SuperNatural

Saturday March 18, 2006

My goal for Saturday was to get out early in the morning and reach the Devil’s Punchbowl in the morning light, take a hike, sample some desert scenery on the way to Palm Springs and cache some water in Joshua Tree for my Tuesday overnight hike. Due to a poor initial attempt at sleep I ended up waking up at 9am. I started loading up the car and returned to the room whereupon I shifted my hand into my pocket to search for the room key. My finger slid ‘thuunk’ into something sharp. An open mini pocket knife on my keychain. Genius! How did my mini pocket knife get open in my pocket? Well, I used it the night before to open a package and counter to my Dad’s teachings since my youth I left the knife open on the table. In the morning I must have grabbed my mess of keys without noticing the open knife and threw them in my pocket. Sorry Dad. You were right.

I had spent the sleepless evening before reading a book called ‘American Gods’ by Neil Gaiman. There was a reason I was reading this book. Pam had been trying to get me to read it and another Gaiman book called ‘Neverwhere’ for a couple of years. Now don’t get too harsh on me yet, I do listen to my wife sometimes. I mean it doesn’t always take me years to fulfill her requests. In a bookstore at Jack London Square recently we had co-picked out another of his titles, ‘Stardust’ and I enjoyed it so much I read a few sections twice or three times which is an almost-never kind of experience for me. Some parts of Stardust reminded me of poetry except I could understand them. And ‘American Gods’ looked to be a tale of the road among other things so it was a good choice for my trip.

So I’m reading this book which is somewhat reminiscent of Jane Lindskold’s ‘The Changer’ and Joan Osbourne’s (or really songwriter Eric Bazilian’s) ‘What if God was one of us?’. You know the lyrics, ‘What if God was one of us, just a slob like one of us’. Well in the book ‘American Gods’ I think we’re talking more gods with a lower-case g. But the slob part definitely fits. The premise of the book is that these beings that were once the proud old gods of the old world are slinking around America up to no good but without out the flash of their early years.

Now you can’t expect a book about Odin and a leprechaun mentoring a two-bit ex-con with an undead wife to not stretch your sense of belief a bit. I realize that. I mean, just because I throw open knives in my pocket doesn’t mean I’m a complete idiot. But some of the dialogue of the Odin character (Mr. Wednesday) to me was hard to believe. It’s just that he talked in a way that was so forward I have trouble imagining him not creating alarm in those around him on a plane for instance. Or without making people just walk away. You’ll have to read it to really know what I mean but here’s an excerpt that shows a little of his forwardness in displaying knowledge that our main character (Shadow, a complete stranger) is not yet privy to..

“I have taken the liberty,” said Mr. Wednesday, washing his hands in the men’s room of Jack’s Crocodile Bar, “of ordering food for myself, to be delivered to your table. We have much to discuss, after all.”
“I don’t think so,” said Shadow. He dried his own hands on a paper towel and crumpled it, and dropped it into the bin.
“You need a job” said Wednesday. “people don’t hire ex-cons. You folk make them uncomfortable.”
“I have a job waiting. A good job.”
“Would that be the job at the Muscle Farm?”
“Maybe,” said Shadow.
“Nope. You don’t. Robbie Burton’s dead. Without him the Muscle Farm’s dead too.”
“You’re a liar.”
“Of course. And a good one. The best you will ever meet. But, I’m afraid, I’m not lying to you about this.”

Now people don’t really talk like this, do they? But of course Mr. Wednesday is a god if only with a lower-case g.

About now if you’re still with me you think I’ve got pretty far off-track from my story of traveling the desert. But that’s what traveling for fun, especially in the desert, is all about : getting off-track. And I’m just about to swerve back on to the road so hold on a sec.

I’m all done washing up my bloody finger and loading the car and I head off for the continental breakfast room at the Inn of Lancaster. I don’t even want to waste time making my usual coffee pot instant oatmeal so I can get on the road quicker. I unlock the room and the only patrons in the place are two older women. Now by ‘old’ I mean that if one of the women had told me it was her hundredth birthday I wouldn’t have blinked. And the other was probably young enough to be the centenarian’s daughter. I head to look for some cereal and before I’m even tempted by the Fruit Loops the centenarian announces in an almost outside voice, something like, “Oh a young man has come to join us. There were two men here earlier but they’re off to start their day”. Then more clearly to me, “My name is Lorine and this is Bridgit and that’s Imelda over there”.

