Monday; July 8th, 2002
Start: Flagstaff, Arizona
End: Cortez, Colorado
390 Miles
In the morning, Sharon and I walk to
breakfast
at a nearby Burger King. There's not
a cloud
in the sky, and the temperature is
just slightly
on the cool side.
As I load the bike, the couple next door
strikes up a conversation. He used to ride,
but hasn't in years... We talk a bit more;
they ask where we've been and where we're
going. We mention attending a convention
in Scottsdale, and the husband says they
may have been at the same "convention".
Sure enough, the same place. So we talk about
the various speakers, events, accommodations,
and the heat. Small world...
With the bike loaded, we head northwest
out
of Flagstaff on US-180. Destination:
the
Grand Canyon.
Just outside Flagstaff is the turnoff for
the Arizona Snow Bowl ski resort. During
the summer the ski lift takes tourists to
the top of the San Francisco Peaks. But not
today - the road to the top is closed due
to fire hazard.
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Rest...
North of Flagstaff |
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Grand Canyon Overlook
South Rim |
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Grand Canyon
South Rim |
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The ride on US-180 is a pleasant one. The
scenery begins as pine forests outside Flagstaff.
Then slowly the pine forest gives way to
high plains, with dry grasses and rounded
hills in the distance. Rangeland. Here and
there are areas blackened by the recent wildfires.
This must be a terrible year for wildfires;
I can only recall seeing the aftermath of
one fire when I lived in Phoenix, yet now
there are burnt areas all over the state.
Just outside the Grand Canyon entrance, the
pine forests reappear. It's slightly before
noon, temperatures are warmer, and traffic
is light. We pay the $20 entrance fee at
the gate, and head in. The entrance gate
is several miles back from the edge of the
Canyon, and we take our time riding to the
rim.
A word about the layout there - if you look
at a map, the road goes along the Canyon's
edge. There are several scenic overlooks,
where you can get off the main road and walk
to the edge and look over. Each overlook
we pull into is crowded, so we continue on
to the central tourist area.
The central tourist area has a campground,
camp store, the El Tovar lodge, a large gift
shop, parking lots, and a train station built
of logs. Early visitors arrived by train,
and in recent years that's been revived.
Most modern visitors arrive by car, then
park and take the shuttle bus that continues
west along the Canyon rim. It's the only
way you can continue along the canyon rim,
private vehicles are no longer allowed.
We're hungry, so we have lunch at the El
Tovar lodge. El Tovar is a large rustic lodge,
almost on the Canyon's edge. We manage to
get window seats, we order Navajo tacos,
and then we watch the tourists stroll past
our window.
There's a lot of variation in the tourists
- we see people that are obviously prepared
to hike down into the Canyon, as well as
people that clearly should not leave the
safety of the parking lot. Young people and
old people, thick and thin, foreign and domestic
- just a steady flow meandering by. And lots
of cameras... Sharon and I eat, talk, and
enjoy the view.
After lunch, we play the role of tourists.
We walk along the edge with our cameras,
we look over the edge, we take pictures of
the Canyon, then other tourists loan us their
cameras and have us take their photo.
Sharon isn't particularly impressed with
the Canyon. She doesn't like the haze, or
that you can't see down to the river other
than at a few select spots. We aren't in
any of the spots where you can see the river,
and even if we were we'd need binoculars
to make out the big rafts shooting the rapids
below. Might not be anybody down there anyway,
due to the drought.
On the other hand, I'm dazzled by the Grand
Canyon! Among the handful of dream trips
I want to do before I die, the Grand Canyon
stars in two of them: I want to kayak it,
and hike it from rim to rim. I have friends
that have done both, and the stories they
tell, and the photos they've brought back...
The whitewater is world-class, and huge.
The scenery is incredible, whether hiking
or boating. And the geology! I've read that
there's exposed rock in the canyon that's
estimated to be 1.7 billion years old. Every
time I visit the Grand Canyon, I want to
learn more about geology. To walk along the
edge up here at the top, is to take just
a very small taste… I'd like a big taste
someday - the river trip is 220 miles and
two weeks, the rim-to-rim walk is 25 miles
and takes 2 days. Someday, I swear I'm going
to do it.
