Tag: road trip

What’s The Point  Picture of the Week

The Point - Afternoon shadows grow long on a portion of the Eagletail Mountains.
The Point – Afternoon shadows grow long on a portion of the Eagletail Mountains.

After last week’s rant about the failed hike Fred and I attempted in the Eagletail Wilderness Area, some of you have probably concluded that I’ll never do that again. I understand; I had those feelings too. After all, why attempt a 7-mile hike when a) I don’t enjoy hiking, and b) I’m not good at it? Well, it’s because I love being in the wild, and I find it revitalizes my soul.

I didn’t become a nature-lover from my father. He was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and grew up in a neighborhood derogatorily called Polack Hill—now Polish Hill. There wasn’t room for nature in the middle of Pittsburgh’s industrial district. I remember seeing the Allegany River between the warehouses from my great-grandmother’s back porch, but no one fished it. The steel mills polluted it so much that the catfish were discolored and had three eyes—like the fish in The Simpsons. Dad didn’t hunt, and the fishing trips he took me on were to fish farms.

It was Ansel Adams that sparked my interest in the natural world. As an impressionable young photographer, I was awed by his works. I wanted to see and shoot all the beautiful places in his pictures. It wasn’t until I moved to Phoenix and joined my brother-in-law on camping trips that ignited my love of the outdoors. He and his friends had the right gear to live well in the wild. That gang taught me that everything tastes better in the dirt. There was something out there that made me feel alive, even if we only swapped Jack Daniels flavored lies in the searing heat of a roaring cowboy fire.

Eagletail Brittlebush - A sure sign that spring is near in the Sonoran Desert, is when the Brittle Bush sprouts new blue-gray leaves.
Eagletail Brittlebush – A sure sign in the Sonoran Desert that spring is near is when the Brittle Bush sprouts new blue-gray leaves. Yellow flowers will soon cover the desert floor.

That feeling of adventure is addictive. I need a regular fix. Although I’m happy to roll down my car window and shoot mountains through it, the thrill is more significant when I know that I’m seeing something most people haven’t. Even though Fred and I failed to find the petroglyphs, we filled our memory basket with petrified wood, rose quartz, and signs of wildlife. I’m not sure if or when I’ll go back to the Eagletails. Other places sing the Sirens song for me.

This year is the beginning of my fourth quarter. Although I can’t see it from here, the end of the road is waiting. With every passing year, I better appreciate nature’s importance. That’s why I’ve joked with Queen Anne to place my ashes on Utah’s Powell Peak—but save my eyes. Like that weird little Microsoft Word assistant—Clippy—put them in a formaldehyde-filled jar so I can still look around. I can hardly wait to see the look on some poor camper’s face when they discover me watching them set up their tents.

This week’s picture is of a mountain ridge inside the Eagletail Mountains. I named it The Point for the granite dome at the center. It’s smaller than Courthouse Rock I showed last week. I shot this image after Fred got back from his reconnoitering trip. While I waited, I watched the afternoon shadows grow into a pleasing composition. You can also see the Ben Avery trail that we meant to hike. The flat Jeep trail near the bottom runs from left to right.

You can see a larger version of The Point on its Web Page by clicking here. Next week, Queen Anne and I begin a new adventure. I’ll give you a hint; it’s someplace in Arizona that I’ve never visited. Come back then and see what we’ve discovered.

Until next time — jw

Courthouse Rock Picture of the Week

Courthouse Rock - The huge granite monolith that attracts climbers and base-jumpers to the Eagletail Wilderness Area.
Courthouse Rock – The massive granite monolith attracts climbers and base-jumpers to the Eagletail Wilderness Area.

When you were in school, did you learn about the Lewis and Clark expedition—the party that explored the Louisiana Purchase and discovered the first Starbucks in what’s now called Seattle? Sadly, when it comes to the outdoors, my buddy Fred and I will never rise to that level of notoriety. We’ll most likely go down in history more akin to Laurel and Hardy.

