|
“We drove miles across the endless Texas
desert, the only vehicle on a road striping through sand and cactus
and greasewood for so long that I forgot we were going somewhere.”
That’s the opening of the Big Bend chapter in
OUR NATIONAL PARKS, a book David and I did together.
It was my first trip to Big Bend. I had never experienced the kind
of space I was entering. The Chihuahuan desert, mountains erupting
out of it like a mirage, a muddy Rio Grande and the countries it
separates, rock, cactus, agave, lechugilla, sand, all of it going on
forever.
After numerous visits I am as awed as I was on
my first.
Ocotillo are profusely in bloom as we drive
toward the Chisos Mountains. David is here to lead a workshop
while I’ll spend the time hiking. On my first visit, David and I
hiked to the peak of the Chisos’ highest mountain – 7832 foot Emory
Peak. I haven’t done it since because of back problems that caused
me concern about doing it on my own. (David is usually leading a
photography workshop when we’re here.) But this trip, I will do it.
Two easy hikes first. Warmups. Then my peak.
Day 1. The Window
trail begins with a 980 foot descent from the Chisos Basin (site of
the lodge, visitor center and store). After that it is a mostly
level 2.8 miles to the narrow slot canyon – The Window—that channels
all rainwater from the Basin to the desert below. (Water is piped
1500 feet back up to the Basin, for use in all tourist facilities.)
Following the Oak
Creek Canyon drainage westward to the pour-off, I cross open
chaparral slopes, pass century plants, cactus, oaks, Mexican
drooping juniper and pinyon pine. The trees provide delicious
shade on a warm day. Shortly beyond some fresh bear scat, there is
a yellow sign. “Warning,” it says, “Bear activity in the area.”
Not long before reaching the slickrock leading
to the pour-off, a babbling Oak Creek emerges from trees and brush,
glittering dark in deep shade. When the trail reaches rock, steps
cut into the stone edge pools of water. Water falls in narrow
ribbons from one level of stone to the next, ultimately pouring
through the Window to plunge 200 feet to the desert below. A
rainstorm the evening before produced more water than I’ve ever seen
here and the wet rock is slippery. The high rock walls forming the
Window--Amon Carter Peak on the south, Vernon Bailey Peak on the
north-- create a space both monumental and intimate, the perfect
lunch spot. Above me, an ocotillo leans over the top of Vernon
Bailey Peak, as if wanting a view of the pour-off.
Day 2. The Lost Mine Trail is the first hike
David and I did on my first visit to Big Bend. Then, as we started,
I noticed a sign announcing that lions had been seen on the trail.
For that entire hike I checked every boulder we passed for the
crouching lion I knew was on top. I looked behind me every
few feet in case one was following. I hiked that trail essentially
missing the entire thing.
This time I focused on the environment
through which I walked. I identified plants presented in the nature
trail guide available at the trailhead. I learned the differences
between alligator, one-seed and drooping junipers. I saw prickly
pear and claret cup cactus blooms. I experienced the subtle
distinction between sotol and nolina, which look similar but feel
different. I looked at views! Letting go of lions, I
was fully present to my hike.
The trail climbs 1,100 ft. in 2.4 miles,
ultimately trading desert mountain vegetation for a broad ridge of
red rock that ends – more or less -- in mid-air when a 10-foot wall
rises up in front of you. On both sides (and beyond the wall), the
ridge plunges steeply down to canyons and green forests. There are
mountains in every direction. It is a high and gorgeous place.
Day 3. Emory Peak. Beginning in the woods
behind the lodge buildings, the trail to the peak crosses open
meadow, switchbacks up through forest, gains about 2250 ft. in 4.5
miles, then ends on the rocky peak. I have imagined this trail so
often that I assume I know it. I remember a broad stone wall built
by the CCC at a curve in the trail, an old madrone hanging over it.
I remember a sloping meadow on the outside of the curve where I
watched the little Sierra del Carmen deer.
There are, indeed, CCC built stone supports at
various turns, and occasional madrones, but the place in my mind is
only in my mind. I wonder if my eagerness to do this hike is based
on eagerness to come to a place I invented, and found magical.
At a broad turn, I meet a man with an enormous
camera lens who tells me he saw a Colima warbler and managed to
photograph it. “Not very well, though,” he says. Colima warblers,
rare, local birds, are found only in the oak/pine canyons in this
area (and in Mexico in winter) and, usually, only on the Colima
Trail, a trail beyond my turn-off for Emory Peak. I’m fascinated by
birds, but I am not a birder, and I have never before actually
considered the Colima warbler. After talking with the man, though,
I needed to see it. When, later, I encountered two other men
at the junction to Emory Peak who also saw the warbler, I am certain
I will see it. Not only that, but this now seems the sole purpose
of this hike.
From the junction the trail climbs steeply a
short way before contouring around the mountain. Much of the rest
of the trail is newly cut or newly groomed. Tarp-covered caches of
trail-building equipment lie to the side of the trail. I blame the
newness for the fact that I remember nothing about this top section
of trail. In my memory, I came out of forest into meadow before
reaching the rocks of the summit. But since the earlier part of the
trail did not coincide with my memory of it, there is no reason my
memory should be more reliable here. The views from this part of
the trail are vast, the trail comfortable. But there is no meadow.
The trail simply ends on the rocks. On the peak I meet a couple who
passed me on the trail. (This is not difficult to do.) They are
leaving as I settle in, but we talk a bit.
They, too, are from Montana.
The woman asks, “You’re not afraid of lions,
hiking alone?”
“No. I think they’ve got plenty of better
things to eat here,” I say, realizing how far I’ve come since that
first hike on the Lost Mine Trail. It’s not that I’m unconscious of
the presence of lions, but feeling at home here, understanding
better how Big Bend lives, I am no longer frightened. This peak is,
indeed, a triumph . . .
I never did see the Colima warbler.
Copyright © 2010 Ruth
Rudner |
