Monday, February 19th, 2024
An East German in the Wilderness
Monday, April 8th, 2024: Hikes, Holt, Mogollon Mountains, Southwest New Mexico.
I woke on Sunday not knowing where I would go for today’s hike. I was tired of driving, but snow and runoff were still a problem in the mountains near home. I literally didn’t have any appealing choices, so I started to drive southwest toward Arizona, halfheartedly intending to try another bushwhack in cattle country.
I only made it about twenty miles, then turned back in dismay. I would just bite the bullet and do a less desirable hike nearer home, and since at this point I was getting a late start, it would be shorter than usual.
After a stop at home to review my options on the map, I set out on the highway north, toward the western crest of our high mountains. There I would find a series of options, and since driving helps me think, I would pick one enroute.
I arrived at the trailhead almost two hours later than usual, but with daylight savings time that still left me up to seven hours for hiking. I’d picked the old favorite trail that had first introduced me to our local wilderness. It involves a lot of elevation gain, but I expected deep snow at the top that would make me turn back early without getting much mileage. So be it – at this point I just needed a damn hike.
The sky was clear all around, the air was chilly, but the high was forecast to reach 60 at the mid-elevations.
You’ll notice I didn’t take many photos this time. One reason is that I know this trail so well I could almost hike it blindfolded. The other reason will become evident.
The trail starts at 6,400 feet, climbs over a ridge at 6,800 feet, then traverses down to the canyon bottom, dropping back to 6,400 feet. Then it follows the canyon upstream for a couple of miles, to the base of switchbacks which take another mile to reach the crest at 9,500 feet. The hike I’d done last Sunday, in a storm, had involved worse trail conditions and more mileage and elevation gain, but for some reason this hike felt much harder, especially the steady climb up the canyon bottom. Shortly before I reached the base of the switchbacks, I stopped to dig a lunchtime snack out of my pack, and saw a guy coming up the trail behind me.
I run into other hikers on maybe one out of every five hikes in this region, which is fine with me. One of the great advantages of this region is the high ratio of mountains to people. We simply have a lot more wilderness than we have people who use it, and that enables solitude for those of us who treasure it, and a sense that we’re discovering wild habitat for ourselves.
Sometimes the hikers I meet are even more intent on solitude, and ignore me or toss off a gruff greeting as they pass. Other times they’re friendly and stop for a brief exchange of small talk.
But as soon as this hiker stopped, I could tell he welcomed my company – for whatever reason. He appeared to be in his mid-thirties and spoke with a soft German accent. I asked him how long he’d been in the area, and he said only a couple of days – he was on his way west to Arizona. He immediately announced he was vegan, and complained about the cafe in the town at the base of the mountains, where the smell of frying bacon had nauseated him as soon as he opened the door. He said he was on a goodbye tour of the U.S., returning to Germany after living here for twelve years – most recently on a horse farm in Connecticut. Then he said, “You must know about the BLM and horses?” I nodded yes, and he went on a long lament about his concern for animal welfare and the treatment of wild horses in this country.
He just kept talking, and he seemed like a really nice guy, but I wanted to finish my hike in the time I had left, and said so. I was obviously moving more slowly so he set off ahead of me.
Much later, I reached the patch of deep snow below the crest, and strapped on my gaiters. It was at least 18 inches deep, but fortunately the melting sequence had packed it hard enough that I could mostly walk across the surface. The German’s tracks had veered off-trail at some point so I figured he was bushwhacking to the peak. I avoid the peak because it’s forested and has no view – the trail takes me to a rocky outcrop with a glorious view of all the high peaks of the range.
On the way down, I had just crossed the snowy patch and unstrapped my gaiters when I noticed the German a hundred yards ahead, dropping down through the forest from the peak. I yelled at him and he came up the trail to meet me.
I asked why he was returning to Germany after so long in the U.S., and he struggled to answer. He said he was uncomfortable with the way things are going here, but admitted that politics are bad everywhere. When he’d left Germany there hadn’t even been a Neo-Nazi party, but now they represent twenty percent of the government.
