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Yes, in 1986 (the same year my daughter, Erinna was born), Life magazine wrote an article about this 287 mile stretch of road, dubbing it “the loneliest road in America.”  The name stuck.  Nevada, eager to attract tourists (ie. their dollars) to this remote part of the state,  jumped on the bandwagon and printed up roadsigns, which you find around each small hamlet along the route, proudly proclaiming it’s loneliness.

The road travels along and through the Great Basin, which includes flat desert, multiple mountain ranges, prairies, canyons, smaller basins, and all kinds of curious landscapes.  It is vast, almost overwhelming in its size.  One can see the chapters of continental shift and evolution in this expanse as one travels across it.

Sometimes the change is subtle, sometimes it demands respect.Lehman Caves

While I didn’t feel lonely driving this “loneliest road”, it is true there were very few other drivers during the two days I traversed it.

I counted seven semi-trucks, five “other” big trucks (dump, haulers, etc), about a dozen road warrior trailer/RV types, and maybe a dozen pick up trucks/cars each five hour day.  That’s not a lot of traffic.

In two days, I passed through three “towns.”  Eli, population 3,907, where I spent my first night,   Historic Main St., Eli

Eureka (a tiny little hamlet at 6500 ft) population 364, with no open services except the gas station where I filled up,

and

Austin, which is known as a “living ghost town,” though 47 people live there today (with no services).

However, in the 1860’s, Austin boasted 10,000 people due to the thriving silver  boom. Interesting fact:  the silver was discovered when a Pony Express horse kicked over a rock, exposing the vein of  beneath.

I ended up my two day trip at the Toyota service department in Fallon,  population 9500,

which is also the site of Naval Air Station Fallon,

the actual Top Gun Air Academy

I heard jets blasting as I came into town.

Fallon is also home of  Banner-Churchill Hospital, where Erinna is an emergency room doctor.

I was glad there was a Toyota service department since my maintenance light had gone on at the summit of the Great Basin National Park during a snowstorm.

Knowing it was routine oil change and tire rotation, I figured it could wait until Reno, but when I spotted one in Fallon, after another five hour driving day, I thought, “There’s my huckleberry.”

Doc Holladay did live in Nevada in 1880 for one year, handling legal affairs so, you know, my excuse to pay tribute to Val.

 

Tthere are numerous mountain ranges along Route 50. The Egan, Desatoya, Snake, Humboldt-Toiyabe, are the ones I remember; the lowest summit I crossed was 6700 ft.  Most were in the 7000-8000 foot range.

And it’s a good thing the loneliest highway had so few other travelers because Durga, pulling Pearl, maxed out at 30 mph on most of those passes with their hairpin turns.

Here we’re heading out of the Great Basin National Park (looking west)  because my campground was snowed in.  I didn’t even try the spur road leading to it (Hester, you were right).

The clouds didn’t stop at the National Park. They continued to make themselves known.

I think this is the Snake Range, but I’m not sure. The clouds draped over the mountains began dancing across the highway.  It was beautiful until

When you’re at 7000 some feet and snow begins to fall in this part of the country, thoughts of the Donner Party intrude.

I tugged along at 40 miles per hour until finally, the worst was behind me.I stopped in the middle of the road to capture this once it no longer felt a threat.

Moving along until finally,

Eli, appeared down before me.

(Thank you, Exploring Nevada for that picture)

I was cold and a bit achy from the tense drive so forego my usual camping, paid too much money for a cheap hotel room where I took a long, hot shower.

Then ate a mediocre vegetable dish as Twin Wok Chinese restaurant which served all their food on styrofoam plates.

“Only husband and me, so no dishwashing.” the proprietor told me, “this better.”

 

Up and at ’em early the next morning,

I passed this interesting geological formation, I assume due to mining The checkerboard of colors from different minerals and soils is really quite unique.

Then, more driving toward distant

mountains.  The sign here, which is hard to read, lets us know that this area has been planted for experimental soil restoration.

A kinder weather pattern carried me through this cut out

down toward another part of  the basin

Off in the distance, toward the Sierras

And suddenly, a massive sand lake which still bears signs of moisture in places though no standing water

while off to the north of it, Sand Mountain, which is literally, one gigantic dune.

It is also a place where ATV’s love to go to bounce around and make a lot of noise.

A thing I didn’t know, but was delighted to find out, is that Route 50 was laid out along the old Pony Express trail.

The trail was used by riders to deliver mail between St. Joseph, Missouri and Sacramento, California.  .

I believe Pony Express riders were a certain kind of heroic. Most of them were young because their weight had to be kept under 125 pounds for the safety of their horses.

They had to be damn good riders, too, for they rode 75–100 mile shifts, changing horses multiple times along the way.  To be hired, riders signed a pledge promising not to drink alcohol, swear, or fight with other riders.

Bronco Charlie, at age 11(!)  was the youngest of the known riders.  Charlie went on to ride with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show.  At 92, Charlie tried to join the army because he wanted to fight against the Nazi’s. He was turned down for “age.”

