold today is a sneeze compared to what it used to look like, due to the erosion of all these millennia. Billenia. Whatever. (I posted some photos on my Flickr site; they offer an understated idea of what the Fold looks like.)
Eventually a forest ranger passed by, but otherwise I passed only one other car during the three-hour journey. On "Utah’s most popular back road"!
*****
I stopped at the Capitol Reef National Park visitor center (Capitol for the capitol-like white dome monolith in the park; Reef as a name that 19th century pioneers gave to craggy land.) After picking up some maps and trail guides I headed for the Sky Ridge Inn, my destination for the night. The inn is a big house sitting atop a rise overlooking Torrey, and its windows offer glorious views and horizons on all sides. I was shown upstairs to my cozy room, The Pinon, decorated with Navajo rugs, a big animal pelt on the floor, and ironwork hangings representing petroglyphs, popular symbols in these parts. The innkeeper opened a door that looked to be a closet but instead gave on to a hot tub resting on a deck in the open air. Wow! The entire side was open, so that when I took a soak after sunset, I was able to lay in the hot water, locate the Big Dipper (pretty much the limit of my astronomy talents) and enjoy a sky full of stars.
We'd stayed at this inn on last June, when we were driving Rosa from Open Sky Wilderness to Falcon Ridge Ranch in southeast Utah. The innkeepers had seemed uptight and not very friendly, so I was a bit guarded today. The man, who calls himself “Jerr,” invited me to join them for snacks at 5PM.
I did wander down to the dining room a little after 5, where Jerr appeared to be sleeping in an upright position on the sofa, facing the sunset. I said hello, hoping not to startle him, and he showed me to a little sideboard of meatballs and several dips. His wife, Shauna, appeared, looking a bit nervous about having to stir up conversation with a lone guest.
I asked her how long she’d been here, and she said six years – she’d grown up near Salt Lake, left the state at 25, and expected never to come back, yet here she was. I was anticipating one of those glowing “how can you stay away from southern Utah” stories, but to my surprise when I asked her if she was glad to be back she said, “No, I don’t like it here. The inn’s for sale and we’re moving. I want to retire.” I immediately warmed to her. I asked her why she didn’t like Torrey, and she said it's too conservative. “The people here call their church ‘The Church,’ she said, referring to the Mormons. She then spoke scathingly of St. George as a “sweet little Mormon town” that she hated.
She went on to tell me that she and Jerr are a blended family with seven children (none in common) and eleven grandchildren ranging from mid-twenties to eighteen months. Before long, she mentioned that their daughter, mother of the eighteen-month-old baby, has a “partner,” which was code. “Yep,” she said, “this baby has two moms.” I congratulated her on her new grandchild, and she promptly pulled out a picture of little Sofia, mentioning that the sperm donor was Russian, which accounts for the child’s blond hair (?), although both moms are dark-haired.
When I mentioned my daughters having been part of a wilderness program, she asked if I meant Aspen, a wilderness therapy program in nearby Loa. I told her that they’d been at Open Sky, near the Colorado border. “Is this a program for at-risk kids?” she asked. I told her that it is, and she explained that she teaches a parenting class at the local school and God only knows how her children survived her, as she hadn’t the tiniest idea what she was doing while she was raising them.
After a little while she excused herself to attend to her and Jerr’s dinner and I retired to my cozy room with cup of chamomile tea.
Monday, November 5, 2007
From Bryce to Boulder—and Hell's Backbone Bridge
I’m feeling homesick tonight, but I’ve had a wonderful few days.
Saturday, 11/3, was my last day in the Bryce Canyon area. I decided to go for a hike in Red Canyon, a nearby park that is part of Dixie National Forest. The Golden Wall trail, recommended to me by a Bryce Canyon ranger, took me in and out of three canyons over about six miles. It took me a good five hours, and was really fun. It was the first day since the beginning of the trip that I was able to hike without substantial discomfort, and so I felt lightfooted and happy. It may have been the particular combination of bandaids, moleskin, and adhesive tape on my blistered heel, or that the arthritis in my left foot was at bay. But my gait felt natural and easy and it was great fun going through the canyons.