Fred and Jim's overlapping skill sets - When we get together, things don't always go as we plan.
Fred and Jim’s overlapping skill sets – Things don’t always go as we plan when we get together.

Don’t get me wrong, Fred is a brilliant man. After all, he is an engineer, and I can write complete sentences, so when apart, we can navigate the world and safely return home (to the amazement of our wives). But when we go out together, our skill sets overlap like in a Venn diagram, setting up a thinking interference pattern that causes things to go south.

To finish up this month’s project, the Eagletail Mountains, I needed a couple more photos that are close to the subject. Since it’s a wilderness area, that meant hiking. I spent time researching and found a perfect trail on AllTrails. It’s only 3 1/2  miles each way and goes to Indian Springs. There, we should see a spring and a rock wall of petroglyphs. They described the hike as “the easiest trail in the world. It’s an old mine road with little grade change. A baby can do it.”

I began calculating. I walk at 2.2 miles per hour (I measured it using my hand-held Garmin), so 2 hours in, snap a couple of shots, 2 hours out, and add four hours of drive time down and back. The outing should easily take an afternoon. I asked Fred if he would be interested (somebody needed to carry me out when I fell). He said, “Sure.”

Monday at noon, I tossed on some comfortable jeans, my whitest Tee shirt (so the rescue helicopter could spot me), and a baseball cap. I drove to Fred’s house to pick him up. He opened the front door dressed like an L.L. Bean model, with a freshly pressed ‘cool-shirt,’ safari hat, day pack, and walking sticks. He was gorgeous.

It was a beautiful day, and we spent the two-hour drive talking about the hike and sharing the maps we brought. Fred downloaded the AllTrails map onto his iPhone; I had printed the directions to the trailhead; we were ready.

Mistake #1: The easy part was getting to the Gas-Pipeline road, but we had to count the miles to the turnoff. As Fred read the instructions, I watched the odometer. When the instructions said, “At 1 ½ mile, turn onto an unmarked road,” a road appeared on the left. We turned, but the sign that they promised wasn’t there. We continued anyway and came upon a group of young men camped at its end. This place must be our spot, so we parked.

Mistake #2: The boys/men were friendly and were sitting around packing parachutes. If we were in California, I would have expected them to be waxing surfboards. They had come to Courthouse Rock to climb the monolith and then jump off with a parachute—even though the rock wasn’t in danger of crashing. They asked why we had come. They said we were on the wrong road when we told them about the trail. They said we needed to return to the pipeline road and go another mile. Fred and I looked at one another, the maps, and the app. Since the trail was just over the hill, we ignored their directions—like any person holding a man-card should.

Mistake #3: We started hiking cross-country diagonally toward the trail. “Surely, it must be over that low ridge, and we’ll see it from the top,” I told Fred. We hiked to the ridgeline and saw——another hill. We began the long trudge to its top. What we didn’t realize at the time was that we were climbing Courthouse Rock’s talus slope. The rock must have been significantly larger at one time because sharp granite chips covered the ground. They had flaked off the enormous tower, making the footing lose. Falling on them would hurt—a lot.

Fred the trailblazer - Fred hikes to another ridge to see if it's the last of our hike. It wasn't.
Fred the Trailblazer – Fred hikes to another ridge to see if it’s the last of our hike. It wasn’t.

After an hour of hiking uphills and over gullies, we reached a point where we could see the trail. It was on the other side of a deep wash. That meant we could get to it if we could cross the dry creek, but it was still a half-mile away. We only managed to cover less than a mile during the past hour. I was ready to quit but could see yet another ridge on the horizon. I hoped it was the last. Fred volunteered to continue seeing if it was our summit while I sat, drank water, and caught my breath. He confirmed that it wasn’t, so we started back when he returned.

Instead of retracing our steps, we went down into the wash, where we could walk the sandy bottom back to the Jeep in half the time. We had to explain our failure to the base-jumping dudes when we reached the camp. “Yeah, I thought you should drive to the other road,” one of them graciously taunted. Since we were in the area, we did. We found the second road with signs, parking, and an informational kiosk. At least we’ll know should we ever go back, but the two-hour drive home was nearly silent for now.

