Shinarump, Goblins, and Arches

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.

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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.

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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.

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Saturday I rested, proving that I really am Jewish.

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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.

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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.