Here he is,  one of the featured riders for Buffalo Bill

 

Route 50 may be marketed as “lonely” but it is certainly never boring.

I found traversing the Great Basin to be an amazing experience; not just for the unending geologic marvels (of which there are so many– icthyasaur fossils, hot springs, caves and caverns, dark skies for stargazing, and so much more–look it up), but also because of the very rich human history carried along its ever changing miles.

Regardless of what one might think about the Mormon religion, including the zeal with which Joseph Smith and his followers “converted” others, or the fact that his golden plates, at a diameter of 6 x 6 x 8 would weigh 200 pounds apiece, with Smith stating he found two sets of them, which then somehow disappeared after he translated them; or what one might think about the horrors of the years that the Mormons, led by Brigham Young, Smith’s successor, masqueraded as Indians, murdering landowners who wouldn’t sell to them, then led merciless raids to slaughter the very Indians who had, in fact, done nothing.

Regardless of all that, what is actually admirable and amazing (to me) is the story of how a small group of Mormon families in 1879, led by Silas S. Smith,

 headed east through the challenging and often deadly desert near Escalante, Utah to establish a new colony for future Mormons who would be arriving after being told to do so.

It is a distance of 180 miles from Escalante to Bluff, their destination.

The trail they forged crossed sand washes, slick rock sandstone canyons,

seasonal water flows, high Mesas (which needed cuts made to traverse from one ledge to another,) until finally,  the big challenge: a narrow crevice in the high mountains overlooking Glen Canyon for a descent to the Colorado River below, (which would then need to be crossed)

83 wagons, carrying 236 men, women, and children, accompanied by 1000 head of livestock, left Escalante. Remarkably, every one of those people survived as did 40 of the wagons.

When the group had travelled 65 miles,  just six miles short of the crevice, the Hole-In-The-Rock, the key to their “shortcut,” they had to stop.

Winter was hard upon them (they didn’t leave Escalante until November).

A group of half of the men climbed to the top and spent the next two months hand cutting and widening the natural crevice so the width of a wagon could fit through it.

They did this with pick-axes, shovels, and a very limited amount of blasting powder. It was dangerous work.  The drop to the river below them is almost 2000 feet with a 25 percent grade, though some places were as steep as 45 percent.

At last, the work was finished.

The builders created an obstacle, a sort of “crib” from logs, rocks, and brush, at the bottom of the steep path they’d opened up, to catch the wagons before they might careen into the mighty Colorado River.

Forty wagons were selected to make the precarious descent.

Elizabeth Morris Decker, one of the travelers, described the journey in a later letter to her parents, “If you ever come this way it will scare you to death to look down it. It is about a mile from the top down to the river and it is almost straight down, the cliffs on each side are five hundred ft. high and there is just room enough for a wagon to go down. It nearly scared me to death. The first wagon I saw go down they put the brake on and rough locked the hind wheels and had a big rope fastened to the wagon and about ten men holding back on it and then they went down like they would smash everything. I’ll never forget that day. When we was walking down Willie looked back and cried and asked me how we would get back home.”

Silas Smith, the leader of the group of men, was relieved when he saw that all of the wagons made it safely down that grade. However, his own was not among them. He climbed all the way back up to the top to discover his wagon, with his wife and children, had been left behind. There was no one to help brake the wagon’s descent,  lower them down.

Smith’s wife, Belle (who sounds a remarkable woman), insisted that they could do it themselves. She said that she and their horse, Nig, would go behind and restrain the wagon which Smith would drive down.  He did not like this idea but she insisted and settled her three children on a quilt at the top, telling them to stay put until their father came back for them.

Together, the young couple began taking the fully loaded wagon down the steep incline. In the first deep cut, the poor horse stumbled and fell, then was dragged behind the wagon as it picked up speed. Belle, too, fell, and was dragged over 100 feet, deeply cutting her leg with a gash of over 6 inches into her thigh.

Once the wagon had safely stopped at the bottom, Smith treated his wife’s wound then climbed back up the long slope to get his children. They were sitting where they’d been told to, waiting patiently.

Smith guided them down the slick road and they all got back in the wagon, pulled by the traumatized and bruised horse.

After they’d almost reached the river where the rest of the party was waiting, a small group who’d realized they were missing, finally reached them.

Lucky for everyone, the Colorado was flowing slower this time of year. They created a ferry and made it across.

They still had miles and miles of challenging terrain to cross.  Another descent had to be cut into the Chute at Grey Mesa (though nothing like the Hole-In-The-Rock), they couldn’t get through the steep Comb Ridge, (Comb Ridge today, with road)

so had to find a passage.

This meant they had to build another road, this one to climb the solid slick rock of San Juan hill. Their route

The group arrived at last, exhausted but jubilant, in Bluff, in April, five months after they’d departed Escalante. Bluff

I’d stopped at the museum in Bluff a couple of weeks ago,  where I first learned of this remarkable journey.

When I found myself in Escalante, after a drive through Dixie Wilderness and the Grand Staircase,

I decided I had to try to follow that historical trail as far as I could.