I shot this week’s picture that I call Courthouse Rock at the beginning of our hike. It’s of the enormous granite monolith from its west side. The 20-foot palo verde tree gives scale, so I’m glad the tree photo-bombed my shot.

Click here to see a larger version of Courthouse Rock on its Web Page. Next week, we’ll finish our Eagletail Mountain visit and move on to another project. Hopefully, somewhere I can drive.

Until next time — jw

Eagletail Peak  Picture of the Week

In last week’s article, I mentioned that the Eagletail Wilderness encompassed two desert mountain ranges and the Sonoran Desert basin that lies between them. The Eagletail Range was one, while the other is a chain known as Cemetery Ridge. After I gave you their name, I made an offhand remark about how they got that name. Well, I accepted that question as this week’s homework assignment, boys and girls. Here’s what I found—nothing.

Cemetery Ridge - A 16 mile-long chain of mountains that make up the southwest flank of the Eagletail Mountain Wilderness Area.
Cemetery Ridge – This is a 16 mile-long chain of mountains that make up the southwest flank of the Eagletail Mountain Wilderness Area.

Well, that’s not wholly true because, in my handy Arizona Place Names book, there is this entry:

“This sixteen-mile-long and two-mile-wide, low range was the scene of the killing of several prospectors in the 1870s, according to local stories. Their bodies are said to be buried on the ridge (sic), which is also known as Cemetery Hills.”

When I read that, I thought, “Alright, there’s an interesting historical story to tell my loyal readers.” So I, as the unofficial Marshall Trimble understudy, started a week of research that would have made Jimmy Olson proud. I wanted to find out what miners, who killed them, why, and where are they buried. I asked Alexa, Siri, Cortana, and Google’s unnamed assistant. None of them knew nothin’.

I did find out that I’m not the only person searching for those answers. Google referred me to the Desert Mountaineer blog. There I found the anonymous author had written a three-part journal covering Cemetery Ridge. The writer is a pretty good storyteller and photographer, but his passion is climbing mountains, and the photographs are incidental, kind of the opposite of what I do.

His three-part saga covers four days of driving the same roads I did, looking for graves. He travels with his dog, sleeps in his truck, and often stops to climb the mountains he passes—sometimes two or three in a day. I’m impressed! Anyway, after exploring the entire length of Cemetery Ridge, he didn’t find our legendary graves. He does mention the place where Deadman Wash crosses Cemetery Ridge on the west side. If ever there were a place to look, that would be where I’d start. It has all the intrigue of a pirate’s treasure map.

Framed between two of the Cemetery Ridge Mountains, Eagletail Peak's feathers lit by the sunrise.
Framed between two of the Cemetery Ridge Mountains, Eagletail Peak’s feathers lit by the sunrise.

I shot this week’s image along the Arlington-Clanton Well Road on the south side of Cemetery Ridge. The Ridge’s mountains (like hills really) appear and disappear in a straight line for 16 miles. At one of those places where they slip below the surface like a giant sea-serpent, I saw Eagletail Peak framed and lit by the sunrise. You can make out the ‘tail feathers’ sticking up at the top in the picture. I want to explain that the Eagletail Wilderness is directly under the Los Angeles-Phoenix flyway, so contrails are part of the natural landscape, but they won’t let me fly my drone there.

You can see a larger version of Eagletail Peak on its Web Page by clicking here. Next week we go hunting for more treasure in the Eagletail Range. Come back then and see if we were successful.

Until next time — jw

My Tracks  Picture of the Week

It’s the end of January already, and we have a final image from the Algodones Dune Field to talk about before moving on to a new project. I’m not sure that I’m ready. At the beginning of the month, when I started writing about the Algodones Dune Field, I wasn’t sure there was enough information for five articles. But, there was enough for that and more—like the relationship between the dune field, Lake Cahuilla, and the San Andreas Fault. If I aroused your curiosity, you’re going to have to hit the books yourself.