Like every place in the Southwest,
there's
a ton of history in the Grand Canyon.
Down
at the bottom of the Grand Canyon flows
the
Grand River, which starts at Grand
Lake outside
Denver near Granby, Colorado, in Grand
County.
Then the Grand River flows through
Grand
Junction and past Grand Mesa, and eventually
through the Grand Canyon.
You thought it was the Colorado River, didn't
you? The Grand River was renamed the Colorado
River early in this century, but I think
they had the name right the first time. I've
kayaked several other sections of the Colorado,
and Grand is the correct name.
In the Canyon itself, at various times
there
have been plans to:
.... Dam the Colorado and flood the
Grand
Canyon for better tourist access.
.... Use the Colorado River for the
passage
of large boats.
.... Build a railroad that would follow
the
river through the Grand Canyon.
All the above plans either wouldn't
have
been profitable, or public outrage
put a
stop to them.
In addition, so many people have passed down
the river itself - explorers like John Wesley
Powell, who was the first "official"
person to boat the Grand Canyon. Or James
White, who claimed to have accidentally navigated
the Grand Canyon while fleeing Indians -
years before Powell. He was discredited at
the time, but there are records of him washing
out of the bottom end of the Canyon exhausted
and holding onto a log. There were witnesses
that placed him above the Grand Canyon 2
weeks earlier. At that time, the only way
to have gotten from Point A to Point B in
that amount of time would have been to have
run the Grand Canyon. Many modern boaters
think that he probably did it, as the Grand
Canyon has been navigated in modern times
by swimmers, so why not a guy holding onto
a log, running for his life? James White
died an old man, still maintaining that he
had been the first white man to navigate
the Grand Canyon.
Indians have lived in the Canyon; while geologists,
surveyors, and tourists have all enjoyed
traveling the Grand Canyon in rubber rafts.
There have even been some ascents up the
Grand Canyon by speedboat, before whitewater
rafting became popular and the park service
enacted a one-way traffic rule.
The Canyon is another place where I
could
spend far more time than what we have
today.
On this trip, we're just passing through
quickly, via the most scenic routes
we have
time to ride. So time is a worry, every
day
- we're cramming a lot of vacation
into the
time we've got.
But I've got to come back here again, with
3 days and hiking boots - or 2 weeks and
a whitewater kayak. I won't be able to resist
forever, it's just a matter of time...
We head out, hoping to make it to Montrose,
Colorado tonight.
Leaving Grand Canyon National Park,
and the
pine forests along the Canyon rim peter
out
as we enter the Navajo Indian Reservation.
Our plan is to take AZ-64 east to US-89 north,
then US-160 east to Kayenta. That route becomes
drier and more barren as we go. There are
different degrees of desert, they vary in
the dryness, altitude, heat, and the amount
of vegetation in them. The desert we see
on the Navajo Reservation is far more barren
than the desert around Phoenix. More sand,
less vegetation, I assume there's far less
water up here.
Since we're no longer at high altitude, it's
hot again. Very hot. We refill our water
bladders with ice at a McDonalds, and continue
on to Kayenta, Arizona.
Arriving in Kayenta, and our water bladders
are empty again. We stop in the Kayenta McDonalds
to get ice, and in the parking lot a Native
American approaches me. I assume he's local,
but he tells me he's been hitchhiking for
days and days, maybe 3 or 4 or 5 days or
so... he hasn't had anything to eat in all
that time, and he's very hungry.
I reply that nobody should go hungry, hunger
is a horrible thing, and that if he wants
to come inside with me I'll buy him a hamburger,
fries, and a drink.
There's a long pause, and then he replies
slowly and deliberately that he really had
his heart set on a pizza or a taco or a burrito.