I drove out east following the sandy trail road which now heads almost to the Hole (the construction of Glen Canyon dam put the actual site under water), but after 40 miles I had to turn back. The road was just becoming too primitive with very soft sand.

If I’d had a four-wheel drive, I could have made it.

But remember, these folks were traveling by wagon, with wooden wheels, pulled by horses or oxen, across that punishing landscape. It boggles the mind to contemplate

In memory of Nig, that valiant horse (of which we have no description)

The actual time of the full moon was 9:56 am this morning.

I found this, exactly as pictured, at the base of the tree where I’m camped, as I gave thanks for my breakfast and a slower start to my day..

Robin’s egg

with Cottonwood star catkin emerging.

The Robin’s egg, in the Old Religion, is seen as a sign of renewal, a time ahead for auspicious growth.  The color of the egg, blue, is associated with the throat chakra. This makes this gift a message from the great beyond to focus on finding and speaking truth as I move into my next chapter.

The Cottonwood is valued as a link between the physical and the astral realms.  Those little catkins are often called “stars,” since they are released by the winds, often at night, resembling stars as they break free to circle the heavens on their way earthward.

Many Southwestern tribal peoples consider the Cottonwood Tree sacred.

The Lakota call it, Watan-Tanka, which means Great Spirit.  The tree is believed to embody the Great Mystery.  Select branches are used in the sacred Sun Dance ceremony, connecting the dancer with higher powers.

The Apache people consider the tree a symbol of the sun, a powerful, life giving, manifestor of dreams.

Several  Northern Mexico and New Mexico tribes bring cottonwood branches to funerals or death rituals because the tree may provide a connection to the afterlife, carrying the bearer’s  intentions beyond this realm for the benefit of the departing.

This is certainly a precious Mother’s Day gift.

 

This is Church Rock near the entrance to the Needles District of Canyonlands.  It is nearly 250 feet tall.

In the 1930’s, a Utopian community called the Home of Truth, founded by occultist, Marie Ogden after the death of her husband, sprang into existence very near this rock.

She convinced a group of about 100 people to join her to prepare for the end of the world. She claimed this was a portal, one of several in the area, by which God would find and bring them all home.

As for church rock, myth has it that the group hollowed it out for use as a highly resonant place of worship.  There is, in fact, a hole 16 x 25 feet in the southern half giving credence to the story.  However,  the rock was actually hollowed out by an earlier Mormon rancher as a place to store grain and is used to this day to store salt blocks. It is hollow, once used for storage of grain.  Since it is now privately owned, you can only see it from the highway as yo drive past.

This is Wilson’s Arch, not far from Church Rock along the highway heading west toward Moab.

And yes, that is a person doing an open rappel from the top of the arch.   Lots of climbers love playing here.

 

I stopped for gas just before entering Moab.

This guy decided to hang out in the middle of the gas pump lane for quite some time,, chatting with  buddies. He said, “Fuck, yeah!” a lot.  His 4-Wheeler is named Big Dick.

Enough said.

Here we are,  coming into Moab, what I remembered from 15 years ago as a quaint little town.Apparently a LOT of people think so, too.

 

This is the line to get into Arches.

They now have an online registration system. You pays your money, are given a time specific slot to enter.  I registered two days before but when I saw this, I let my timed entrance go unused.

I moved on toward Goblin Valley where I hoped to camp for the full moon.

Some of the goblins

Some of their friends

The campground was full, full up,  so I headed on into Capitol Reef,

Which I ended up being very happy about.

     These rock formations are shaped like the

US Capitol Dome, which is how the park received its name.

I decided to honor the full moon by heading up into the canyon  

As the sun set,  colors became so vivid.

Moving deepe, I caught my first glimpse

    Worth a closer shot

Excited, feeling the pull, I drove to the very end of the road, then back tracked to a quiet little spot I’d seen driving in

There were no other cars, no people left in the canyon, only the rare call of a  crow who remained unseen.

Just me, the ancient canyon winds, gentle this night, and absolute stillness. I made my observance, practiced my lunar rite.

Gave thanks.

I want to write about silence.

No, maybe not silence. Silence implies a void. What I want to talk about is absolute stillness.

At 8000 ft, coming the back way into Bears Ears, I stopped at a vista. The view was spectacular.

I could see all the way to the Canyonlands to the south, Dead Horse Mesa to the west, the La Sal peaks to the east. Behind me the Abajo range, which I was making my way through.

The view is what first captured my attention. But the absolute stillness took over.

There was the sense of no sound.  A false sense because after only moments I could discern the cry of a hawk, soaring in the currents before me, a wren trilling their distinctive, happy trill. The familiar tones of a Meadowlark, my childhood favorite.

A bird I sat within fields of deep grass in for hours in west Eugene just so I could listen to it sing.

someone caught this one mid-song

 

The meadowlark’s contribution was sporadic. The wren, consistent. A crow, far away down in one of the canyons at the base of Bears Ears, chastised something. It’s throaty rebuke carried up to me on my perch in the Abajo Mountains, crystal clear.

A breeze sipped up a gentle caress now and again. To the west, storm clouds were building, white fluffs filling with water, turning dark grey, then black.