After working on this week’s picture, I realized that shifting sand was also a metaphor for time passing (Wasn’t there a daytime soap called, The Sands of Time? If not, there should have been.) As I examined my photos of endless piles of sand, I wondered why someone hadn’t come up with a way to put it to use. That was until my brain’s hammer came crashing down with an obvious answer. They have, or had—it’s already been done. You see the device every New Year with a picture of father time holding an hourglass about to run out of sand; of course, an hourglass. Why didn’t I think of that?

I even bought one a long time ago when I was wet behind the ears. I was still in the Army and stationed in Pasadena, California. My brandy new and very young bride—neither of us could legally drink in bars at the time—leased a furnished apartment three blocks north of Colorado Boulevard for a year. We didn’t need furniture as we set about nest building, so we bought shiny things from our local head-shop. There were posters taped to the wall (we couldn’t put nails in the drywall), kitchen trinkets, an alpaca throw rug, and a three-foot-high hourglass.

It was harvest gold that matched our appliances. It was big enough that we used it as a side table. We regularly turned it over when friends visited, but that soon got boring. I still don’t know how long it ran because I couldn’t afford a stopwatch, and when I tried timing it with the stove clock, my ADD kicked in, and I forgot what I was doing. I believe it was somewhere between 45 minutes to an hour.

After four years, the hourglass was one of the things I got from that divorce. I don’t know what happened to it, but I suspect that it turned bright flaming red in the eyes of one of my subsequent wives and wound up at Goodwill (assuming they were that kind to it). It wasn’t like I immediately noticed the day it was gone; I simply realized that the clock was no longer part of the decorations.

With how precise we can measure things these days, you’d think building an ultra-accurate hourglass would be possible. We could sift sand to within one micron, machine a precise orifice, and calculate the right weight to make the sand run out within a nanosecond. The results would make a super-accurate timepiece—once. It would quickly become out of tolerance because it grinds the hole imperceptibly larger while the sand flows. I guess I’ll just stick with my trusty ol’ Timex.

My Tracks - I photographed the set of tracks that I made on the Algodones Dunes to have a semi-permanent record that I was there.
My Tracks – I photographed the set of tracks that I made on the Algodones Dunes to have a semi-permanent record that I was there.

For this week’s picture, I wanted to show a semi-permanent record of my footprints in the sand. In real life, my tracks probably disappeared in hours—or days if the wind was calm. After taking last week’s photo, I headed back to the road. I turned before leaving the dune and shot this photo that I call My Tracks. The giant mess at the dune’s top is mine, and if you look closely, you’ll find other fainter tracks. Near the bottom are bug tracks, and there’s a set of coyote (or fox) tracks in the middle. There will always be some tracks in the dunes if you take time to look.

You can see a larger version of My Tracks on its Web Page by clicking here. Next week we move on to another location in search of natural beauty. Come back then and see where we landed.

Until next time — jw

Wilderness Dune  Picture of the Week

Although I’m sure that chasing each other around dunes in Mad Max-style is fantastic fun, being an artist and naturalist, I prefer my sand without tire tracks. If only there were an area of the Algodones Dunes like that. Fortunately for me—and you, if you feel the same—there is. It’s across the street in the North Algodones Dunes Wilderness Area. This set-aside area starts at the highway and continues north for another 15 miles to the Salton Sea. The only tracks you’ll find are those of the critters calling this home.

Wilderness Dune - You can explore dunes without tire tracks in the North Algodones Wilderness Area, which is across the street from the Imperial Dunes Recreation Area.
Wilderness Dune – You can explore dunes without tire tracks in the North Algodones Wilderness Area, across the street from the Imperial Dunes Recreation Area.

For four weeks, we’ve been walking with sand-filled shoes, and you’re asking, “Why is all of this here? Aren’t sandy beaches associated with large bodies of water?” Well, you’re right—here’s your gold star.

Here’s an interesting fact about Imperial Valley, much of Coachella Valley, and the Salton Sea—they’re below sea level. When you drive to San Diego on Interstate 8 and pass the Calexico exit—on the south side, there’s a large water tank rising from the lettuce fields with a painted mark indicating sea level. The grade runs downhill from there north to the Salton Sea. This entire basin was once underwater.

