Of Boots and Cairns
As we started our return hike in Upper Muley Twist Canyon, my right knee started bugging me. It’s a good pain, though, that I have felt twice before. It happens when my hiking boots are shot, and with 450 miles on this pair, they were definitely done. Fortunately, I had another pair ready to go as we anticipated this pain when we were in Moab a month ago.
Somewhat surprisingly, the hiking on this adventure of ours has taken center stage. I tried for over a decade to get Alanna to like hiking, to no avail. She was much happier running, and found hikes boring and slow. Two years ago, southern Utah finally changed her tune. Still though, when we set out last June we were not expecting hiking to be the central focus of our days, but interesting trails have very much informed our day to day whereabouts.
At the end of yesterday’s hike, through the Dry Fork of Coyote Gulch to Peekaboo and Spooky slot canyons, our total mileage is 1215, which shocks both of us. At the outset of our adventure neither of us had climbed a mountain, walked more than 8 miles, or taken an unmarked route into a wilderness area, nor were we looking to, but we have now done all of that and more.
The roads through most parks are pretty, but a little dull, and while the drive-up overlooks are beautiful, they can have the feeling of a circus. The trails though (almost) always lead us to magical and more isolated places.
For example, Druid Arch in the Needles district of Canyonlands NP. It stands 450 feet tall, and unlike most arches it looks like it was built by a giant out of massive slabs of stone. We did the short hike to Delicate Arch, that 60 foot tall icon of Utah, the last time we were here. But the cue of tourists waiting to take their selfies underneath Delicate sort of spoiled the view. Druid Arch was way more interesting in our opinion, even though it was a very long walk. The shortest hike to Druid is 11 miles, but we had to take the long way, 15 miles, since the Minnie was too big for the road to the shorter trailhead. We didn't mind though; it was a clear warm day in a beautiful canyon, plus the distance kept the selfie lines at bay.
When we arrived in the Bisti/De Na Zin Wilderness Area in the fall we were nervous because we had never ventured off of marked trails before. The Bisti, as you may recall, has not one single trail. Since then we have logged hundreds of miles through unmarked wilderness areas and Alanna has gotten quite good with the compass, topo maps and our GPS app. We adore the solitude and appreciate the extra attention required to navigate.
The trails we have traversed not only took us to stunning vistas, but have offered me the opportunity to get in the best shape of my adult life. I have walked off some serious weight and feel a strength in my legs that I have not felt since I was much, much younger. A great benchmark of our progress has been returning to parks we've been in before and easily hiking the trails we once dismissed as way too difficult for us. Hiking has also been meditative as we spend a good deal of time walking silently. I have loved the chance to just to be in nature, listening to chirping birds, watching wildflowers sway in the breeze, wondering who walked these paths before me.
This post, then, is a shoutout to all the folks who maintain hiking trails, volunteer or paid, wherever they may be situated. A few weeks back, when we were miles into a hike to the confluence of the Green and Colorado Rivers, I had a powerful feeling of gratitude for those whose job it is to care for the trails.
Trail maintenance may be as simple as checking signs and clearing brush, or it may be as strenuous and dangerous as hauling a jackhammer 2000 feet up a mountain to fix a narrow trail section damaged over the winter, like we witnessed on Siyeh Pass in Glacier NP. Either way, we appreciate the people who do this work so that we can find our way and continue to enjoy incredible hikes. And we certainly appreciate the parks and monuments that prioritize trail maintenance—not all do, or can, because of limited funding.
I’m a little ahead of myself, though. Before I can thank those who maintain trails today, I need to give the biggest of shoutouts to the CCC, the Civilian Conservation Corps, and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. In the depths of the Great Depression the Civilian Conservation Corps built the current infrastructure of many of our parks. The goal of the CCC was to provide jobs, which they certainly did; over three million young men participated in the program in its nine years of existence. They built visitors centers, campgrounds, roads, picnic areas, and trails in over eight hundred sites nationwide and planted nearly three billion trees. We know their work well, as almost every mile of marked trail we have hiked so far on our trip has been on a trail built by the CCC.
As our time on the road, and the trail, winds down (we are still shocked that June has arrived!), we plan to make the most of it by seeing as much as we can see and hiking as far as our legs, and our boots, will take us. Part of the next adventure will be learning about hiking in the Santa Barbara/SoCal region, so if you have any thoughts, send us an email please!