Last year, I was following a seasoned westerner into a steep canyon. Once on the canyon floor we must have barely walked for ten minutes when he stopped and turned. He made me turn. “Can you find your way back?” He asked me. I stood aghast. The trail that I had used a few minutes ago seemed to have disappeared. The canyon stood in front of me like a wall. He laughed. I felt like an idiot.
In order to correct this situation, I planned a trip to Utah prepared to walk some canyons alone and to get myself out unharmed. Like swimming in the open ocean, skiing down a slow covered in fresh powder or diving from an airplane tethered to a parachute, the only way to do it, is to do it.
* * * * *
I had spent a month in preparation for there are many ways to die in this rugged country.
One can as easily die here of thirst as of drowning. Of over-confidence or panic. Of heat or cold. Of under-preparation or over-carrying. Of heart ache – loneliness or overexertion, or heart burst – premature jubilation or being unknowledgeable. Of being overtly cautious or extrovertly ambitious. Death can be cruel, quick and ruthless or kind, slow and caring.
I had read everything that was there to read. I was dressed in layers, shod in appropriate shoes, carried a gallon of water in different bottles in various pockets of my backpack. I had a generous supply of almonds and fruit-bars with me. A waterproof copy of the BLM terrain map of the Grand Gulch was secreted in a compartment on my back. I had color photocopies of the canyons I was planning to enter tucked in my shirt pocket. I had a hi-fidelity GPS app running on my fully charged iPhone and I carried a fully charged backup charger.
Heck, I even had a three inch knife with Bear Grylls’ signature inscribed on the hilt.
I felt prepared.
* * * * *
Bullet Canyon, Grand Gulch.
Bullet Canyon was picked to be the first canyon for my first solo adventure.
Bullet Canyon is a single deep gorge that runs westwards to meet Grand Gulch. Other than a solitary side-canyon, there is little chance of getting confused and lost. (Only later would I find how wrong I was in making this assumption.) As an added bonus, just past the 5 mile mark from the trailhead is an Anasazi ruin that I have been reading about for several months. And lastly there is a historic and emotional connection, as is the case with most of my travels. Bullet canyon has been on my bucket list ever since I read about the earliest Caucasian wanderers to the Gulch, including Richard Wetherill, the pioneer of American southwest archeology, had entered the Grand Gulch using Bullet.
* * * * *
It was just past daybreak when I dropped down from the canyon rim towards the floor. The sunrays were young and barely cleared the tall cliffs, the longest fingers of light tentatively groping for the canyon bottom. They seemed to be a source of light, not heat for the temperature was below freezing and a thin layer of frost covered the landscape. The canyon bottom was covered with moist sand and the progress was slow. For the first hour I twisted and turned down the canyon following the deep gash in the earth lined with orange sandstone cliffs that rose 200-300 feet around me. The trail wound through bone dry cottonwood trees, at times took me through 5 feet tall dense patches of Mormon rice grass. Turning around a bend, the landscape quickly got rugged. The canyon floor dipped steeply over several pour-overs and chutes. The benches below the pour-overs were brimming with water. At one such pothole,I noticed a school of tadpoles swimming happily beneath a thin layer of ice, a wonder of nature – existence of life where you least expect it.
As the side canyon opened up towards south, the boulders got larger, some the size of a VW Beetle requiring me to scramble over them when I could not find a purchase around. The rocks were slick with the morning wetness and the mud was unforgivingly slippery.
The trail crisscrossed several dry washes but it was easy to follow. I had the quiet canyon to myself. There was not a soul in sight. The fall colors were in full bloom. The valley was awash in shades of red, yellow and orange. By the end of the third hour, I was already a touch north of 5 miles from the trailhead. I should be in the vicinity of the Perfect Kiva ruin. Apparently the ruin is not visible from the canyon floor and I had to spot the right alcove to get to it.
Unsure if I had overshot it, I was wistfully looking at an all-south facing alcove to my right about 200 hundred feet above the canyon floor. It would have been perfect alcove for the Anasazi to build for themselves a little adobe house. And it was! Hidden in the deep shadow of the alcove, I spotted a tiny patch of unmistakable Anasazi masonry. Excited at having spotted my first ruin ever, I attacked the steep sandstone trying to find a way up. After 15 breathless minutes of scramble and having picked up several cuts and bruises on my limbs, I had a clear sight of the ruin and the two beams of timber sticking out of a hole in the ground.
The half a dozen ranger-led trips I have made to Anasazi villages around the Four Corners area fade in comparison to the privilege of walking to a well preserved ruin lying in the open in the backcountry. Perfect Kiva Ruin is a perfect example of Prudden’s Unit Pueblo – Ancient Anasazi quarters consisting of living room surrounded by 3-4 storage rooms overlooking a subterranean kiva. Unlike the curated Anasazi ruins that can be visited in the national and state parks, this ruin felt real. Potshards the size of my palm covered with mesmerizing black and white geometric designs lay buried in the dust. I picked up a triangular rock that was lying near the tip of my shoe. It that had definitely been worked upon. I slid my thumb on the chipped edge, still sharp enough to shave yucca leaves or to skin a rabbit.