He complained about how bad racism is in the U.S.. He’s been working as a carpenter, and white people in the building trades blame Mexicans for taking their jobs. He also complained about their sexism and antagonism toward sustainable construction. That led to a complaint about materials that are non-recyclable or even toxic, from which he launched on a long, excited discourse about a landfill in Brooklyn that began as a dump for fat rendered from horses before the advent of cars, and is now a park, where relics from past generations keep eroding onto the surface. The German’s complaint there was the “Do Not Remove” signs all over the park – apparently he felt these artifacts should be free for everyone.
He’d been walking ahead of me, which made it harder for me to understand his accent, and he kept wanting to stop and just talk, so finally I passed him and took the lead. I was beginning to resent the nonstop conversation, which completely prevented me from enjoying the wilderness and views around me, and disrupted my usual rhythm of stopping for pictures, snacks, and hydration. Instead, I began hiking faster than usual and made much fewer stops.
Back on the subject of the U.S. vs. Germany, he said he’d grown up in East Germany, where his family had been oppressed by both the Nazis and the Russians, so he sympathizes with Native Americans. But he complained about how rude they’ve been on the few instances he’s met them. That’s when I told him about my place in the desert and my Native friend, and the German said he really envied my experience. He wondered if maybe he was making the wrong decision, and should stay in the U.S., moving to the West where people might be more open-minded.
I mentioned I’d done carpentry myself since childhood, even working on construction projects here and there as an adult. That’s when the German stopped complaining and really lit up. He said his passion is for wood-framed construction, and began an endlessly detailed description of the little houses he built for the goats on the farm in Connecticut. One he built in the shape of a wooden ship, with a surrounding deck, a sleeping loft inside, and a wooden anchor on the front door. He told me about something he’d built out of cherry and walnut – maybe some kind of cabinet – with wooden hinges and a wooden lock. This is when I began to visualize the classic old German craftsman out of Grimm’s fairy tales, deep in the Black Forest, carving gingerbread decorations in the lintels of doors and windows.
More random stories of living on a kibbutz in Israel, persecution by hard core Zionists, wanting to have kids but accepting it wasn’t likely to happen. He enjoys being the “bad uncle” to his sisters’ kids but rejects the loss of freedom that comes with raising a family. He didn’t completely monopolize the conversation – I regularly interrupted with questions and comments, and he did ask me a few questions about my life – but by the time we reached our vehicles I was more than ready for a break.
His vegan and animal welfare complaints had put me off at first, since they often reflect an ignorance of ecology and a bias toward domesticated animals at the expense of wildlife. In general, he’d spent a lot of time sharing simplistic complaints on complex subjects. Then he’d proudly mentioned a photo someone had shared of him taking a dump off the side of a sailboat, and said since he’d left the farm he’d launched a project of him pissing at various scenic spots around the U.S., which he was sharing with friends. I said I expected his friends’ kids would love that, and I finally realized that even in his 30s, the German was a kid at heart – that characterized everything he’d said. And in some way, that made him lonely, and anxious to connect on this wilderness hike.
I’d been able to share my experience of moving west to escape the European worldview that dominates the old colonies of the eastern U.S. I’d described how I’d pursued, met and befriended Native Americans, and how they’re struggling to survive our “progress”. I’d described how I’d moved to southwest New Mexico hoping to grow my own food, stayed on a commune and almost tried to join it. The German and I parted as friends, and we both seemed elated by the experience. He seemed impressed by what little I’d managed to share about my accomplishments and experiences. I can only wonder how he’ll continue to ponder all the topics we discussed, and whether he’ll really return across the ocean to stay – because it sounded to me like he might be better off here.
Monday, April 15th, 2024: Hikes, Pinalenos, Round, Southeast Arizona.
You’d think I would’ve learned by now that the twelve-to-eighteen-mile hikes I crave are simply not accessible from January through April. But I guess it will always be frustrating to give those up every winter.
I was so frustrated this weekend that I decided to return to the route I’d hiked over in Arizona only four weeks ago. The trail continues down into a new canyon, and it appeared to have been cleared of brush, so this Sunday’s goal was to reach the bottom of that canyon, adding a thousand vertical feet to the return hike.