They would keep welling until another inevitable spring release. Which from the looks of it, would hit about the time I arrived down inside the canyons.

I stood in this profound silence, in the stillness, taking it all in.

Absorbing.

Time drifted away. Lost meaning. In its place, I became aware of the actual ions, microscopic refractions of energy filling the air.

Energy so palpable it buzzed.  A very faint, high-pitched buzz. Almost inaudible.   The buzz of the universe.

A bee, lonely traveler to the high altitudes, hummed its way from teeny, tiny, hardy, low growing yellow desert wildflowers. Arnica, I believe.

Good for aches, and pains     Sparse,

they bloom only for a brief time after the rain.

Stillness.

That union with the Divine.

Which is not really a union because we have been part of it all along.

The mountain, the canyons, the clouds filling with life giving water, the meadowlarks, the tiny wildflowers. Me. You. All of us.

All of us are it        This.

A few hours later, I made my way back from the Canyonlands National Park where people queued up to gaze at the stillness, too hurried to take it in,

I re-entered Bears Ears  Canyon.

so incredibly lush in May.

Thick, green, filled with giant oaks, aspen, willow, and the lonely call of a wild turkey hoping to lure a mate.

The canyon, meandering around the entire base of Bears Ears.

 

Newspaper Rock is a place in this lush canyon where travelers past did gaze at the stillness. Lived within it.

Wrote their stories for the next ones to read.        I killed this buffalo.  My friends and I killed these buffalo, these deer.  I shot this magnificent many horned elk from horseback with only a bow. These birds live in this canyon-they call me awake each morning. Our village goats are thriving this year.  I swear, it was the longest snake I’ve ever seen.  The sun shone at festival time. We skinned these two beavers. Or are they something else?  The Bear stopped by.  So did these weird ass men with horns who tried to tell us something about the wheel of time. Who were those guys and where did they come from?!!    

A few miles away, looking south in the stillness, the teats of Mother Earth,

                              

 

Ranchers and miners are hungry for Bears Ears. Lusting

for the possibility of minerals and gasses.

In a unique, somewhat hopeful move,  the Nature Conservancy in 1997 purchased the historic 5000 acre Dugout Ranch, owned by Cowgirl Hall of Famer, Heidi Redd.  The mission:  to create the Canyonlands Research Center, dedicated to studying grazing, ranching, canyon watersheds, and land management impacts on climate change.

 In addition to the 5000 acres owned, there are over 350,000 acres of “public” land, which has been continually leased as grazing rights to Redd, who ran her cattle operation for nearly 50 years.

It is still a working ranch, though now studied by scientists from all over the world. It remains controversial, however, because even with the Conservancy’s take over, the land  remains depleted due to overgrazing, while as always, the water used takes away from an already stretched system. Several conservation groups banded together to challenge the conservancy’s recent plan to build more reservoirs on the ranch and add more fencing.  The judge ruled in their favor after finding that the conservancy failed to adequately monitor and report on its own cattle operation.

I was stunned to see  overhead irrigation being used in such an arid climate. It is the least effective system, losing a high percentage of water to evaporation. I would have thought the Conservancy, as part of their research, would have switched to drip.

BTW, Redd, a very interesting woman now in her 80’s, still lives on the ranch, helping work the land in partnership with the Nature Conservancy.

A few more miles along the canyon and I found this corral set into the stone.   Been there a long time,

chose black and white

The free ranging cattle overgrazing the already sparse desert get driven into here come the fall, then loaded for shipping to market.  Your tax dollars at work!

Take a breath.  Let it go. Bring it in.

The air surrounding me is potent.

Rejuvenating. Clear, clean air.

Fresh and scented with rainfall, juniper berries, flowering sage, the faint top note one of a blend of Silvery Lupine, Blue Columbine, and the rare Sago Lily.

I breathe it as I crawl along the canyon floor, absorbing as much as possible.

Several times, I stop.

Step back into the stillness.

As if to check the reality of such a sacred thing.

Each time, I feel my place in the unified field of One-ness.

The Oversoul, above, below, around, within.

Timeless. Beyond time. Precious beyond measure.

A’wee Chi’deedloh is Baby’s first laugh ceremony. That first laugh marks the time a baby transitions from the spirit world to the physical world, ready to join the community.

I learned this from my host, Jeremy, who grew up right here, right amongst these massive monuments.

In the Navaho tradition, the person who causes the baby to laugh first is the one responsible for hosting the party. That was Jeremy. A large, strapping 21 year old, with an affable personality and glittering brown eyes.

Jeremy invited me to boondock on his family land months ago; it was serendipity (is there really such a thing?) that I arrived at the same time as thirty of his family and friends.

I did not intrude on their special occasion, merely added my blessing to the baby’s blessings basket

then set up out in his side field    

away from the action, content to listen to the sounds of drumming, singing, and happy voices coming from inside the family hogan nearby.

. (keep your eyes on those clouds)

Soon, everything was drowned out by the action of a fierce storm which came roaring out of: first, the west with a sandstorm as intense as the one in the movie the Mummy, then an hour later, from the north with wind gusts to 40mph.