Nearby, I spotted a series of vertical grooves in a rock where the the Anasazi had sharpened their atl-atls. Had the rock been shaped right here by a pair of ancient gnarled hands?
“Don’t touch those arrowheads, son. Here, you play with this.” Had an Anasazi father said that to his son?
A few feet away, facing the beautiful valley, several milling stations used by the Anasazi women to ground corn were evident in the slickrock. An ancient Anasazi gossip station for sure.
The main house, the living room, had survived the tides of the time well. Juniper logs peep out of ancient walls made of sandstone and adobe. I stuck my head through the hauntingly beautiful T-shaped door and inhaled the musty old air. The walls and the roof are black with soot. A shallow depression marks the spot where the hearth would have been. I looked back at the milling station. One living room, one hearth, one matriarch. Why so many milling stations?
A storage room lies a few feet away. A natural rock is beautifully incorporated into the design, using it as the south wall. The roof is long gone, its innards exposed to the light. Sticking out of the dust is a shucked corncob. How long has it been lying here?
The metal nuts on the ladder betray its age – or the lack of it. Entering backcountry ruins is not permitted, but I knew this kiva was exempt. The kiva has been very delicately and expertly repaired. The atmosphere inside the kiva is largely how it was when it was discovered or when it was in use or probably both. A shaft of light cuts through the darkness illuminating the underbelly of the structure. Blackened cottonwood timber held together with Yucca strands cover the subterranean room. The hearth is still there. The deflecting stone that prevented the population of the room from being smoked is still there. C C Graham’s signature, the first validated westerner to enter the kiva, carved into the soot, is still there. Were ceremonies performed here to please the gods? Or is this a community gathering place for residents to get together and gossip, much like modern day tavern in Europe or the village square in India?
Questions and more questions. I am a hundred years too late to find a pristine ruin that fits the southwest stereotype of a Anasazi site “so fresh” “that it seems the ancients had just left.” The soot on the wall, the hand pecked stone tool and ancient corn cob is as close as I could come to experiencing it.
It was well past mid-day. It was time for me to head back. Another exotic ruin nestles in a nearby alcove kitty-corner to Perfect Kiva’s. I decide to give it a miss, choosing to see it from the canyon floor, wolfing down a sandwich washed down with cold water. The trek back usually feels shorter, probably psychologically so. In rapid succession I made two mistakes. May be I had inadvertently relaxed a bit, forgetting the perils that still surrounded me, probably even more now in the fading light. First, I slipped into the side-canyon requiring me to backtrack for a good 30 minutes. Then following the well marked trail diligently, I thought I found a route that did not require me to scramble over the rocks as much as I had in the morning. Delirious I walked on until I came to a very peculiar rock formation that I had crossed an hour ago! I must have doubled back somewhere!
I still had a tad over three miles of hike left. The winter sun was fast retreating throwing the canyon bottom in deep shadows. The temperature was rapidly falling and I had started to feel the first pangs of fatigue. A few times the frightening thought of having to spend the night in the open canyon crossed my mind, especially if I was not able to find my way through the undergrowth.
Luckily I did. By the time I reached the trailhead, I was exhausted. The canyon was in darkness. The night had grown cold. For somebody with more experience in the canyon country, this would be neat timing. Me, I knew I got lucky.
* * * * *
Moon House Ruin in McCloyd Canyon, Utah
The raven took off from his perch on the rock, flapping his wings a few times, the sound of the feathers cutting the air audible across the quiet canyon. Having climbed above the landscape, the raven spread its majestic black wings and floated, its path describing a lazy arc that took it past me for a second or two. As our eyes met, the raven pinned me with his gaze. The black marbles of his eyes looked at me accusingly.
“You too?” He seemed to say.
I sat with my legs dangling off the edge, four hundred feet above the canyon floor in southwest Utah with my back to a ruin that the Bureau of Land Management has been trying hard to keep away from public eyes.
The raven did not seem to be happy that I was here. But I was happy and that counted more.
I probably shouldn’t be here. Neither should the fifty odd people whose names are scribbled on a legal notepad stuffed in the army surplus ammunition box lying a few feet away. The same bleak compulsion that brought them here had brought me too – to experience a pristinely preserved Anasazi ruin lying in the backcountry.
The human mind is hideously convoluted and greedy. The desire to experience places that aren’t accessible to all and sundry is inexplicable and petty. Ask any given mountaineer. So here I am, inadvertently degrading the historical site just by being here despite demonstrating immaculate archeological etiquette.