The day was forecast to be clear, with afternoon temperatures at the trailhead reaching the 80s. My vehicle’s air conditioning was destroyed when I hit a deer two years ago, and on the back road that leads to the trailhead, it was warm enough already that I had to roll down my side window. There, I was amazed to discover brittlebrush – encelia farinosa, one of my favorite spring wildflowers in the Mojave Desert – covering the foothills.
By the time I hit the trail in the mouth of the canyon at 9:15 am, it was already warm enough that I had to unbutton my shirt. The sweat was dripping off me as I labored up the steep, rocky trail over the shoulder into the tributary canyon. Spring flowers were exploding, but I was discouraged to notice isolated patches of invasive brome grass even within the wilderness study area, which hasn’t been grazed in decades. Other than that, the vegetation here is remarkably wild.
Past the trail junction above the tributary canyon, the dauntingly steep climb to the distant saddle felt as hard as ever. Damp stretches of trail showed the tracks of three hikers who preceded me more than a week ago, two men and a woman. Despite the trail being clear all the way, I had to stop frequently to catch my breath, and it took 3-1/2 hours to go the four miles. As the tributary canyon narrowed, a cool breeze came up and I had to re-button my shirt.
Last time, I’d ventured less than 200 yards on the trail into the new canyon, where as I mentioned above, a trail crew had cut brush. But now I discovered their work ended right beyond the point I’d reached before. Beyond that, the trail was overgrown with shrubs, blocked by deadfall, and in many places the old tread was completely eroded away – all 1,000 vertical feet of it.
I debated turning back, but after a few minutes of that I started pushing through, figuring I would just see how bad it was. The advantage of the brushy overgrowth was that it stabilized the soil, so in overgrown stretches, you could easily follow the old tread. I found myself comparing this with the scrub oak thickets that have replaced mixed-conifer forests near home after wildfires. The scrub oak thickets have very stiff branches, but they only reach chest height, so you can use your torso to force your way through, optimizing your center mass and avoiding scratched hands.
But these Arizona post-fire thickets had long, slender trunks and branches that grew high overhead and arched over the old trail, interlocking from both sides so I had to walk with my arms upraised and head bent forward so my hat would keep the branches out of my eyes. My hands ended up covered with scratches, but since long stretches of overgrowth alternated with clear stretches, I kept going.
My first goal was to round a corner to my left which would give me a view of the crest above, featuring the summit of the range. But when I reached that point, it looked like the canyon bottom was only a few hundred feet below, which encouraged me to keep going.
For the next hour, I pushed my way through thickets, crawled under fallen logs, stepped high over the outstretched branches of deadfall crowns, and inched carefully across steep slopes of loose dirt where the old trail had completely collapsed. One blessing was a scarcity of thorny locust, the scourge of higher elevation burn scars back home, but there was still enough to damage my new shirt and canvas pants.
Switchbacks took me downstream of the point I’d seen from above, and I knew it would be even harder to bushwhack back up from the bottom, but now I was committed.
The old wildfire had almost completely destroyed the mixed-conifer forest on this slope, but as I approached the bottom, where the fire had been slowed by cooler temps and higher humidity, I finally entered intact forest, and soon I found myself on a grassy bench. Below lay a broad debris field which had been colonized by post-fire trees and shrubs. I had to pick my way through more thickets and deadfall, stepping precariously over the boulders in the debris flow, while somewhere beyond, the stream was roaring, still unseen.
On the other side of the overgrown debris flow I reached a vertical bank and saw the stream cascading over rocks ten feet below. A major post-fire flood had deposited the hundred-foot-wide debris field, then vegetation had colonized and stabilized it, and finally, winter snowmelt and summer monsoon flows had cut a deep channel along the edge of the debris field.
Of all the backcountry water sources I’ve visited, this had to be the purest – its origin is the back slope of the summit, an endangered-species preserve where humans are prohibited and there are no active trails, and the entire canyon has been free of livestock for decades. I just had to fill my drinking bottle and take advantage of it.
Surprisingly, now that I knew what to expect, the bushwhack out of the canyon was easier than I feared. I just had to take it slow.