Imelda is a hotel maid cleaning up the breakfast area and gives me a real smile with an unsure look that says, “I just met these ladies. I don’t really know what they’re up to and my name may not be Imelda”. Now in fact her name wasn’t Imelda and neither were Lorine and Bridgit their real names. Not that they lied to me. Not that I’m trying to protect their identities. You just can’t expect me to remember anything I learned in my first hour awake after a rough night. You might go ahead and expect someone else to but not me.

Now here’s the kicker. I tell Lorine ‘I’m Jason’ and then turn to look through the packaged danishes. I’m especially fond of the Butter Horns by Svenhard’s. Lorine says ‘we know several Jasons, but right now you’re the only one that matters’. I have to admit I have never heard an older woman talk in a forward, almost sleazy salesman way like that. I once knew a young woman from Missouri who spoke like that and it always made me (and mostly everyone) cringe. Right now I don’t know if I should cringe or laugh. I decided to keep my mind on business and fill up on other quick items for the car ride like orange juice.

Lorine proceeded to talk more about me than to me in a loud sort of way talking about how most men get up early but ‘this one likes to sleep in’. It was remarkable in a funny way – she obviously was craving attention. But I admit part of me was tempted to sit down and chat for the novelty. My gut reaction and my need to get on the road won over and I bailed out the door while Imelda attended to Lorine’s refill request.

I thought about how a famous author (was it Tom Clancy?) once said that you can learn at least one thing from every person you meet so learn to listen. This definitely would have been one of those situations. But more importantly I thought Lorine sounded like one of those old gods in the book. So maybe it’s better I high-tailed it out of there.

Does ‘American Gods’ portray a dwindling sense of spirituality in a modern world? I don’t know. Fact is I haven’t finished the book yet so I’ll refrain from giving my final word on that yet.

There is something about spending times outdoors in 'Nature' as we call it that makes me focus more on the supernatural. I guess for a lot of the people in this world who spend almost all of their time outdoors such as hunter-gatherers there really is no distinction which makes my premise a little silly maybe. Or maybe it reinforces it. But for some of us spirituality resides on some plane of the human mind that must be ascended to through some means or method. Maybe it's by dressing up and going to church, or kneeling on the ground, taking our hats off, bringing our hands together, or maybe climbing the steps towards a lofty ziggurat like the old Mesopotamians used to do it.

For me heading 'away from the things of man' works. How it works I'm not really sure. I think it has something to do with being in quiet places makes me feel at peace and thankful. Sometimes it's more the exposure to the power of nature like standing next to a flowing river can make me feel pretty insignificant or part of something much greater than myself. But it's not too important how it works. It does, so I use it. Sometimes I feel like I need a hike like someone else might need "churchin' up".

I thank God for every day I get to spend outside kind of like Cahuilla Indians (as I learned on my trip) thanked the spirits of a mesquite bush for all the beans they took off it to eat. But how spiritual could a visit to a place called the ‘Devil’s Punchbowl’ be?

The Devil’s Punchbowl is a County Park. I’ve driven past the sign to the Devil’s Punchbowl several times on the Pearblossom Highway and considered a side trip. Why is it County Parks sound inferior in some way to State Parks or National Parks, like they’re only recognized locally, they must not be that spectacular? That’s a bad conception on my part.

For some reason, particularly peculiar examples of geologic curiosity have been labeled as the ‘Devil’s’. That’s a bad conception on somebody else’s part. I don’t know why in most cases. Then there’s the Devil’s Postpile, the Devil’s Golfcourse, the Devil’s Racetrack . I’m just guessing that the Devils’ Postpile has to do with the rock’s dark appearance, the Devil’s Golfcourse deserves the name because it would be a golfer’s ultimate nightmare and the Devil’s Racetrack gets its name from the mysterious rock moving phenomenon there. The only reason I could think of for the Devil’s Punchbowl name is a 5 foot diameter, 4 foot deep hole at the bottom of a steep rock pit at the foot of one of the tilted rock formations.