I didn’t try to stand out in that sand to take a picture.

I had been caught in it while peeing, sand infiltrating my eyes, hair, nostrils, and of course, the lovely bits,

but here, (facing west)

you can see the storm moving in from the photos I took before it hit.

(looking northeast)

Besides rocking Pearl (with me cocooned inside) to and fro, the wind sent a jackpot of tumbleweeds racing  from the direction of the monuments in front of me toward the ones behind.

(yeah, like this

but a LOT of them at the same time)

One smacked right into my window on its journey. Startled the bejeezus out of me.

Next, thunder began rumbling impatiently throughout the sky,

until it unleashed lightning, cracking and echoing across the valley. (not my capture but the exact image)

I thought “this is a fitting show for a baby’s first laugh celebration.”

Yes, the rain came down.

Gentle at first, it soon pounded down, turning the red dirt into a sticky, clay like cement which I discovered in the morning while answering the call of nature.

It did a nice job of rinsing the dust off of Durga and Pearl, though.

It got cold.  The temperature dropped down into the high 30’s.

I stood out in the storm awhile, letting the rain and wind baptize me, loving the wildness of it all, thinking how fortunate I was to be experiencing this event in Monument Valley in May.

But soon, it became too much. I scrambled into Pearl, holding tight to the door while the wind fought to rip it off.

I peeled off my drenched clothes, brushed my teeth, peered out at the storm awhile, shivering, climbed into bed.

Burrowed inside my covers even though it was only 8:30. Occupied myself for several minutes with blowing hot breath down between my legs to warm my toes.

Inside my nest, I thought about the ancients I’ve been visiting these many days.

I imagined being inside one of their earthen cave rooms watching such a storm run its course, wondering if the Gods were angry, planning how to appease them.

Then I laughed.

“Nyla, they weren’t parked out in the middle of the flat desert inside a fiberglass shell, being blown to and fro.  They were wisely nestled into snug crevices, out of the wind. Enjoying fires and each other. And maybe baby’s first laugh.”

 

This beautiful woman is Ila.She is my guide.

Ila grew up in Canyon de Chelly, which she loves. She said, “it is my umbilical cord, the place I am forever attached to.”

Ila’s father’s clan comes from the Mummy Canyon, a north side canyon so named because two mummies were discovered in the ruins of the largest pueblo anywhere within the canyon system, located 300 feet above the canyon floor within a huge cave.

She told me these mummies were Anasazi (Ancestral Pueblan) and must have been special to have been mummified and left there alone.  Her father’s family owns the largest land in that back canyon

Ila grew up climbing among the ruins, the cliff houses, crawling along the canyon trails and exploring the verdant canyon floor.

Ila’s mother’s people come from Black Canyon, a smaller side system on the south side. We stopped at the intersection of these two canyons, which she explained is a very important meeting location.

She also explained that her Dine’ people are matrilineal; all land passes through to female clan members and their female heirs, and on and on.

There are about 40 families with roots in the Canyon.  Most of them have traditional hogans (this one is Standing Cow)

and/or cabins on their hereditary parcels.

Ila said that many are just now returning to prepare the land for spring planting following the harsh winter. Most share land tending duties among family members, also sharing weeks or weekends, though some do stay throughout the full spring, summer, and early fall harvest season.

She told me that her family had driven their 30 head of cattle down into the canyon to their land where they would free range until fall.  She said it was one of the most fun days she’s had in a long time.

“I wish we would have brought our gear and spent the night. The stars are so amazing. It’s hard to even pick out the known constellations because there are so many stars scattered about.’

“Turtle was given the job of creating the constellations. He was careful but slow. Coyote got impatient so stole the rest of the stars, then threw them up into the heavens with no thought.”

A few minutes earlier we had been making our way across a wash when shestopped abruptly.

“What is that?  Do you see it?”  She asked.

“It’s a coyote.”

“Yes, it is. I need your help.”

She had us gather up handfuls of the sand we were walking on, then she tracked coyotes tracks in the sand in front of us.

“We’re lucky,” she said after studying the footprints in the sand. “He didn’t cross directly in front of us, but veered away off north.  Coyote crossing in front of us would be a more serious message. He is a messenger. Still, we need to cover his tracks.”

I followed behind her, scattering the sand I’d gathered into Coyote’s footprints as we moved forward.

“Thank you, Grandfather,” she spoke earnestly to the direction Coyote had ambled, “We appreciate you and your message. Go in peace.”

I thanked Coyote, too.  Then, we continued on our trip deeper and deeper into the canyons.

Ila stopping frequently to point out wall art

those zigzags tell of big flood

This cave is thought to be a birthing cave. The small handprints would be of women or children.  If you look, you can see Kokopelli on his back, playing his flute.

Ila said it is the only known image of him on his back, which is the position often used to depict women in childbirth.

She made sure I would  see the cliff dwellings almost hidden in the clefts of the canyon wall.

At each stop, I pointed out the faces in the rocks of Guardians I saw.