The descent from the saddle is so steep, it was hard to control my speed going down. I kept telling myself I had plenty of time, then a few minutes later I would find myself running down a stretch of hard-packed dirt. Unsurprisingly, that took its toll on my knees.
But the worst was yet to come. I’d forgotten how much worse the surface is on the final two-mile stretch to the trailhead. This is not only steep, it’s either lined with loose rocks or cut into deep steps by rectangular boulders emplaced by the original trail-builders. The result is one of the hardest trails I’ve ever found on the knee joint.
On the plus side, as I traversed the lower slopes of the tributary canyon I was serenaded by frogs – or toads? – with a resounding croak like a slow, low-pitched machine gun. Due to the long bushwhack, the steep grades, and the brutal trail surfaces, it ended up taking me 8-1/2 hours to go less than 11 miles out-and-back.
I spent the night in my new favorite small-town motel, discovering a burrito that turned out to be big enough for three meals, and waking up to an espresso bar next door. I keep saying I live in paradise, but sometimes it’s hard to end one of these weekend getaways…
Monday, April 22nd, 2024: Hikes, Pinos Altos Range, Southwest New Mexico.
After last Sunday’s bushwhack in Arizona, I needed a hike that was both nearer and in better condition. But since I was still trying to rebuild capacity, I chose the mostly boring hike, twenty minutes from home, that totals 18 miles out-and-back, with over 3,000 feet of elevation gain.
A short drive meant an early start, giving me plenty of time to move slowly and mitigate the impact on my joints, which hadn’t faced anything this long since last September. But the proximity to town and the easy start on a road up a spectacular canyon means this is a popular trail, and within the first quarter mile I encountered an older couple with a dog that looked like a wolf.
It was chilly in the canyon, but I expected a high in the 70s in the afternoon. I made good time climbing the steep section through the dark forest, out of the canyon to the five-way trail junction at 8,000 feet – the four-mile point. Just past that, on the forested traverse across the next watershed, I stepped aside for a thirty-something trail runner, a guy who’d gone up to the peak with his dog and was returning – a pretty good run at twelve miles and almost 3,000 feet of elevation.
Just below the peak I encountered a forty-something woman wearing a t-shirt from some statewide environmental group. She was perky and immediately asked me where I was coming from, but as I answered it was clear she wasn’t familiar with the area, and she seemed uptight and anxious to move on. She said she’d driven up the road to the crest and was just doing a short hike down this trail.
I’d been avoiding this trail because just past the peak there’s a segment that holds deep snow late into the spring, and I’d brought my gaiters just in case. Sure enough, I needed them – patches were up to eighteen inches deep, and soft enough to sink in.
I was feeling okay, but began to doubt the wisdom of going all the way to the pine park at nine miles. I figured I would pay attention to my body and turn back whenever it seemed right. But it never seemed right. A quarter mile before the pine park I encountered a chubby guy in his 40s or 50s, also with a dog, and it turned out he was the same mountain biker I’d run into last September, using a chain saw to clear logs off the trail so he could ride it. He’d picked the same day as me to return seven months later – how likely is that?
At the park, I stretched out on pine needles to rest, but was quickly swarmed by ants, so I moved to the grassy meadow in the middle, which seemed ant-free. I wasn’t feeling too bad after the first nine miles, but was a little concerned about how I’d feel another nine miles later, after a 3,000 foot descent on knees that had been punished last Sunday.
I recalled the story about the blind men and the elephant. All the people I’d run into on this hike had only seen part of it – as usual, I was the only one who’d covered it all.
And I’d been suffering from allergy all day – surprising because pollen is mostly settled this late in the season. But coming down from the peak I noticed a big alligator juniper completely blanketed in pollen. Apparently our long winter delayed the blooming.
I ended up going slower and slower as my joints began to complain, and in the end, the eighteen miles took me ten hours, including the stops. I ran into yet another hiker with dog shortly before the end. The guy was tall and skinny, but his dog was tiny, and I thought what a tasty morsel it would make for a native predator. This canyon is popular with bears.
Four parties out of five had dogs, and a few days earlier I’d noticed an article in the national media titled “Too Many People Are Getting Dogs”. Something I’ve been saying for years. Most pet owners are irresponsible, and the few who are only encourage others to get them, calling themselves “animal lovers” as our planet becomes more and more domesticated and wild animals and plants suffer and go extinct.