Wait a minute! I tell him this is McDonalds. They sell hamburgers and fries and soft
drinks. I'll buy him a hamburger and fries
and a soft drink, but I'm not going to go
riding all over Kayenta looking for a pizza
or a taco or a burrito.
He thinks for a second, then says: "Thanks
anyway..." and walks off. I guess he
wasn't that hungry after all.
Around Kayenta, the desert is desolate -
and beautiful. Fine red sand, and little
tufts of grass everywhere. A little bit of
red sand drifted onto the road in places.
Kayenta is only about 25 miles south of Monument
Valley, and it looks a lot like pictures
I've seen of Monument Valley.
We head north out of Kayenta, towards Utah
and into Monument Valley. It's an incredible
ride! Monument Valley doesn't appear all
at once, the landscape slowly become more
and more strange until all around is red
sand, green grass, and then huge monoliths
rising up from the desert.
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Construction Zone
Near Monument Valley, Utah |
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Sharon
Near Monument Valley, Utah |
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Looking back...
Monument Valley, Utah |
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Looking south...
Monument Valley, Utah |
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Before entering Monument Valley proper, we
run into a construction zone and have to
wait. It's the prettiest construction zone
I've ever seen, so I'm taking pictures while
we wait. One shot is of Sharon, possibly
the best photo I have of her. She's got her
flip-up helmet open, and her gloved hand
over her eyes to block the glare off the
sand. The sun is behind her head, so she's
outlined with sunlight - and behind her in
the background is red sand and red cliffs
and green tufts of grass.
A few miles into Utah, and there's a pullout
with incredible views of Monument Valley,
as you look south. Words fail me, so we spend
some time taking photos and looking around
at the scenery where we've just been. We're
up on a rise, looking several miles across
a huge valley, and when cars do come from
across the valley we can see them for at
least a couple miles before they arrive where
we are. There's another couple there with
us, traveling by car, but with much better
camera gear than we have.
We talk photography for a few minutes while
looking at the scenery to the south, then
turn to look to the north and oh my.... to
the north is a wall of brown, a brown cloud
several thousand feet high, heading our way.
A huge dust cloud, I've never seen anything
quite like it.
Sharon and the other couple ask me what we're
going to do. I think, and then reply that
we may as well ride into it. Standing here
we have no protection at all, but moving
through the cloud, we have the fairing and
our helmets to divert the grit, and we should
punch through the cloud much sooner if we're
going 30-40 mph north and it's going 30-40
mph south...
Sharon and I suit up and head north; a half-mile
later we're swallowed by the dust cloud.
It's not as bad as it looked, visibility
is good enough that we can maintain 60 mph
safely - though it is very gusty in there.
The funny thing is the color inside the cloud
- everything is sepia-colored. Sepia sun,
sepia sky, sepia ground, sepia cliffs....
10 minutes ago, we had red ground and green
tufts of grass and red cliffs and blue sky.
No more.
We continue north to Mexican Hat, Utah. Around
Mexican Hat, we see cliffs that look as though
they've been painted in layers - there are
distinct stripes and swirls curving through
the open cliff faces. Maybe on another day
they'd be many colors, but today they're
just several shades of sepia.
Mexican Hat is a place I've wanted
to see
for a few years now.
Ernie Pyle was here. In the 1930s, before
his fame (and Pulitzer Prize) as a war correspondent
in World War II, Ernie Pyle spent 7 years
on the road. He wrote a syndicated newspaper
column about unique people and places he
saw on the road, a 1,000 word column, six
times a week. In one of those columns he
wrote about whitewater boatman Norm Nevills.
Nevills was one of the first commercial whitewater
boaters. A hydraulic engineer by trade, he
later pioneered the first commercial trips
through the Grand Canyon, as well as a long
list of other commercial whitewater firsts.
Browsing the web, there's a ton of stuff
on the man - including a picture of him standing
by one of his boats. It looks like a wooden
bass boat - flat bottom, shallow draft, and
a dashboard bolted / screwed on in front
for passengers to hold on to.
Nevills took Pyle for a whitewater
trip on
the San Juan River; from Bluff, Utah
to Nevill's
trading post back at Mexican Hat.
