Up until two weeks ago, I had never walked through a slot canyon, but the ancient and almost alien landscape of the San Rafael Swell in central Utah provided the perfect introduction to such a place as a solo adventurer. I do hesitate to explore the outdoors alone in certain circumstances, but embrace the opportunity in ones I deem safe 'enough.' Sometimes I get that gut thumping reaction, a visceral sense of danger, and I listen to these. Call it instinct - I am an animal first and foremost - it's intuition to me, and I've learned with fortunately few failures that I have to heed those warnings. The friends who suggested the Little Wildhorse to Bell Canyon loop advised me that it was a friendly, low risk hike of 8 miles, lacking the deep-water crossings and gear assisted scrambles necessary to travel through many slot canyons. This would be a Canyoneering 101 sort of experience. So, while my male companions rode dirt bikes on single track a hundred plus miles from our camp near Green River, Utah, I drove west and south to an area near Goblin Valley. Sola, right.
The Swell is an anticline aged between 40 to 60 million years, which means that it's one long line of rock turned back over on itself, a fold with the oldest rocks at the core. Massive sandstone reefs rise in misshapen towers across the mesa that fronts it, and flash flood erosion over millions of years has ripped away sedimentary rock to form canyons, valleys and gorges. It was up one such canyon and down another that I walked through layers of time, event and a beauty rivaling that of any cathedral.
My being requires time spent alone in nature in the same way a Catholic goes to mass: to connect with the Divine, to breath in the ever renewing power of grace, and to find the peace of prayer. Yes, there are more risks in the wild, but the rewards of solitude for my spirit and the movement of my body, and my breath, far outweigh these. I take care to watch the weather - a flash flood in this narrow space could mean possible death - and my amygdala hums at the ready in case I need to scale the rock to higher ground. My steps are measured and the pack I carry is loaded with water and a few snacks. I temper wild with caution when I'm sola, just as I do when I ride my mountain bike alone.
The trail starts out as a superhighway, an open water-graded and graveled path, until its first choke a mile in. I scramble up a nearly vertical stack of boulders and soon reach the Little Wildhorse and Bell Canyon juncture, where I choose right into Little Wildhorse. From there, the walls undulate wide apart to so narrow that I have to squeeze through sideways, and there are enough climbs to stay challenged. I trot past groups and couples, until I'm truly by myself.
The sheer walls are painted with 'desert varnish,' or oxidation from water, and I can almost believe the art has been formed with intention. When the wind quiets in the hush I hear the earth, still now but resonant with the floods that created the space where I stand, and this is a place where the Mother creatrix reigns unique.
I reach the Bell Canyon sign and walk along a road for a mile or so, until I reach the actual trailhead, and then I descend into Bell. Downstream as the water flows where it fills the gap in the rock, so I'm downclimbing instead of upwards. I reach standing water, and remove my shoes and socks as some boys and their grandma I meet instruct me to do. It's a foot deep and the most moisture I've seen that day, the only other evidence of water pools in pockmarks in the stone or moistens the lower layers of sand. The canyon residents I encounter - lizards, birds, bees, cacti and flowers in bloom, penstemon, Indian paintbrush and globe mallow - thrive, not troubled by the dry climate.
All too soon I arrive back at the juncture where I turned right, and I exit the canyon as a family meanders into it. I am calm, happy and just tired enough, and certain I will return to Utah, and navigate other canyons, alone or with company.I have fallen in love with this desert, this remnant of inland seas in the driest land, where a diverse ecology thrives in its environs, and beauty is found in the margins.
No comments:
Post a Comment