“So, was the Salton Sea much larger then?” No, grasshopper. California’s largest lake is not a ‘natural wonder.’ It’s an engineering blunder. The lake is the result of underestimating the Colorado River’s floods, which resulted in irrigation canals breaching their dykes, diverting the river for two years (1905-1907), and sinking the small community of Salton under 52 feet of water. The Sea suffers from decades of farm runoff laced with high fertilizer and salts that killed everything living in it. It’s now a toxic cesspool best viewed from miles away.

What actually happened was that the entire Salton Basin was part of the Sea of Cortez. Over time, the Colorado River Delta dumped enough sediment to bridge the gap between the mainland and a mountain chain off the western shore (today called Baja California). Like how the Mississippi formed Lake Pontchartrain in Louisiana. The historic landlocked body of water is named Lake Cahuilla (don’t confuse it with the Cholula hot sauce, as I did).

After the last Ice Age, Lake Cahuilla (ka-we-a) began to dry because there was not enough runoff to keep it filled. It finally went dry sometime after 1580. We know the lake existed then because the Spanish sailed ships past the delta into the lake. Today researchers have evidence of old shorelines and native archeological sites around them, providing evidence that people lived in the area for centuries. On the lake’s eastern shore was the Algodones Dunes. Geologists believe that the prevailing northeasterly winds carry Salton Basin sand aloft then dumps it at the foot of California’s Chocolate Mountain Range. Aw geez, now that Queen Anne has read this, she wants to go there because she thinks it’s where Willy Wonka lives.

This week’s photo shows a pristine dune I took from the roadside. The bad news is that you can’t stop here for at least two miles on either side of the fee area described in previous posts. So, to get this shot, I could’ve parked far away and hiked back (uphill in both directions) or paid the $35.00 fee. I’m lucky and glad that the Rangers took a day off.

You can see a larger version of Wilderness Dune on its Web Page by clicking here. Next week we’ll have the final Algodones Dunes story, so come back then.

Until next time — jw

Dune Avalanche Picture of the Week

Dune Avalanche - When the angle of wind-blown sand meets or exceeds 35 degrees, the sand collapses under its own weight and slides down the dune's leeward face.
Dune Avalanche – When the angle of wind-blown sand meets or exceeds 35 degrees, the sand collapses under its weight and slides down the dune’s leeward face.

My sisters and I never got to play in sandboxes when we were toddlers. My dad said it was because the cats kept covering us (cue drum). That joke was the extent of my dune knowledge until this month’s project. It turns out that they’re pretty complex.

For example, I thought they were a large pile of uniform sand grains. Not so. Only the grains on the surface layer are the same. Below—about a yard (or a meter, if you’re Canadian)—is another layer where the sand grains are large enough that wind can’t lift them. The surface has even more refined grains that get picked up and suspended in the air—like dust—and carried to faraway places. Recently, scientists found that dust from the Sahara Desert is held aloft high in the trade winds and falls back to earth in the Amazon Rain Forest. The settling dust is the source of nutrients supporting jungle plants. The soil in that area of Brazil is otherwise nutrient-poor because the river constantly flushes everything out to sea.

The weirdest fact that I learned was that dunes could sing—not like in tunes from Rocky Horror Picture Show—but a deep booming bass note (70-100 Hz). Conditions have to be perfect. The sand must be dried (in the hot summer), it must be windy, and the dunes must be tall—120 ft or more. The Algodones Dune field is not that high, but the Dumas Dunes between Barstow and Las Vegas are, so now I have to hear this for myself.