The parking lot at the Punchbowl park was a bit past the formations I wanted to visit so I turned around and parked closer on the sandy roadside. I decided to test out my new hiking equipment, a Camelbak ‘Blowfish’ 3L water bladder pack. I generally rely on bottled water but I also generally get mildly dehydrated when I hike so I thought I would try something that would make me sip more often. The idea is you have the mouthpiece near your mouth and drink on it more often due to convenience. You actually suck on the mouthpiece, but apparently ‘Suckfish’ was not quite as marketable as the debonair ‘Blowfish’ name. I filled the pack with my camera gear and headed out cross country (which is a bit easier in the desert than other climes).

After about 30 or so minutes of chugging up and down small canyons walking circuitously around high sage and other desert scrub I finally sight-navigated myself to a proper angle and treeless view of the tilted rock I wanted to photograph. This small break in the brush on the side of a hill must have been the only decent spot to get the photo I wanted. But the camera wouldn’t power up. Probably because I left the camera battery in its charger in the car.

Back to the car.

Back to the one spot I could take my photo that took a half hour to find.

Now I could start my day of photography.

Well, I made a lot of other stupid mistakes that day but do you need to hear all of them? How about the smart things I did? I figured out I could use the high shoulder strap cross strap on the Blowfish to hold my heavy water bladder pack onto my light tripod and keep it from vibrating during long exposures in the wind. And I ended up relieving myself at least seven times so the water bladder must have been a good idea too.

There was something really powerful about the place. Some people believe there are places of power. In ‘American Gods’ one is a carousel at a road-side attraction that transports you to another dimension. This wasn’t quite like that but I got a good feeling from just being there, waiting in a little divot high on the rock wall past where I should have stopped on account of the rock being darn easy giving and loose. Waiting for a perfect light from cloud and sun alignment to compliment the sun-bleached dead yucca rosette I was camped at. A few flakes of snow fell in the desert while I waited and rested there. It felt sacred to me. It made me patient which, believe me, is a transformation.

I’m thinking of petitioning LA County for a name change to ‘God’s Punchbowl’. If you visit there maybe you’ll sign my petition.

-j-

Antelope Valley part I

March 17, 2006

Whenever I travel for work I try to throw in some fun too. So I added a couple of days of desert hiking and photography to my trip to Palm Springs for the ESRI Business Partner Conference. Going to the desert in Spring without getting outside would be a crime. The conference started on a Sunday so I left on Friday around 1pm and headed down 99 for the Antelope Valley. From the San Joaquin Valley, the easiest route is down 99 to join up with 5 and head over the Tejon Pass. A little past Gorman is the turnoff for 138. There always seems to be some interesting wildflowers in Spring along 138 even if the poppies of Gorman are taking a break. There's a nice chunk of public land near the Antelope Hills called the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve.

Antelope Valley is the western tip of the Mojave Desert that asserts itself between the Tehachapi Mountains to the North and the Sierra Pelona Mountains on the South. One of the great things about the Antelope Hills is I'm always alone there. Most people don't give it a second glance especially when the poppies aren't in bloom. But even then it's often quiet. At sunrise or sunset it's often vacant and that's when the lighting is the best.

I started shooting photos of the goldfields (Lasthenia sp.) and the storm that was sweeping through the Valley. I got a number of landscape and close-up photos before I left my tripod and returned to the car to get another layer of Fleece to stop the wind from making me shake. As I reached the car I heard the last thing a photographer wants to hear: the WHUMP of camera biting dirt.