Once again, I hardly ran into anyone – just one couple eating lunch along the trail. The path wound along the edges of red rock mountains, and was often hard for me to identify. Imagine walking a long a mountainside covered with red rocks, sized anywhere from gravel to boulders. The path is about 12 inches wide and not really level, covered with slightly smaller gravel than the surrounding area. It’s easy to get diverted by gullies that look just like the trail, or by following footsteps created by hikers who took detours. I found myself off the trail at least four times and had to retrace my steps to find it again. The signposts in this part of Red Canyon are not very helpful; I’d hike for two miles and come upon a little wooden sign that read “TRAIL.” Following a path that, according to the map, formed part of a big loop, I found myself at the summit of a mountain in front of a sign that said “TRAIL END.” Grateful to have a reasonably good sense of direction, I managed to find my way back to civilization before sundown.
Sunday morning I packed up and left Ruby’s Inn to begin my drive eastward to Boulder, Utah. My route took me along Scenic Byway 12, an amazing feat of engineering that carries you along narrow, winding ridges through sandstone cliffs. The 30-mile segment between Escalante and Boulder is considered one of the most beautiful highways in the country. Glad to have only an 80-mile trip from Bryce to Boulder, I took my time, enjoyed the views, and stopped at two parks en route for hikes. An interpretive sign at one vista claimed that it was one of the largest areas of wilderness anywhere on the continent, and that if you came there on a moonless night you would see no artificial light at all, for hundreds of miles.
My first stop was at Kodachrome State Park, twenty miles or so east of Bryce. I took a trail and once again lost it several times. But a nice man and woman from Wyoming were sharper than me and kept finding the trail that I lost. They were moving to Phoenix; they said they didn’t like the Wyoming wind anymore.
My second stop was Escalante State Park, which is known for its abundant petrified wood. I didn’t really know what was special about petrified wood until I saw it there; it looks more like rock than wood and is colored like gemstones. The hike I took led me up and down a mountain dotted with bench-sized hunks of this colorful wood.
I arrived at Boulder Mountain Lodge and discovered it to be a lovely, rustic ecotourism spot. Quiet and nicely blending with the surrounding landscape of mountains and farms, it is simple and quiet but extremely comfortable. The grounds include an 11-acre bird sanctuary that comes right up to my porch. The ducks are diving for dinner and the grasses are golden. On the property is the Hell’s Backbone Grill, a destination restaurant (if you’re in southern Utah) specializing in local organic food. Boulder is a tiny town, with just a couple hundred residents; it was the last town in the United States to receive its mail by pack mule.
Last night I went to the Grill and ordered the pork chop, which was the best pork chop I have ever eaten. It actually tasted like meat. I am certain that this pig spent its days grazing the hills and its nights watching HBO on Demand. It was a happy, juicy, flavorful pig. Tonight I went back to the restaurant for dinner but was disappointed; perhaps Monday nights the chef is off. The meal was fine but not memorable, and seemed overpriced.
Today I hiked the Lower Calf Creek Falls trail, which is well known in this area and tends to attract large crowds in the summertime. Today, however, there were just a few people, and the walk was beautiful. It ran along the bank of Calf Creek, inside a big, grassy valley surrounded by those outrageous Utah mountains. As I began the hike I encountered a sign that warned: “RATTLESNAKES LIVE HERE. Give them a wide berth and do not attempt to pick them up.”
So counterintuitive! My guidebook elaborated: “If you come across a dead or decapitated rattlesnake, do not touch it. Reflex snakebites are as damaging as those from a live snake,” It went on in encouraging tones: “Do not let your fear of rattlesnakes deter you from enjoying this beautiful landscape.”
I carefully followed the directions to avoid blindly reaching behind any rocks, and all went well. The trail was sunny and beautiful; the waterfall at the end of the trail was breathtaking. Crashing from a high mountain, it flowed into a clear pool at the bottom and ran on to form Calf Creek. Trout swam in the clear waters. Out on the trail it was hot and bright; by the falls it was cool and windy, a whole different climate. People put on the fleece jackets they’d been carrying in their packs, and no one, including me, stayed in there to eat lunch. But it was lovely to be there.