“You like to find the faces in the rock,” she said, more of a statement than a question.

“I do,” I answered. “I always see faces. The rock is alive and I believe that the Guardians show themselves if we’re willing to see.”

She liked that. So showed me some that she knew.

A man came galloping by on a slender Palomino, two half wild looking dogs trailing behind.

She spoke to him awhile, asking where he was headed. Shared that we were going way back, all the way to Big Cow.

At that he looked at me and smiled. Then, wheeled his mare around and headed across a deep seasonal stream into the canyon.

When we came to Antelope Canyon,

she shared with me a fact that I’d never been taught in school.  And this is that shortly after the forced marches of her people (and so many others), Navaho prisoners on the “Long Walk”

there was a big gathering in this fertile canyon valley of the chiefs, or their head representatives if they were unable to attend, of many, many tribes. They met to discuss strategy: should they continue fighting, dying, fighting some more or what?  Finally, they agreed to send a delegation to Washington, DC. to plead their case before the president that they would stop being forced from their lands.

When we came upon this panel, Ila pointed out the horsemen on the left side.

“Ah, the Spanish, who brought the horse to our country,” I offered.

“Yes. They traded with my people: horses for food, blankets; they hoped for gold.”
“But look,” she continued, “this panel tells of a sad story. It shows the Conquistadores racing down the canyon to kill our people. Which they did.

The people fled deeper into the canyon. The women and children hid in a cave high up on the walls. The warriors met the invaders to protect them. But the Spanish had archers up above the canyon shooting down on the men, they had the mounted horsemen on the ground shooting up at them. They killed them all. The women and the children jumped from the caves to their death rather than being taken hostage. It is now called Massacre Cave.”

“Raped. Enslaved. Tortured. Or die free.” I added quietly.

“Yes.” Ila said.

We both stood and read the story in the wall. I thought of how many generations of people, just trying to live their lives in this challenging environment, had been prevented from doing so. Over and over again.

“You know,” I shared with Ila, “I saw the sign for Massacre Cave Overlook yesterday when I was driving in.  I couldn’t bring myself to check it out. I didn’t know who was massacred, or why, but I knew that it would be a tragic place filled with anguish. I am very receptive. A channel. I couldn’t allow that energy to enter me.”

“I understand,” she said. “It takes a lot of medicine, energy work, to cleanse ourselves from such evil.”

We got back into the Jeep and continued our journey.

“Look,” she would say, “do you see that?”

Or, “Can you spot the two owls?”

And I would look and I would find what she was showing me. Sometimes take a picture. Sometimes just join her in a chuckle of appreciation.

“What kind of wildlife live in the canyon?” I asked at one point after we’d stopped to take our picture together.

“Oh, we have black bear, deer, bobcats, coyote, wild turkeys, the smaller ones like skunk and squirrel.  Wild horses.”

“Is there a well or year-round spring?”

She thought for a moment.

“Most of the water comes from high in the mountains. Snow melt. Rainfall. Floods which travel through the washes and irrigate the land. We had a well but it has been dry for a long, long time. There are two lakes up on the canyon rims which send water our way in seasonal river or creek flow.”

Ila’s grandmother, older than me by five years, hikes these canyons, runs marathons every year.

Ila shared that running is an important ritual to her people.

“I try to run every day. In the mornings. From the trail at White House to the mouth of the canyon is five miles. To the Holiday Inn, six and one half.”

Ila then shares with me that she was in a bad accident five years ago. She shows me the scar which runs from her thigh down to her ankle.

“Head on collision.” She says, “I almost died. My leg is now held together by screws and pins. I had many surgeries. My gut was almost sliced in half by the seat belt-instead, I ended up with a severe hernia. I had to go through months and months of rehab.  I had to learn how to walk again. I didn’t think I would ever run again.  I was an athlete in school. I couldn’t imagine never running again. I trained and trained. I run now. I’m not 100% and its hard accepting that I’ll never be the way I was, but I walk and I run. It’s my number one clan. The mover on the land. My number two clan is water.”

I marveled at Ila, climbing these steep canyon walls, running the uneven sandy and rocky roads, at her grandmother, at 75, doing the same. Strong women.  Beautiful, strong, matriarchs.

I chose the Navaho owned company, the Beauty Way, for my day tour through the canyons because I loved the name. Their website also posted the Beauty Way Poem, which I share here:

Ila and I laughed over the fact that my name is Nyla and hers, Ila.

“I knew somehow that today would be a good day. I knew I would have a good tour,” she told me, smiling with her bright, white, sparkling smile.

“I’m glad you feel that way,” I said, “I am so grateful to have gotten you as my guide. Thank you for sharing your time, your knowledge, your land with me. It has been a wonderful day.”

She got out of the jeep and gave me a warm, full body, generous hug. One which carried affection. I hugged her back.

“You stay safe out in your canyon,” I told her.

“And you, on your solo pilgrimage. You stay safe, too.”

We smiled at each other for several seconds. I felt like I was saying goodbye to a family member.

We each went on our way, the Beauty Way.