Sunday, May 12th, 2024: 2024 Trips, Mojave Desert, Regions, Road Trips.
This is the story of a road trip I made to the desert, to visit people I love and places that are sacred to me. Nine months ago I had been asked to lead a ceremony there, and that was the main purpose of the trip.
During the intervening months I faced challenges and crises that repeatedly brought me to the brink of a mental and emotional breakdown, struggling daily with the cumulative effects of both recent and past traumas, and since January I’d been in almost constant pain. Nevertheless, I began planning weeks before the trip, preparing music I would try to play, songs I would try to sing, stories I would try to tell.
All my preparations were speculative; I had no idea what would work, or even what people would want. I wasted a lot of time on things I ultimately realized were off-target. Despite being the designated leader, I had no plan for how the ceremony would unfold. Maybe nothing I had prepared would be used.
The last week before I left was a whirlwind of activity, finishing the gifts I hoped to share with the group, packing and struggling to finalize my schedule.
Day One: Departure
On the day of departure, I still didn’t know how long I’d be gone, where I would be on most days, or when I’d get back home. I hoped to camp, so I loaded my 4wd vehicle with all the usual desert survival gear.
It’s a two-day drive, crossing seven or eight mountain ranges, the highest pass over 8,500 feet. The first stint was a six-hour drive, the last part on the interstate. I’m spoiled to live in a remote small town, and any amount of traffic makes me boil over with stress, so as usual I was a wreck when I reached my first destination.
For the ceremony, I really wanted one item I hadn’t been able to find, and didn’t have time to order, at home. The town at the end of the six-hour drive was where I expected to find it, but after that grueling drive, I ran the nightmare gauntlet of traffic jams and construction sites for three hours, checking five different stores all over town, only to realize it simply wasn’t available here. My only remaining recourse was the sole big box store in the next town, two-and-a-half hours west and half the size of this town.
I’d booked an affordable room in a new boutique hotel. It turned out to be popular with affluent, age-inappropriate couples from Los Angeles and arrogant, wizened tourists from back east. The only saving grace was the cassette boombox in the room, with interesting tapes custom-curated by the owners.
Day Two: Arrival
This was to be my last internet access before the desert, and feeling the pressure, I tried to make last-minute arrangements without committing to specifics. I checked out, and did my grocery shopping for the desert, because what we have at home is limited and I like to treat myself on these rare occasions.
Then I drove across the high plateau and descended to the desert. My luck was turning – the next town had exactly what I needed at a discount price, and I enjoyed lunch at my favorite Mexican dinner house. And I thought to fill my solar shower and strap it to the top of the vehicle so I could clean up in camp before going to bed that night.
My little 27-year-old 4wd vehicle is punishing to drive in any conditions, with its tall profile and big windows creating a greenhouse effect, its extremely heavy clutch requiring me to stand up in the driver’s seat to depress the pedal at every gear change or stop, and its light weight combined with stiff suspension that make driving a road with any imperfections like riding a jackhammer. But it’s also been having shifting problems for years, which may portend a transmission failure. The mechanical clutch had supposedly been replaced just before I bought it, and it soon became almost impossible to shift into first gear or reverse. I eventually discovered that adjusting the clutch cable would solve the problem, but only temporarily – it had to be readjusted every six months. And in hot weather it got much worse.
So before the trip I’d adjusted it in advance, but sure enough, when I reached the warmer weather of the desert it required up to 40 pounds of one-armed force on the shift lever to change gears, and sometimes the engine had to be shut off before I could shift. I had no time to stop and adjust it now, so I just suffered through it for the next week, relentlessly punishing my already torn rotator cuffs.
I’d brought plenty of water and firewood from home, so all that was left was to fill up with gas. Gas gets progressively more expensive on the way to the desert, from $3.50 to $7.00 per gallon, so I topped up my tank incrementally at each of the last three opportunities.
And at last, I was back in the land I love, the land I can only visit at long intervals.