After the hike, which was about six miles, I decided to take a ride on Hell’s Backbone Road. The entire route runs for 45 miles through the Box-Death Hollow Wilderness (cheerful!); it’s especially known for the Hell’s Backbone Bridge, a 1930s construction feat that bridges a 9,000-foot high crevasse that looks like a giant gash in the earth. The bridge is exactly wide enough for one car, and hangs across a vast chasm. I drove about fifteen miles from Boulder to the bridge; it was impossible, on the gravel road, to go much faster than 20MPH. The road twisted along the rim of the mountains, rarely wide enough for two cars to pass each other, and climbed higher and higher. The temperature dropped twenty degrees during my ride up the mountain, which took close to an hour. I never passed another car during my trip, which scared me a little but was also a relief, since I couldn’t imagine how we’d get by one another. At the bridge I parked and walked around, overwhelmed by the chasm below that is so appropriately named Hell’s Backbone. The drive took a lot of courage for me, and total concentration; I stopped just before crossing the bridge. The sun was setting and I had no idea how much farther I’d have to drive before finding another place to turn around. I didn’t want to be on that road in the dark. I executed the most careful three-point-turn of my life, moving in tiny increments to keep away from the cliff edge. I’m sure that locals take Hell’s Backbone Road in stride; I was holding my breath the whole time. Seeing the view from the bridge was really worth it.
Tomorrow morning, I leave Boulder and head out to Capitol Reef National Park in Torrey, UT.
Saturday, 11/3, was my last day in the Bryce Canyon area. I decided to go for a hike in Red Canyon, a nearby park that is part of Dixie National Forest. The Golden Wall trail, recommended to me by a Bryce Canyon ranger, took me in and out of three canyons over about six miles. It took me a good five hours, and was really fun. It was the first day since the beginning of the trip that I was able to hike without substantial discomfort, and so I felt lightfooted and happy. It may have been the particular combination of bandaids, moleskin, and adhesive tape on my blistered heel, or that the arthritis in my left foot was at bay. But my gait felt natural and easy and it was great fun going through the canyons.
Once again, I hardly ran into anyone – just one couple eating lunch along the trail. The path wound along the edges of red rock mountains, and was often hard for me to identify. Imagine walking a long a mountainside covered with red rocks, sized anywhere from gravel to boulders. The path is about 12 inches wide and not really level, covered with slightly smaller gravel than the surrounding area. It’s easy to get diverted by gullies that look just like the trail, or by following footsteps created by hikers who took detours. I found myself off the trail at least four times and had to retrace my steps to find it again. The signposts in this part of Red Canyon are not very helpful; I’d hike for two miles and come upon a little wooden sign that read “TRAIL.” Following a path that, according to the map, formed part of a big loop, I found myself at the summit of a mountain in front of a sign that said “TRAIL END.” Grateful to have a reasonably good sense of direction, I managed to find my way back to civilization before sundown.
Sunday morning I packed up and left Ruby’s Inn to begin my drive eastward to Boulder, Utah. My route took me along Scenic Byway 12, an amazing feat of engineering that carries you along narrow, winding ridges through sandstone cliffs. The 30-mile segment between Escalante and Boulder is considered one of the most beautiful highways in the country. Glad to have only an 80-mile trip from Bryce to Boulder, I took my time, enjoyed the views, and stopped at two parks en route for hikes. An interpretive sign at one vista claimed that it was one of the largest areas of wilderness anywhere on the continent, and that if you came there on a moonless night you would see no artificial light at all, for hundreds of miles.
My first stop was at Kodachrome State Park, twenty miles or so east of Bryce. I took a trail and once again lost it several times. But a nice man and woman from Wyoming were sharper than me and kept finding the trail that I lost. They were moving to Phoenix; they said they didn’t like the Wyoming wind anymore.
My second stop was Escalante State Park, which is known for its abundant petrified wood. I didn’t really know what was special about petrified wood until I saw it there; it looks more like rock than wood and is colored like gemstones. The hike I took led me up and down a mountain dotted with bench-sized hunks of this colorful wood.