  And lest we forget: Spider Rock,

the abode of Spider Woman,

she who originally wove the web of the universe

A kind Navaho elder told me, elder to elder, that the most beautiful drive on the entire vast reservation is BIA road 13 through the 9482 foot Buffalo Pass in the Chusksas Mountain range.  “It is very steep and twisty,” he said, “but if you go slow, you will see beauty to make it worthwhile. It is the Holy Path.”

I didn’t have much choice about going slow.   And certainly a Holy Path deserves mindful attention.

The 14% gain, then drop, as you wend around the mountain, brought Durga down to 25 mpg. I opened all my windows and listened to bird song most of the way.

This drive begins behind Shiprock, a massive stone monument which the Navaho call “the center of the world.”  It is easy to see why.

 At a time when travel might be limited to walking or riding horses, Shiprock stood in the center of an area bounded by mountains, canyons with sheer drops, and amazing geologic spines across the terrain.

Shiprock  is a true holy site.

Permission must be granted by a tribal member to come onto the land surrounding it.  Climbing it is forbidden, though many culturally ignorant Anglo climbers have been attracted to its sheer walls, with some violating the space and hospitality of the People.

I settled for stopping roadside, just outside of Red Rock Valley, when I was close enough to zoom in.

The drive meanders through gorgeous vermillion landforms, the dirt heavy with the cinnabar which gives it such a striking color. Here and there, small circular clusters of tribal members live in modest, tidy housing among the rocks.

A few miles further along the road, I passed the village of Lukachukai, one of the few communities in Navaho Nation which is actually gaining, not losing, member. Tribal Community Services Coordinator, Gayla James, says it’s mostly young people moving back.

“They’re coming back from college and wanting to live here,” she says.

Though there are only two businesses in Lukachukai, one of which is the historic Totsoh trading post, where one can still buy a cradleboard for their baby.  They also have a beautiful new building which houses the senior center and the Head Start program.

But what the area really has is a wealth of beauty.

The mountains climb above the flat plains below, rich with trees of good size. Juniper, Pinon, Cottonwood, Spruce, Fir, and Aspen stand tall due to the tribes sensible land management, unlike the clear-cut madness our NW forests have endured.

As a result, the mountains still are home to black bear, elk, mule deer, wild cats, wild horses, and coyotes, none of which I saw, though I did spot tracks at the base of the holy spring high in the pass.

Waterfall Spring comes singing down from the highest part of the mountain. As I came upon it, a huge surprise in this mostly dry area, I had to stop. It called to me.  The water is so cold, so clear.  A long path upward to its source was inaccessible to me, but a shorter path along the banks exposed one of those areas Edward Abbey used to write about: steep walls of red where ferns live perched on the side, thriving under the constant sprinkle of the water which falls from fissures and cracks high above.

When I stopped at Antelope House overlook miles later, a Grandmother there and I got into a chat. I told her I’d come over the pass, stopped at Buffalo Overlook and at that waterfall.

“You should have filled up a bottle of that water,” she told me, “it’s holy water. That water falls all year round, a gift of our Gods.”

“I bathed my face and hands in it,” I answered her, “I could feel it was magic. It called me to stop. I mean, it’s like a miracle, falling from so high through the rocks. I gave thanks.”

“That’s good,” she said.

“I also said a prayer for the healing of our planet, our country.  This is a very sick time we are in. Let us pray it continues to fall and heal as many as possible.”

She then showed me a collection of juniper seed and bead necklaces she makes.  I was drawn to one with glass beads the color of turquoise.

“That one is called Ghost Beads,” she said, with reverence,”It is meant to protect from nightmares and evil spirits which might want to come to you.”

I told her about my Tibetan friend, Tenphel. How he’d described hungry ghosts and their desire to feed off of the living because they are never satisfied.

“Yes, like that. You say a prayer to keep them away,” she advised, as I handed her twenty dollars for the Ghost Beads.

“I’m traveling alone since March 1,” I told her. “I figure protection against evil is never a bad idea.”

“You be careful,” she warned, “We have a problem with too many women disappearing out here.”

“Yes, I’ve read about that.” I said. “It’sterrible. And it just seems to keep happening.”

“Well, you say your prayers and hang your beads.  And you be careful where you go to set up camp. Some places will have the bad energy. You, I think, will feel it. Get out of those places.”

I promised her I would.

“We women must look out for one another.” I smiled sadly.

But back to Buffalo Gap, which actually comes before Waterfall Spring as you travel west, is a lovely little place where the tribe has placed a few picnic tables to entice people to stop and take in the view.

The view is pretty spectacular, with the Center of the Universe down below, jutting up. (look hard to the right above the tree line.

Still visible.zoomed in

Buffalo Gap is named after the actual buffalo which used to travel this route from one side of the Chuskas to the other.  Sadly, they are long gone.

Coming down the west side of the pass, still managing those 14% grades, I stopped to gaze upon this canyon.

In a land with so many canyons, some of them call to me more loudly than others. This was one of those.