Tomorrow, I’d been hoping to do some clean-up at the cave where the ceremony would take place. But I arrived in mid-afternoon, so I was able to get a head start. A friend had suggested the wildflowers might be good now, but all I found was beavertail and hedgehog cactus in bloom. I’d been warned of juniper mortality, and sure enough, I found many had died recently.
We’d never left valuable gear in the cave, and the cheap stuff that had accumulated over decades had been attacked by weather and woodrats.
I spent a couple hours assembling a load to carry out this first night. It was melancholy work, the end of an era lasting more than four decades, many items laden with memories of a loved one.
The sun was setting, and I was lucky to find a campsite nearby. I had just enough time before dark to lay out my bedding, shower, and warm up a can of chili.
The campsite lay along a deeply eroded dirt road that continued for another mile back to the foot of cliffs, and after eating, in full dark with no moon, I began walking down the road. I love night hikes in the desert; the ground is pale and even starlight is enough to go by. As far as I could tell, I was alone from horizon to horizon, and the night was still.
Near the end of the road, surrounded by the low, rounded silhouettes of dark junipers and pale boulders, I happened to glance north, and saw a hazy light in the sky, moving slowly from north to south, without making a noise. I couldn’t tell how high it was, but all round it, the stars were crystal clear and sharply defined. I could clearly see the tiny lights of jets crossing east to west behind it, but this light was much larger, and surrounded by an elliptical haze – an aura. Since the sky around it was clear, it was like the light was generating and illuminating its own haze – some sort of gas or vapor.
When I first saw it, it was about 60 degrees up in the northern sky, and about 15 degrees west of Polaris, the north star. It was moving north-south like a satellite, but slowly. For five minutes I watched it climb steadily, unchanging, through 30 degrees of arc. When it reached the zenith, directly overhead, it slowly faded out and disappeared over about 10 seconds. It completely vanished, with the stars uncovered in the space where it had been.
I call it the Aura. I welcome logical explanations – please just don’t mention UFOs.
Day Three: Work
The temperature in my camp unexpectedly dropped to 40 degrees that night, and even wearing thermal tops and bottoms, I was too cold in my summer sleeping bag. But next morning, a friend living nearby offered her dumpster for the stuff I’d hauled out of the cave, and I was able to return for another load.
Tramping out to the cave one more time, I sorted and packed up the really junky stuff, leaving our old cooking utensils neatly arranged around the hearth. Then I raked the sticks and cactus spines away from the floor so my companions could enjoy the cave when they arrived in a few days.
After disposing of the junk and trash and making lunch at my friend’s place, I drove over to my land in a much more remote mountain range for a couple days and nights of hiking and camping. The roads have gotten worse and worse over the years, which is a good thing, reducing both visitation and vandalism. It had been almost a year and a half since I’d been there last. High winds were forecast for the next two days, which worried me – it’s almost impossible to sleep outside in a high wind.
Our campsite, sometimes subject to vandalism, was in good shape. The air was still, and I was swarmed by flies and gnats as I set up camp. They had no interest in standing water or my open mug of beer – what they seemed obsessed with was my exposed skin, perhaps for the salts. They got so bad that I had to pull on my head net. I wondered if the invasive feral burros were responsible – they’ve only arrived here within the past five years. I tried to play guitar, but the flies and gnats crawled all over my hands as I played.
It was inconvenient eating and drinking with the head net, but I was in my sacred place, so I couldn’t complain. I could almost feel it starting to heal me, already. The flies and gnats disappeared at 7:30 – I assume it was getting too cool for them – and I had a wonderful night’s sleep.
Tuesday, May 14th, 2024: 2024 Trips, Mojave Desert, Nature, Plants, Regions, Road Trips, Rocks.
Day Four: Hike
Today was forecast to be hot, and despite the high wind forecast, the air was still and already warm in camp as I started the day. Tomorrow I needed to make contact with the folks who were traveling to the ceremony, and that would mean driving outside the mountains for a cell signal. But today was my free day, and I planned to hike.
Unfortunately, the flies and gnats were just as bad as last night.
Where should I go? On my last visit, almost 18 months ago, I’d done all the iconic hikes. There was one canyon I’d been wanting explore, but the mouth of it was almost three miles away across gently undulating open desert with no chance of shade.