Pyle was unimpressed with Nevills, both initially
and throughout most of the trip. Paraphrasing
here, but Pyle described Nevills as a scrawny
happy-go-lucky boatman with a leaky and beat
up boat. The trip was mostly uneventful,
with Nevills laughing and joking the whole
way down as they ran small rapids, and with
Pyle doubtful that the man knew anything
at all about rowing a boat as they drifted
and talked and laughed.
The pair rounded a bend near the end of the
run, and a flooded tributary had pumped the
river level up in that spot - the last rapid
was a big surprise, much bigger than Nevills
expected. Nevills' whole persona instantly
changed - he grabbed the oars, telling Pyle
to hold on to the dash. Meanwhile, Nevills
found the correct route through the rapids.
A large wave crashed over the bow, breaking
the dash loose and leaving Pyle sprawled
in the bottom of the boat.
And then it was over, the boat upright but
swamped, with Nevills bailing and laughing
and joking again - back to business as usual.
In his column, Pyle compared the experience
to having a car accident, and came away dazzled
by Nevills' boating skills. It's not recorded
what Nevills thought of Pyle.
That was my first exposure to Ernie Pyle's
writing, and I've been a fan ever since.
His style is simple and easy to read, yet
paints a vivid picture of Nevills the boatman
with his beat-up boat. And of Pyle as the
innocent newbie, and that innocence lost.
Pyle was killed by a Japanese sniper in April
1945, while covering the war in the South
Pacific. By then he was a celebrity, having
won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of
the war in Europe from the perspective of
the soldiers fighting there.
Nevills and his wife were killed in an airplane
crash in 1949; flying was one of Nevills'
hobbies.
Pyle writes the way I wish I wrote: concise,
vivid, simple.
And Nevills sounds like me when I've taken
innocents down whitewater rivers in my two-seater
whitewater kayak. I can picture both men
very clearly in my mind, I understand laughing
and joking so that passengers are at ease,
I understand how much work 1,000 words can
be… I admire both men.
But the history lesson above is pretty
obscure,
there's not much in Mexican Hat now.
A trading
post, some restaurants, a hotel, and
a combination
gas station / convenience store / post
office.
We continue north on US-163 to Bluff, Utah.
At Bluff, we turn east to Colorado through
Montezuma Creek and Aneth, Utah. Everything
is still sepia colored as the sun goes down,
we haven't managed to escape anything. And
as it gets dark, the lightnining begins -
never near, but always visible, off in the
clouds somewhere lighting up large areas
of the sky. It's not a good feeling, rain
comes and goes, there's "Open Range"
signs, visiblity isn't great, and the lightning
adds a lot more to the adventure than what
I'd like.
I want to stop for the night, Sharon agrees.
However, there's no lodging available in
Montezuma Creek - the name is bigger than
the town. There's nothing in Aneth either
- Sharon didn't even notice that we'd passed
through a town when we went through Aneth,
it didn't register as anything more than
a few buildings to her. From Aneth, we head
southeast and intersect US-160 just north
of the Four Corners monument. Then we head
north on US-160 to Cortez.
We don't have any other options, Cortez is
the next large town. Thankfully, Cortez is
big enough that they'd have to have somewhere
for us to spend the night. Between the cloud
cover and the lack of moon and the sporadic
rain, it's very dark and somewhat cool. We're
tired, we really want to be somewhere safe
and warm... then off in the distance, we
see a glow. Coming closer, and the glow turns
into lights - it seems as though we're almost
there. Yet it takes a long time to get to
those lights, even though we can see them
clearly...
Entering Cortez, we grab supper at a "classic"
Dennys - it's styled like an aluminum diner
of the 1940s-1950s but it's obviously brand-new.
We order something light, just to keep our
stomachs from growling. Then we check into
the first motel that looks well-kept, and
go to bed. We've seen a lot today, and just
absorbing what we've seen is exhausting...
Best,
Doug Grosjean
Pemberville, Ohio |