An array of motivations converged and led to a delightful road trip. Along with Charlie Hamilton, a long time friend and a perfect road trip companion, we set out with a to-do punch list that would be strung together with whimsy. Yes, we had stops to make—visit old friends, return to stomping grounds from our misspent youth, kick tires at possible relocation communities—but each day’s itinerary was decided over morning coffee. On top of that, we would be traveling the crest of the Rockies while the aspens were in full color. Plenty of reasons to be excited.
Charlie had never been to the Santa Fe area, so we planned to blaze through southern California and Arizona to New Mexico, then downshift and shuffle north in a more relaxed mode. But a place I had visited before leapt off the map and insisted we swing north for a short side trip. Canyon De Chelly, sacred Navajo land in eastern Arizona, is a scenic gem and the cite of some sad history. While the Grand Canyon is immense and incomprehensible, Canyon De Chelly has a mysterious intimacy that is transfixing. Under warm evening light, we peered down into the canyon from the rim, fully enrapt and free of extraneous thoughts, as though we were looking into a campfire.
The next morning, we descended into the canyon at the only location visitors are allowed without a Navajo guide: the White House Ruins. Not rough and tumble, the red rock there appears to have been finely smoothed and finished by a craftsman. The White House Ruins are only one set of cliff dwellings in the canyon left by the Ancient Puebloans centuries ago, but perhaps the most elegant.
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A superficial brush past a place that would take years to learn and fully appreciate, but the road calls.
As the remaining slice of sun thinned toward totality, the air chilled. Sunsets have edges – shafts of light here, shadows there – but this was an eerie uniform dusk that evenly dimmed the hundreds of square miles we could see. Going, going, gone. People on our hilltop gasped and called out, and I felt a stirring I checked with a deep swallow and several rapid blinks. Overhead, an astounding jewel radiated needles of pure white light alone in the near total darkness.
Wherever we chose to roll out our bags, each of us was enchanted with Miter Basin. The rim of the basin is surrounded by 13,000′ peaks, and each recess above holds a mountain lake with its own unique charm. Beautiful fall reds colored a ground-hugging mosaic of alpine flora. Daybreak songs of a coyote choir echoed up and down the granite walls, adding to the mystery and magic.
Our relationship with nature, even when we intentionally seek it, is usually superficial. Unless the scope is wide and the scenery grand, we tend to tune out. We demand grandeur. If we are not perched on the rim of the Grand Canyon or standing beneath the immense monolith of El Capitan, we often don’t take notice. It’s a pity, for we miss so much.
But when I open up to it, photography allows me to witness the extraordinary in places I might otherwise dismiss as ordinary. The nature of beauty I find in “ordinary” places is not vast and grand, but baby grand. The wide angle lens generally stays in the bag and is replaced by a normal or telephoto lens. Morsels of stunning beauty are often at my feet, but it doesn’t come easily to me. I have to leave the house determined to look – really look, and then see. The irony in all this is that the photographs I enjoy most are those intimate portraits of a ho-hum subject, that when abstracted from a cluttered landscape, is simply lovely.
I recently wrote a post about adventure; the notion that the urge for it is a greater motivator than we recognize. I suggested that 49ers came to California as much for the adventure as for the prospect of striking it rich. As evidence, I offered the testimony of many who went to a later gold rush: the Klondike in 1898-9. As with the California Gold Rush, virtually everyone returned empty-handed, but most who were interviewed by author Pierre Berton looked back on that time with fondness and satisfaction.
We often buttress our case to do something new and exciting with “reasons,” but more and more, I think the real reason we want to do it is because it is new and exciting; aka an adventure.
I’m not supposed to say that. It’s not PC. “Digger” is a condescending term that was used by early Eurpoean settlers to characterize some of the Native Americans in the Great Basin and in California who dug in the soil for roots and bulbs. One of our native pines inhereted that moniker as its common name, but the modern day arbiters of politeness say no, it must be changed. So, the digger pine has become the gray pine, or the ghost pine, or the foothill pine. I like digger pine. It is a good reminder of just how mean and insensitive we can be.
I am never quite sure what the exact recipe is for a great spring wildflower display. While I enjoy botanizing in California’s Coast Range and in the Sierra, I know just enough to be dangerous. I’m likely to concoct some groundless theory and assert it as fact. But based on the significant rainfall we have had thus far, I wonder if this spring could be a memorable one.
Naturally, rain is a must, but there have been many so-so spring blooms after a wet winter; other factors certainly play a part. It makes sense that during the recent drought years viable wildflower seeds have not received enough water to sprout. Perhaps through the sparse blooms of recent springs that seeds have been accumulating waiting for a winter like we are having now. With an average amount of rainfall during the rest of the California winter, maybe we will see a spring bloom like 1997.
Do you buy it? I may be way off base, but it sounds good.
Stop! Can I get off?