I finally decided to head up our main canyon, with the tentative goal of reaching its head on the crest, with a view east. I’d tried that once, 32 years ago, but had been stymied by a confusing maze of stone fins and pinnacles.
For the first mile and a half, my gaze was rooted to the sand of the big wash, where I was delighted at the bloom of wildflowers and puzzled by the vehicle tracks of trespassers during recent months. A big truck, some kind of UTV or ATV, and two or three dirt bikes. These people treat the whole desert as their God-given playground and can’t be bothered to walk anywhere; they consider it a failure if they have to get off their butts.
Before the trip, a friend had suggested I might find a decent bloom around the cave, but the flowers here in my home range were far more spectacular – and this was not even close to the best bloom I’d seen here. And that’s just the flowers – the rocks in this range are also more diverse and beautiful than those elsewhere in the desert. It’s wilder, richer, and more forbidding than other ranges I know.
Past the dry waterfall, I was approaching the old miner’s cabin, which used to be maintained by a family of gun nuts from Huntington Beach. The truck had to turn back early, but the dirt bikers and ATV rider drove up the banks to avoid boulders in the wash, trampling vegetation, until they reached the base of the old, deeply eroded road to the cabin. And that turned out to be just too rugged for them.
Fortunately the cabin is falling apart, the junk around it slowly rusting away.
Having reached the cabin, I remembered that an old, now-impassable road climbs behind it to mine works and a roofless drystone cabin farther up the canyon. I went a short way up that and discovered a developed mule trail with stone retaining walls branching off, appearing to lead into the next canyon south. This is a canyon I backpacked into and partially explored more than thirty years ago, but I remember nothing of its upper reaches. It’s hidden from below, which makes it doubly intriguing, so I made a snap decision to follow the old trail.
It was blocked in several places by big chollas, but it eventually led to a saddle overlooking the hidden canyon, and from there down into a side gully, where I stumbled upon a mine, almost completely hidden behind a thicket of catclaw acacia.
It turned out to be an unusually long tunnel for this range. It went almost straight back for more than 150 feet, and another man had explored it recently – I could tell because he’d broken a living branch of catclaw to reach it. Any tracks in this protected environment would last forever, and his were the only human tracks before I arrived.
I dug out and turned on my headlamp, and nearing the back, found bones, and then parts of animal skeletons – a spinal column, a collapsed rib cage, and what appeared to be a couple of skulls. And at the very end was a patch of damp mud.
The old trail had washed out around the mine entrance, but I could see some sort of manmade ledge farther down the gully toward the hidden canyon, so I climbed over the washout and kept going. A bend of the hidden canyon lay below me, and I thought I could discern a continuation of the trail across the slope above the bend, so I used that to reach a narrow stretch of canyon upstream. This canyon is exceptionally beautiful and decorated with spectacular rock, but it’s also full of long-established invasive tamarisk, in apparent equilibrium with native riparian vegetation.
Including honey mesquite! This is one of only two canyons in the range where I’ve found big stands, probably cultivated prehistorically by Native Americans. The other mesquite canyon also has spectacular rocks. I’d made the right choice in detouring over here.
I was amused to encounter a shrike who stood on a yucca blade only ten feet away from me, making continuous agitated calls while holding an insect in its beak.
I began encountering what would turn out to be a series of natural rock dams across the canyon bottom, some requiring technical bouldering moves to climb over. And suddenly I found myself at a fork in the canyon, where two branches of seemingly equal size converged. One featured a towering cliff and a narrows that looked potentially impassable, so that’s the one I tried.
I was able to get through the narrows, climbing more natural rock dams, and the canyon just kept getting more spectacular, until suddenly I spotted a pinyon pine ahead! This range is low enough that pines only survive on protected slopes at its highest elevations, so my heart always soars when I come to these trees that were so important to native people.
There were only a few in this stretch of canyon, but they beckoned me onward.
I next emerged into a basin where more drainages converged, and far above, I could see what appeared to be the crest, dotted with more pines. I wasn’t sure which route to take from here, so I climbed a rock formation a hundred feet or so above the wash, where I could get a panoramic view.