Quiet, smelling of sage and wild mint, the calls of crows and jays, mixed with the sweet sound of seasonal warblers penetrating the stillness, I stood humbled before the scene. I longed for a horse with a knowledgeable guide to ride me through the land, share some of its history.

Instead, I plowed on westward, leaving beautiful BIA 13 for a different experience.

BIA 12 is the back road into Canyon de Chelly.  The one the locals use to get from here to there.

A side road with a small, unobtrusive sign said, “Antelope House.”  Somewhere in the gray matter of my brain a memory kindled.  I turned south and followed the one lane to its dead end, a parking lot with only one other car.

I wandered through the junipers and large sage bushes until I found a path. I clambered over rocks, through narrow spaces, across hard packed sandstone plains

and stairs cut into the living rock,

until the Canyon came into view.

Canyon de Chelly, which I will write about more tomorrow, unspooled before me.  The canyon is actually quite long and is really many canyons interconnected: the two largest, Canyon de Muertos and Canyon de Chelly, hosting numerous side canyons.

All of them following the cut outs made by Chinle Creek, a tributary of the San Juan River, as it makes its way down from the Chuska mountains and through Apache County, where it will eventually join the Colorada.

I hiked to both accessible lookouts into the main canyon in preparation for a day long tour tomorrow I have booked.

When Joe and I came through here on our honeymoon so many years ago, we didn’t do that. Content to drive the rim, we were stupefied by the beauty but as I have learned over the years, its going inside canyons, any canyons, where the real magic happens    

Buried here

In this sun blasted

Pauper’s cemetery

                                  

Bones

Laid to rest

Each one knew Love

                (Old Mission San Juan, May 1, 2025)

About 30 miles east of Farmington, New Mexico, there is a county road which heads into Dinetah lands. I

 

It isn’t well marked, which I think is a good thing.

Because after driving more than 20 miles over gravel, sandy washes, facing closed bridges

forcing a detour through dried up river beds,

past more gas and oil wells pumping the earth’s life blood than one wants to contemplate,

we arrive at a sacred place.

The Canyon of the Crows, or Crow Canyon,

Made it!  

is a side canyon in the middle of the vast four corners region.

More than 400 years ago, nomadic bands of people chose this place to stay awhile.

.

It is a smart location, defensible,

We are fortunate that those historians and artists of their clans documented their stays.

100’s of images have been found along the walls over miles of the canyon, paying homage to deities

celebrating the hunt,

 

marking the harvest.

Some of the images have yet to be interpreted.

I love these three, holding hands.

I was fortunate.

Yesterday’s Red Flag Warning had lifted, the winds settled, and it was a perfect 66 degrees, meaning I could hike through the slot canyons, over and around trails

and along the cliff

without overheating.

I wear a hat, a UV protective long sleeve shirt, and take eough water along with enough food and emergency supplies that should I end up stuck for a day or two, I’ll be fine.

This Goddess image bottle wanted to have its picture taken.

Most of the rock art has been determined to be from the 16^th, 17^th, and 18^th, centuries.

Crow Canyon is the most extensive,  best preserved collection of Navaho petroglyphs in the American Southwest. 

There are earlier Anasazi images mixed in with the later glyphs but I couldn’t tell the difference.

There is also a small amount of graffit from more recent years mixed in with some of the images.

I tell myself that it’s just more of the same: artists making their mark on the walls of time.

Most of the art is clustered in the lower cliff faces of the canyon,

which is a good thing for me, since those are the ones I am able to photograph.

There were trails up into the rocks where the Pueblito ruins are but without a traveling companion,  it wouldn’t be wise to try to climb over the boulders.

So instead, I sat for awhile in the meagre shade provided by a small cave created through an overhang of stone thousands of years old. I was acutely aware of sitting where who knows how many other souls had sat, just as I sat, contemplating the vast, unforgiving panorama before me.

The air smelled of sage, iron, ozone, dust. Crows, for which this valley is named, soared in the drafts above, occasionally calling to one another–or perhaps, to me, stranger in their strange land.

I felt a stirring of fear, a feeling one does not want to welcome in when one is alone in such an unforgiving environment. I think  fear simply arises due to the fact that the desert is, despite the life within it, not a sentient being. So vast. So timeless. Eternal.

It exists as it always has, whether I, or Anasazi hunters, or greed driven natural gas extractors bent on disturbing its severe beauty, come through.

Were I to stumble, fall, break my leg bones making it impossible to walk out of this canyon, my flesh would become food for the various birds, insects, and other flesh eating mammals that survive here, delighted to drink my blood, a source of moisture where there is so little. my bones would dry out, whiten, maybe become another feature of this canyon of crows, and the desert, this canyon, would be an unemotional witness of it all.

The fear passed as soon as I had named it.

I noticed this guardian as I breathed in the dry air, gave thanks for being even one small speck of light, life, matter, consciousness, placed my hands on the living rock to remind myself that yes, we/it are all One.

Crow Canyon Archeological Site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.

It has been under the protection and management of the BLM since then. Let us pray it remains protected.

And from what I experienced, there was not another human soul to be seen except for the drivers of the big white trucks working the gas drilling rigs.

May it remain so.