Five
miles from there and I pulled off on an unmarked red dirt road and followed
it for an hour as it followed a valley floor; a hundred foot cloud of
dust following in my trail. I stopped at a small clearing. 'Wire Pass',
was written on the BLM post, so I knew I had landed. I read a passage
from Conrad and marked it,
"Watching
a coast as it slips by the ship is like thinking
about an enigma. There it is before you--smiling, frowning, inviting,
grand, mean, insipid, or savage,and always mute with an air of whispering,
'Come and find out.' This one was almost featureless, as if still in the
making, with an aspect of monotonous grimness. The edge of a colossal
jungle, so dark-green as the be almost black, fringed with white surf,
ran straight, like a ruled line, far, far away along a blue sea whose
glitter was blurred by a creeping mist. The sun was fierce, the land seemed
to glisten and drip with steam."
My
backpack was heavy,
my tripod and equipment bag were heavy too, and it was hot, blistering
hot, and I walked down a desert wash, with cactuses and junipers rising
above me, and as the floor descended the two miles toward a mess of rocks
and cliffs, the insects thickened. Flying black beetles, moths, deer flies.
Buzzing. Buzzing. And some crawled, like the lizards. In the stillness
of the air, you didn't only see the lizards, you could hear them pulling
their tails along the red sand. Thhhh. Thhhhhh. Thhhhhhh. In time, the
wash narrowed until small ledges of red stone, sandwiched it, and soon
the stone was overhead, a hundred feet overhead.
The
temperature dropped by twenty degrees and it became dark. Soon, as I continued
down this dark slot canyon, there was no direct light, only the amber
cast of warm tones on the grey and pink walls. These walls became narrower,
as I descended. Soon, I was removing my backpack and squeezing myself
and equipment through, or walking sideways, tiptoeing. When the tight
corners gave way, I found myself on a 10 foot ledge, and I said "Forget
this." but the Canyon echoed back, "Forget this, forget this, forget this."
And it made me think; well maybe there is a way back up that 10 foot wall?
And I said, "Screw it." And the canyon echoed back and I threw my pack
and followed with a jump and a fall. Oh the Sweet Paria.
I edged around
another dark corner, now wearing my flashlight. I saw a giant log wedged
between the canyon walls - 50 feet above me. That made me realize that
I was now miles from escape. If it rained, even 50 miles from here, those
same floods that crammed that tree 50 feet above me would come roaring
down. In time, I crossed into the sunlight; a triangular trough and the
convergence between the Wire Pass and the Gulch; the two slots that wind
into the Paria. Although the convergence was enclosed by 200 foot cliffs,
it was sunny here, and there were green trees.
I
drank water on a grassy plateau, and entered the gulch. This slot descended
to 500 feet under its cliffs, and it was narrow. Soon, there were patches
of water. When they became impassable I took off my boots and waded through
them at knee length. The water stank of dead animals, and was a sinewy
brown, so I was glad to be on sand.my feet, however, began to sink, and
I realized that this was the quicksand the rangers had warned about.
Lower Antelope Canyon