I arrived at Boulder Mountain Lodge and discovered it to be a lovely, rustic ecotourism spot. Quiet and nicely blending with the surrounding landscape of mountains and farms, it is simple and quiet but extremely comfortable. The grounds include an 11-acre bird sanctuary that comes right up to my porch. The ducks are diving for dinner and the grasses are golden. On the property is the Hell’s Backbone Grill, a destination restaurant (if you’re in southern Utah) specializing in local organic food. Boulder is a tiny town, with just a couple hundred residents; it was the last town in the United States to receive its mail by pack mule.
Last night I went to the Grill and ordered the pork chop, which was the best pork chop I have ever eaten. It actually tasted like meat. I am certain that this pig spent its days grazing the hills and its nights watching HBO on Demand. It was a happy, juicy, flavorful pig. Tonight I went back to the restaurant for dinner but was disappointed; perhaps Monday nights the chef is off. The meal was fine but not memorable, and seemed overpriced.
Today I hiked the Lower Calf Creek Falls trail, which is well known in this area and tends to attract large crowds in the summertime. Today, however, there were just a few people, and the walk was beautiful. It ran along the bank of Calf Creek, inside a big, grassy valley surrounded by those outrageous Utah mountains. As I began the hike I encountered a sign that warned: “RATTLESNAKES LIVE HERE. Give them a wide berth and do not attempt to pick them up.”
So counterintuitive! My guidebook elaborated: “If you come across a dead or decapitated rattlesnake, do not touch it. Reflex snakebites are as damaging as those from a live snake,” It went on in encouraging tones: “Do not let your fear of rattlesnakes deter you from enjoying this beautiful landscape.”
I carefully followed the directions to avoid blindly reaching behind any rocks, and all went well. The trail was sunny and beautiful; the waterfall at the end of the trail was breathtaking. Crashing from a high mountain, it flowed into a clear pool at the bottom and ran on to form Calf Creek. Trout swam in the clear waters. Out on the trail it was hot and bright; by the falls it was cool and windy, a whole different climate. People put on the fleece jackets they’d been carrying in their packs, and no one, including me, stayed in there to eat lunch. But it was lovely to be there.
After the hike, which was about six miles, I decided to take a ride on Hell’s Backbone Road. The entire route runs for 45 miles through the Box-Death Hollow Wilderness (cheerful!); it’s especially known for the Hell’s Backbone Bridge, a 1930s construction feat that bridges a 9,000-foot high crevasse that looks like a giant gash in the earth. The bridge is exactly wide enough for one car, and hangs across a vast chasm. I drove about fifteen miles from Boulder to the bridge; it was impossible, on the gravel road, to go much faster than 20MPH. The road twisted along the rim of the mountains, rarely wide enough for two cars to pass each other, and climbed higher and higher. The temperature dropped twenty degrees during my ride up the mountain, which took close to an hour. I never passed another car during my trip, which scared me a little but was also a relief, since I couldn’t imagine how we’d get by one another. At the bridge I parked and walked around, overwhelmed by the chasm below that is so appropriately named Hell’s Backbone. The drive took a lot of courage for me, and total concentration; I stopped just before crossing the bridge. The sun was setting and I had no idea how much farther I’d have to drive before finding another place to turn around. I didn’t want to be on that road in the dark. I executed the most careful three-point-turn of my life, moving in tiny increments to keep away from the cliff edge. I’m sure that locals take Hell’s Backbone Road in stride; I was holding my breath the whole time. Seeing the view from the bridge was really worth it.
Tomorrow morning, I leave Boulder and head out to Capitol Reef National Park in Torrey, UT.
Friday, November 2, 2007
Ruby's Inn
It’s been a few days since my last entry, although I’ve continued to post new pictures each day. I’m at Ruby’s Inn, the sprawling hotel just outside the entrance to Bryce Canyon National Park.
By the way, I'd love it if you left a comment (link at the end of each entry). It would definitely liven up the blog!
My first day here, Halloween, I went for a hike (inside the park) in a place called Fairyland Canyon. Places are rather fancifully named here, but you could really see how this one got christened Fairyland. Smaller and more intimate than some of the huge canyons like the Bryce Amphitheater, it looked a magical land dreamed up by someone who loves the color pink.