Moon House is to Anasazi architecture what Lascaux is to cave art - simple ancient designs that are as much current in this era and context as they were when they were executed. Behind the curtain wall of the great house are two decorated rooms that, without trying too hard, timelessly continue to capture the viewer’s imagination.
The room on the west has the unmistakable Anasazi T-shaped door. The reason for this peculiar shape is now lost in antiquity, probably forever. The modern archeologists flip-flop between superior heat conservation design and the more practical ease of entry for somebody carrying a load on their head. I stick my head through the door, careful not to touch the ancient walls. A bright band of orange paint runs along the base of the four walls. Another band, this one in white, runs above it and topped by a row of white polka dots. At the back of the room, a beautifully carved niche, its corners still sharp. A protruding piece of timber on the top to be used as a hook.
Inside the room, next to the door, I see a feature I have never seen in Anasazi ruins. Perpendicular to the outside wall is a short half wall that forms a tiny little portico, a waiting area of sorts at the entrance. If this were a modern room, a basket would sit on top of the little wall where the master would drop his car keys. What did the master of this house drop here?
The room next doors is decorated equally profusely except the decoration is on the outside. A band of white, lined with a row of dots, pairs of triangles dripping down. Structurally the room seems to have undergone reconstruction during ancient times. A door has been blocked to make it into a window, a living room with a blackened roof converted to a storage room.
Had the eldest daughter of the household found herself a new bridegroom? Had they moved in and decorated their room, the one with the T-shaped door? Had the elderly parent moved out, converting their little living room into a storage room for the newly wed?
A part of the main wall of the house is visible both outside and from the corridor inside. A massive zigzag motif is painted in white color, carefully bordered in dark brown. White tick marks are placed on the corners where the line bends. Nine ticks in total, I counted. A tick for a month - a birthing calendar? Or does it say “welcome” unless it is “stay away?” or simply “The Snake clan lives here”?
To an inexperienced but passionate spectator like me, the decorations are a glimpse into the indefatigable human spirit living in difficult conditions of the early thirteenth century.
“Sorry Mr. Raven. I had to be here.”
* * * * *
Horse Shoe Ruin,Natural Bridges National Monument
The ranger at the Natural bridges National Monument is being elusive as park rangers are probably taught to be in ranger school.
“It is here” The circle he traces on the map is probably a mile in radius, refusing to pinpoint the ruin. “The trail is not maintained by the BLM. And I hear it takes a serious scramble up the slickrock to reach the ruin.” I thank the ranger politely and take to the Sipapu Bridge Trail. I reach the bottom of the tremendous span of the natural bridge within 20 minutes. The bridge is very impressive, but lesser known and visited compared to their cousins, the arches. Both formations look similar, the difference being technical - the force that creates them – Bridges are created by water erosion, arches by wind.
I am searching the Horse Shoe Ruin. An unplanned detour, I am feeling brave having spotted two backcountry ruins in two days.
The wash at the bottom of the canyon has standing water, but not enough for me to wet my shoes as I follow the trail. No cairns here, I noticed. The cairns must be the earliest known crowd-sourced navigational devices. I had depended on the pyramidal pile of rocks on the previous hikes, sometimes for validation that I was on the right track, but mostly for motivation to keep moving forward. I have walked about a mile from the Sipapu bridge going due east. I spot an alcove about a 100 feet above the canyon bottom. But several minutes of careful inspection does not reveal a single sign of an Anasazi building. is this the right alcove ? Or is it in the next canyon?
I decided to try the next one. At the junction of a major side canyon, I spot a perfect south facing alcove about half a mile down canyon but a fifteen minute hike along another sand filled trail leads to an empty dead end. I am on a bit of a clock. Unless I find the ruin in the next 15 odd minutes, I am in the danger of having to really rush to my flight from Salt Lake City.
Hightailing it back to the beginning of the side canyon, it looks like I will need to return back empty handed. I shrug out of my backpack. I uncap the bottle of water and drink deeply. My eyes extend in a straight line along the tilted bottle of water and lead straight to an unblinking eye of an Anasazi window staring at me from an alcove further down canyon. Gotcha! Three in three days! I may actually be good at this!
In the absence of any marked trails, it takes me a better part of 30 minutes to get to the ledge that leads to the alcove. I could see the ruins in the alcove while I was half way up. But I cannot not see any horse shoe shaped doors. Am I in the wrong alcove? My fears are confirmed when I stand in front of the ancient row of rooms at the back of the alcove. The roof is missing, yet they ruins look in a good state of preservation. But no horse shoe shaped granary windows in sight. Wrong ruin?
I am ready to head back when I realize that the ledge seems to round a bend, continuing beyond the thick underbrush on the edge. Hopeful, I wade through the brambles and am rewarded with the most beautiful granaries I have seen.
(Standing next to the granaries I find another very interesting structure. But I will save that for another blog.)