The main drainage came steeply down from a saddle that seemed to be on the crest, but I couldn’t tell if it would overlook the east side of the range or only the main canyon to my north. Also, the slopes of that drainage were really rocky and potentially hard to traverse. To the right was a slope that featured stretches of grassy ground, potentially easier to traverse, until the route vanished over a divide into a side drainage that seemed to lead to a higher saddle. I was sure that route would lead to the true crest, so that’s the one I would try.
To get there, I had to proceed up the main wash. But above it on the left was a sort of ramp that looked easier going, and after climbing it I discovered another big stand of mesquite. The mesquite here was really thriving – in fact all the vegetation here seemed to be doing better than that around the cave farther north.
Dropping back into the wash farther upstream, I reached a stretch of rugged ground congested with boulders, thorns, and cactus that took some getting through before reaching the grassy slope I hoped to take to the crest. This required a steep climb, but there were parts that almost hinted at a trail, and dramatic rock formations both near and far as landmarks to memorize for my return.
Wind had been rising as I climbed. The forecast finally seemed to materialize.
Up and up I climbed, over the divide into the next drainage. And there I began to find cairns. I believe these to be remnants of the old Sierra Club peakbagger group, and I dismantle them wherever it’s convenient – this is supposed to be a wilderness, not a recreational area. Still, it surprised me to find them in this obscure, hidden canyon that I hadn’t even explored until 35 years after first arriving. It suggests that even fewer Anglos know these mountains now than then, which has got to be a good thing.
Back and forth I meandered to avoid obstacles in the new drainage, steadily approaching what I really hoped would be the crest. As is typical, there were lots of fallen skeletons of big pinyon pine strewn across the slopes here.
Hours had passed since my planned turn-around time. The wind was howling as I reached a saddle on the crest, but I was ecstatic. I’d only been on this central stretch of crest once before, over 30 years ago, and never at this spot. I made my way higher and farther south to get a view of the iconic rock formations along the southern crest. Clouds were massing along with the wind and the temperature was dropping, which was fine with me.
I hated to turn back – I wanted to stay up there forever! That’s the way it always is. But the longer I waited, the colder my shower would be in camp that evening.
I had no trouble retracing my route down. And as usual, I paid more attention to the ground, finding a couple of old ram’s horns from mountain sheep, and a mushroom under a tiny nurse shrub.
It was when I reached the hidden canyon that I became entranced by the exotic rocks. The sky had grown overcast and mostly dark, and the wind bore directly down the canyon from the northeast. But in the lower stretch the sun came out again for a while.
The wind was so strong now, I was sure my tarp had blown away and been ripped to shreds in a catclaw. I’d forgotten to pack it away before leaving camp, and the little rocks I use to anchor the edges were surely inadequate. I feared I wouldn’t be able to sleep in that wind and would have to leave the mountains during the night.
But miraculously, my tarp was intact, and the wind died shortly after I finished my shower. The flies and gnats never returned, and I enjoyed a delicious dinner and a peaceful last night in my sacred mountains.
Since I’ve known these mountains by hiking them extensively for 35 years, I guessed that today’s hike only covered between 7 and 8 miles out and back, and when I plotted it on my mapping platform a week later, it turned out a bit under 8, with a little under 2,200 feet of accumulated elevation gain. But including many stops, it took 8-1/2 hours to complete.
It interests me to compare this with the hikes I do back home, which are all to some degree preparation for hiking in the desert. Two weeks earlier I’d hiked 18-1/2 miles near home in the same amount of time, with almost 60 percent more elevation gain, on maintained trails. The hardest hike I do near home, more than 16 miles out-and-back with over 5,000 feet of elevation gain, only takes a half hour longer.
Though much shorter, with much less elevation gain, today’s hike in my desert mountains felt harder than either of those, and as I discovered during the next week, it took a more serious toll on my body than any hike I’ve ever done near home – even the bushwhacks in severe weather. It was also more dangerous, but interestingly, I never stumbled or fell, which happens regularly on those hikes near home.
Numbers aside, it felt like one of the best ever, one I won’t forget. I wondered how much longer I’d be able to do this.