This hike was not a hike for the faint hearted. It was over eight miles, and took me down into the bottom of the canyon. I had to hike back out, too, which was the real kicker. The trail has lots of switchbacks so you’re not going straight up or down hill (you’d just slide the whole way), but it was a serious workout. The views and surroundings were just breathtaking, though, and kept me occupied. I didn’t run into anyone at all for the first two hours I was out, and then I passed just a handful of hikers walking in the opposite direction. That was really lovely, having the place practically to myself.
Speaking of which, I had a moment of panic at the beginning of my trip before I parted with Charlie, thinking about my physical safety when hiking alone on rather remote trails. I know that my odds of any harassment are far lower here than in Brooklyn, but still it unsettled me. Charlie suggested that I carry some pepper spray, which perked me up quite a lot. We were still in Virgin, UT at the time, visiting Rosa at Falcon Ridge, and I immediately thought of Karen, Falcon’s case manager, as the best person to direct us to a pepper spray retailer.
A hefty, hearty, maternal 50-something Utahan with a headful of curly brown hair, Karen was more than happy to assist. She didn’t seem fazed in the least that I was in search of a self-defense device, and offered to call Sportsman’s Warehouse in St. George to see if they carried my product. A salesman named Mike answered her call and they chatted amiably for several minutes, after which Karen informed me that pepper spray was available in not one but two of the store’s departments, and I would have a choice of over a dozen types. Wow!
Charlie and I set off for Sportsman’s Warehouse, which was kind of a cross between an outdoorsman’s Target and what LL Bean looked like in 1971. Not at all fancy or chic in the Patagonia fashion, but full of useful items for fly fishing, elk hunting, and dirty work around the corral. Mike wasn’t there so a droll man named John showed us an entire wall display of pepper sprays. A number of them were high-powered, designed for bear. It struck me as a bad idea to spray a bear with something disagreeable, but then I wasn’t worried about bear. We chose a canister that seemed geared to deflecting unsavory humans, and John assured me it was good for at least 35 actions, although he certainly hoped I’d never have to use it once. I like my pepper spray a lot. It has a clip so I can hang it from a belt loop, always at the ready. So far the most annoying encounters I’ve had are with small children who are tired of walking uphill, but it’s good to know that if I needed to defend myself, I could. At least until my attacker got hold of my pepper spray.
When I reported to Karen that our mission was successful, she eagerly asked if I’d purchased the 90 mile per hour edition, and sounded sorely disappointed when I told her I had not.
Yesterday I went on a little adventure, canister on my belt loop. I decided to take a ride down one of those unofficial-looking gravel roads that kick up huge clouds of dirt as you drive along. This particular gravel road was identified on my BLM map (for you urban greenhorns, that’s Bureau of Land Management) as the road to Tropic Reservoir; its full name was the East Fork of the Sevier River Backway. That sounded good. I never take these kind of roads, mostly because I assume that I’ll get stranded fourteen miles in with a flat tire and run out of water before anyone realizes I'm missing. Perhaps I took Into the Wild a little too personally. But I’m driving a car designed especially for roads like this, and I’m armed – well, not for bear but at least for prairie dogs, so I decided to give it a go. It was fun! The huge brown cloud of dust following my car made me feel invincible. The road was very pretty, and I was surprised to come upon the green waters of Tropic Reservoir. Set in a meadow with piney woods nearby, it didn’t look at all like the desert that is most of this region. Not a car was in sight, not a soul was there. I parked and sat by the water for a while, enjoying the tranquility and listening to the songbirds.
A sheriff’s SUV passed me as I drove out, leading me to suspect that if I had gotten stranded with a flat he probably would have found me, and probably within the hour.
****
NEWSFLASH: According to my guide, the town of Hatch was, in fact, settled in the 1870s by a Mr. and Mrs. Hatch! So I guess the fact that Hatch has a hatchery is merely coincidence.
****
After my journey to Tropic Reservoir I wanted to roam a little further so I drove a few miles east to Red Canyon, part of the vast Dixie National Forest. It’s funny how every park out here is very rock-driven, yet each one is unique. Zion is massive and masculine (or butch, if you prefer); Bryce is delicate, filled with spires; Red Canyon looks like a toy land, and is by far the reddest rock around. Seriously red. Not coral, not pink, not orange, but actually red. The park is officially closed now for the season, but except for the shuttered visitors’ center it’s perfectly accessible.