Here’s how it works. As wind moves over the field, the windward face of the dune forces air up and move faster—like an airplane wing. The fast-moving air picks up sand from the middle of the face and drops the sand at the top. When the angle of the top sand exceeds 35 to 38 degrees, it’s not able to support its weight, and it begins to slide down the dune’s leeward face—as we see in this week’s image called Dune Avalanche, but on a larger scale. As the sand slides, it creates vibrations reflected off the denser layer beneath—like the strings and body of a cello work together to make music. If you’d want a more thorough explanation from a more credible source, you can watch What Makes These Dunes Sing? (ft. @It’s Okay To Be Smart) on YouTube, but be warned, you need a good bass response from your speakers, or you won’t hear the song. And you thought last week’s story about the sandworms was fantastical.

I took this week’s picture at the Imperial Dunes Recreation Area, as you can guess by the tire tracks in the background. When I saw the sloughing sand, I knew that it was essential to the ecology of the dunes, but I didn’t appreciate why. After this week’s research, I’m glad that I snapped the photo, and—as I said above—I want to check out the Dumas Dunes and maybe go back to Death Valley. I want to hear their song—but do I want it bad enough to go when it’s 120 degrees?

You can see a larger version of Dune Avalanche on its Web Page by clicking here. Next week we’ll poke more into the beauty of the Algodones Dune Field, so come back then.

Until next time — jw

Predator Tracks Picture of the Week

We need to drive an hour to show you a different part of the Algodones Dunes. I hope you had breakfast because we’re not stopping. There are only two roads that cross the dunes, Interstate 8—east of Yuma and California State Highway 78. We’ll hop onto I-8 and head west to Holtville, then north to Brawley.

Most of this drive is flat and dull except for the towering green John Deere tractors that take up three lanes of the two-lane road. The farmers drive them on public roads to remind you that if you eat steak and salad in winter, this is where they were likely grown—either here in the Imperial Valley or Yuma.

Once we get to Brawley (there’s a bypass, so thankfully, we don’t have to go into town), we’ll turn west onto S.R. 78—the road to Blyth (boy, it keeps getting worse, doesn’t it). It isn’t far out of town that you see a cloud bank on the horizon—or at least that’s what it appears to be. The sand reflects light on a bright day, and the detail gets lost. The shapes and color begin to resolve in another mile, and the windshield fills with an overwhelming sea of golden sand.

We have arrived. This area of the dunes is the home base for So Cal dune-buggy enthusiasts. As soon as the highway starts up the sand, you’ll see Gecko Road on the right. It’s a paved street loaded with vendors, campers, and rangers. This road is a fee area, so we may have to buy a permit if the rangers come to work today. There are several designated camping areas along the road, and they’re full of R.V.s and trailers—even in the middle of the week. Judging from the size and luxury of these rigs, they’ve come from the L.A. Basin—and they’re richer than anyone from Arizona. There must be a thrill racing up and down dunes; otherwise, what’s the point? I wouldn’t try it in Archie, but with Bluto, I might. It could be fun.

Predator Tracks - An innocent victim was snatched from her friends by a giant sandworm California's Imperial Dunes .
Predator Tracks – An innocent victim was snatched from her friends by a giant sandworm in California’s Imperial Dunes.

It can also be dangerous. Some creatures live in the sand that nobody’s seen—their tracks are the only evidence that they’re real. They’re called sandworms, and they feed on unsuspecting victims as they try to cross. It’s true; they were in the ’90s movie Tremors, and you can see for yourself in this week’s picture called Predator Tracks. In it, you see footprints from a herd of bikini-clad tawny blond valley girls, moving north across the sand while staring at their phones. They were defenseless because they ignored their parent’s warning to take a chainsaw.

As they incessantly chattered about their Instagram likes, they overlooked the sandworm lurking behind a distant mound. Like dolphins feeding on a school of mackerel, the sandworm blindsided the girls. From their midst, it snatched Cassie in its massive jaws and drug her under as she complained about losing all her bars. None of the others noticed. They continued to the snack truck making snide remarks about how Cassie had just ghosted them. The only record of this tragedy is the tracks in the sand in my photo. Within a couple of days, even those will blow away.

You can see a larger version of Predator Tracks on its Web Page by clicking here. Next week we’ll hang around the Imperial Dunes and see what other sand tracks we can find.

Until next time — jw