I took a hike that kept leading me to better and better lookouts. The park management had thoughtfully placed benches at various points along the trail, and posted signs identifying the shape of the path you were walking on, such as Serpent and Camel. Again, I was the only person in the entire park. Not a soul on the trails, not a car in the lot. Amazing! The sinking sun cast that outrageous golden light all over the red hills, making the whole place look like one of those cheesy biblical paintings of the promised land. I took another trail. I just didn’t want to leave the park.
Not wanting to find myself navigating Serpent in the dark, I finally tore myself away. I stopped on my way home at a place called Foster’s, which is a motel, restaurant, and store with a bakery. An old, overweight dog came ambling over to me when I got out of the car, and I bent down to pet him. He was delighted. Back in the car, I noticed a noxious smell; a quick sniff of my hand told me right away that that dog hadn’t had a bath in a long time.
After washing my hands, I went for dinner at the fabulous Ruby's Inn Cowboy Buffet. Hundreds of people – essentially every visitor within twenty miles of Bryce – go there to eat, and they’re hungry. There is a menu, but it doesn’t look promising (would you really want to order lobster in the middle of Utah?). Most everyone gets dinner at the buffet.
The buffet is a festival of starches and sugars, from jello salad to corn, carrots, potatoes, beans, rice, cornbread, and rolls. But there is a green salad, composed primarily of iceberg lettuce, and there is roast chicken, and that makes a good dinner for me. I couldn’t resist tasting the chocolate sheet cake, but it was awful and not worth eating. I elected to bypass the trembling vats of pudding.
On my way through the main lobby, I hear a man talking on his cell phone. He’s sitting on a bench, and he’s wearing cowboy boots. From the rising indignation in his voice, I get the impression he’s staving off a creditor. “Hey, you know it’s been a bad year! Ever since we turned the cattle out in the spring, the grass has been dry!” This is an angle I haven’t overheard on DeKalb Avenue.
I stop off at the grocery store to pick up some milk for breakfast, and the cashier launches into a conversation with me. The workers in the vast complex of shops at Ruby’s Inn are slowly dying of boredom because at this time of year so few people wander in. The cashier asks me where I’m from, and tells me that just a week ago, carrying a 50-pound pack, she hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and back up, on a trail that hasn’t been maintained in eighty years. She wasn’t able to get a permit for one of the better trails because they were too full. This woman is probably ten years older than me. “Wow! How are you feeling?” I ask her. “I had to do it now, or I would never have done it,” she replies. With a big smile, she hands me my milk. “My back is killing me,” she says.
Today I went for a hike on a combination of two Bryce trails: the Navajo Loop and the Queen’s Garden. The Queen’s Garden is supposedly named for a rock formation that reminded someone of Queen Victoria, but despite my efforts I could not pick it out of the crowd. I asked some passing hikers if they’d spotted the queen, and they all waved vaguely in another direction, saying something like, “Oh, I think you can only see her from over there.” The beginning of the Navajo Loop consisted of an amazing descent called Wall Street, for obvious reasons. But not only does it rise hugely on either side of the path, it also goes down, down, down into the canyon. It was very exciting. I’ve posted some photos of it on my Flickr site, but I have to say it’s hard to capture the scale with my camera.
After my hike I drove to Inspiration Point, where a sign stated "Elevation: 8100 feet." I thought Inspiration Point would be a nice vista that you could enjoy from the parking area, but as it turned out I had to walk up a very steep trail. It was worth the ascent. At the very top was an outcropping of rock with a fence at the end, suspended over the canyon. A small girl named Margo Rose arrived with her family on the viewing platform, stared at me resentfully as I sipped my water, and declared loudly, “I’m thirsty!” As she scampered back down the trail holding her mother’s hand, she managed to kick off her shoe five times.
By the way, I'd love it if you left a comment (link at the end of each entry). It would definitely liven up the blog!
My first day here, Halloween, I went for a hike (inside the park) in a place called Fairyland Canyon. Places are rather fancifully named here, but you could really see how this one got christened Fairyland. Smaller and more intimate than some of the huge canyons like the Bryce Amphitheater, it looked a magical land dreamed up by someone who loves the color pink.
This hike was not a hike for the faint hearted. It was over eight miles, and took me down into the bottom of the canyon. I had to hike back out, too, which was the real kicker. The trail has lots of switchbacks so you’re not going straight up or down hill (you’d just slide the whole way), but it was a serious workout. The views and surroundings were just breathtaking, though, and kept me occupied. I didn’t run into anyone at all for the first two hours I was out, and then I passed just a handful of hikers walking in the opposite direction. That was really lovely, having the place practically to myself.
Speaking of which, I had a moment of panic at the beginning of my trip before I parted with Charlie, thinking about my physical safety when hiking alone on rather remote trails. I know that my odds of any harassment are far lower here than in Brooklyn, but still it unsettled me. Charlie suggested that I carry some pepper spray, which perked me up quite a lot. We were still in Virgin, UT at the time, visiting Rosa at Falcon Ridge, and I immediately thought of Karen, Falcon’s case manager, as the best person to direct us to a pepper spray retailer.
A hefty, hearty, maternal 50-something Utahan with a headful of curly brown hair, Karen was more than happy to assist. She didn’t seem fazed in the least that I was in search of a self-defense device, and offered to call Sportsman’s Warehouse in St. George to see if they carried my product. A salesman named Mike answered her call and they chatted amiably for several minutes, after which Karen informed me that pepper spray was available in not one but two of the store’s departments, and I would have a choice of over a dozen types. Wow!
Charlie and I set off for Sportsman’s Warehouse, which was kind of a cross between an outdoorsman’s Target and what LL Bean looked like in 1971. Not at all fancy or chic in the Patagonia fashion, but full of useful items for fly fishing, elk hunting, and dirty work around the corral. Mike wasn’t there so a droll man named John showed us an entire wall display of pepper sprays. A number of them were high-powered, designed for bear. It struck me as a bad idea to spray a bear with something disagreeable, but then I wasn’t worried about bear. We chose a canister that seemed geared to deflecting unsavory humans, and John assured me it was good for at least 35 actions, although he certainly hoped I’d never have to use it once. I like my pepper spray a lot. It has a clip so I can hang it from a belt loop, always at the ready. So far the most annoying encounters I’ve had are with small children who are tired of walking uphill, but it’s good to know that if I needed to defend myself, I could. At least until my attacker got hold of my pepper spray.
When I reported to Karen that our mission was successful, she eagerly asked if I’d purchased the 90 mile per hour edition, and sounded sorely disappointed when I told her I had not.
Yesterday I went on a little adventure, canister on my belt loop. I decided to take a ride down one of those unofficial-looking gravel roads that kick up huge clouds of dirt as you drive along. This particular gravel road was identified on my BLM map (for you urban greenhorns, that’s Bureau of Land Management) as the road to Tropic Reservoir; its full name was the East Fork of the Sevier River Backway. That sounded good. I never take these kind of roads, mostly because I assume that I’ll get stranded fourteen miles in with a flat tire and run out of water before anyone realizes I'm missing. Perhaps I took Into the Wild a little too personally. But I’m driving a car designed especially for roads like this, and I’m armed – well, not for bear but at least for prairie dogs, so I decided to give it a go. It was fun! The huge brown cloud of dust following my car made me feel invincible. The road was very pretty, and I was surprised to come upon the green waters of Tropic Reservoir. Set in a meadow with piney woods nearby, it didn’t look at all like the desert that is most of this region. Not a car was in sight, not a soul was there. I parked and sat by the water for a while, enjoying the tranquility and listening to the songbirds.
A sheriff’s SUV passed me as I drove out, leading me to suspect that if I had gotten stranded with a flat he probably would have found me, and probably within the hour.
****
NEWSFLASH: According to my guide, the town of Hatch was, in fact, settled in the 1870s by a Mr. and Mrs. Hatch! So I guess the fact that Hatch has a hatchery is merely coincidence.
****
After my journey to Tropic Reservoir I wanted to roam a little further so I drove a few miles east to Red Canyon, part of the vast Dixie National Forest. It’s funny how every park out here is very rock-driven, yet each one is unique. Zion is massive and masculine (or butch, if you prefer); Bryce is delicate, filled with spires; Red Canyon looks like a toy land, and is by far the reddest rock around. Seriously red. Not coral, not pink, not orange, but actually red. The park is officially closed now for the season, but except for the shuttered visitors’ center it’s perfectly accessible.
I took a hike that kept leading me to better and better lookouts. The park management had thoughtfully placed benches at various points along the trail, and posted signs identifying the shape of the path you were walking on, such as Serpent and Camel. Again, I was the only person in the entire park. Not a soul on the trails, not a car in the lot. Amazing! The sinking sun cast that outrageous golden light all over the red hills, making the whole place look like one of those cheesy biblical paintings of the promised land. I took another trail. I just didn’t want to leave the park.
Not wanting to find myself navigating Serpent in the dark, I finally tore myself away. I stopped on my way home at a place called Foster’s, which is a motel, restaurant, and store with a bakery. An old, overweight dog came ambling over to me when I got out of the car, and I bent down to pet him. He was delighted. Back in the car, I noticed a noxious smell; a quick sniff of my hand told me right away that that dog hadn’t had a bath in a long time.
After washing my hands, I went for dinner at the fabulous Ruby's Inn Cowboy Buffet. Hundreds of people – essentially every visitor within twenty miles of Bryce – go there to eat, and they’re hungry. There is a menu, but it doesn’t look promising (would you really want to order lobster in the middle of Utah?). Most everyone gets dinner at the buffet.
The buffet is a festival of starches and sugars, from jello salad to corn, carrots, potatoes, beans, rice, cornbread, and rolls. But there is a green salad, composed primarily of iceberg lettuce, and there is roast chicken, and that makes a good dinner for me. I couldn’t resist tasting the chocolate sheet cake, but it was awful and not worth eating. I elected to bypass the trembling vats of pudding.
On my way through the main lobby, I hear a man talking on his cell phone. He’s sitting on a bench, and he’s wearing cowboy boots. From the rising indignation in his voice, I get the impression he’s staving off a creditor. “Hey, you know it’s been a bad year! Ever since we turned the cattle out in the spring, the grass has been dry!” This is an angle I haven’t overheard on DeKalb Avenue.
I stop off at the grocery store to pick up some milk for breakfast, and the cashier launches into a conversation with me. The workers in the vast complex of shops at Ruby’s Inn are slowly dying of boredom because at this time of year so few people wander in. The cashier asks me where I’m from, and tells me that just a week ago, carrying a 50-pound pack, she hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and back up, on a trail that hasn’t been maintained in eighty years. She wasn’t able to get a permit for one of the better trails because they were too full. This woman is probably ten years older than me. “Wow! How are you feeling?” I ask her. “I had to do it now, or I would never have done it,” she replies. With a big smile, she hands me my milk. “My back is killing me,” she says.
Today I went for a hike on a combination of two Bryce trails: the Navajo Loop and the Queen’s Garden. The Queen’s Garden is supposedly named for a rock formation that reminded someone of Queen Victoria, but despite my efforts I could not pick it out of the crowd. I asked some passing hikers if they’d spotted the queen, and they all waved vaguely in another direction, saying something like, “Oh, I think you can only see her from over there.” The beginning of the Navajo Loop consisted of an amazing descent called Wall Street, for obvious reasons. But not only does it rise hugely on either side of the path, it also goes down, down, down into the canyon. It was very exciting. I’ve posted some photos of it on my Flickr site, but I have to say it’s hard to capture the scale with my camera.
After my hike I drove to Inspiration Point, where a sign stated "Elevation: 8100 feet." I thought Inspiration Point would be a nice vista that you could enjoy from the parking area, but as it turned out I had to walk up a very steep trail. It was worth the ascent. At the very top was an outcropping of rock with a fence at the end, suspended over the canyon. A small girl named Margo Rose arrived with her family on the viewing platform, stared at me resentfully as I sipped my water, and declared loudly, “I’m thirsty!” As she scampered back down the trail holding her mother’s hand, she managed to kick off her shoe five times.
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