A wind gust had tossed the whole tripod over. I picked up the camera and noticed that the adapter ring had taken most of the impact. It was bent. A good sign. I turned the camera back on and everything looked okay. Now the problem was I couldn't get the adapter ring off the lens and I couldn't put a filter holder or lens cap on it. Bad, but not as bad as a busted camera. It was 5 o'clock on a Friday. I called my lovely assistant Pamela at home for a desperate internet search that turned up King Photo Supply in downtown Lancaster. And they were open 'til 6! I drove in to Lancaster and I got great service from Eric in the shop. I was able to remove the adapter ring and they had a replacement in stock. That was pretty lucky because I had to mail order the original. Eric cleaned up a bit of moisture on the lens that had transferred from the high speed ground vegetation encounter. He also noticed a bit of a fog on the inside of the lens. Aye carumba!

I considered the possibility of having to buy a replacement lens but they had sold out of the one I needed. Eric informed me that the best thing to do was to wait a day or two and see if the fog went away on its own before committing to repair or replacement. After a nervous night in Lancaster the lens was crystal clear. The trip was not going to be a total loss.

Next installment .. SuperNatural.

-j-

Yosemite Valley part I

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January 29th, 2006

As a belated celebration of my Dad's Birthday we (my wife Pam, my father John and my mother Julie) headed to Yosemite Lodge for the weekend. This was my first overnight stay in Yosemite Valley (other than one possible trip when I was a couple years old). We spent a lot of time just walking around the valley, visiting the Ansel Adams gallery, watching the snow and taking photos. We also ate at the Ahwahnee for the first time, which was a great experience. I was taken aback by the selection of seafood at breakfast time. I don't usually go for seafood that far inland. But I tried to adopt a 'when in Rome' mentality. So I'm happy to say that the lox and the green lip mussels were the best I've ever had. My favorite dish though was pork with sweet potatoes and cornbread pudding.

We could see Yosemite Falls from our front door and Half Dome from our back door. The best part was being around for dusk without having to drive home for two hours. It's hard to make an original image of Yosemite given it's one of the most photographed places in the world. But since I don't live too far away and I go there a few times of year I didn't spend my time worrying about having a snapshot of Half Dome, El Capitan or the view of the valley from the tunnel parking lot that everyone else has to stop and get. So I just followed the changing weather conditions and focused on what interested me.

And now to the photos..













All photos in this post were taken with a Canon Digital Rebel XT camera.

San Joaquin River Trail part I

Click on photos to see larger versions.

Did you know that a single trail exists that will eventually allow hikers to travel from highway 99 in West Fresno to the East side of the Sierras? How about that there's a quiet 14 mile long trail that is just beyond Table Mountain Casino, only about 45 minutes from central Fresno? If not, then I should tell you about the San Joaquin River Trail (SJRT).

The San Joaquin River trail right now is a collection of historical and modern trail segments that roughly follow the San Joaquin River and the route of Native Americans and later miners as they crossed the Sierras. In some places the trail is a maintained foot path, in others a jeep trail. In a few places it disappears altogether. The longest complete segment in the foothills connects the terminus of Sky Harbor Road to the BLM's San Joaquin River Gorge (formerly known as Squaw Leap) near Auberry. If you read the Weekend section of Friday's (March 3rd) Fresno Bee you probably noticed a front page article about a trail at the San Joaquin River Gorge. The main trail in that article is a different trail known as the Loop. But it begins at the same trailhead as the SJRT. And the SJRT is mentioned as 'a 14-mile hike'. While the SJRT heads downstream parallel to and far above the river, the Loop Trail heads down to a pedestrian bridge crossing, over the river before it splits into two uphill trails that form a loop. Both trails have significant up-and-down exercise. Right now I'll focus on the SJRT as I just completed a short 6 mile hike along its course a couple of weeks ago. In some places you will hear of the SJRT as a 76-mile trail from Friant Dam to Devil's Postpile National Monument in the Eastern Sierras. But the San Joaquin River Parkway Trust and other organizations plan to extend the route to Highway 99. How long will that take? 20 years? I don't know.Several follow-ups on this topic are in the works as I have had a number of experiences on various segments of this trail.

February 12, 2006.
I'm so used to seeing smog in Fresno and even in the foothills that I didn't think too much of the grey layer of air hanging over Millerton Lake at noon. I chose to hike the down the San Joaquin River Trail because it's close and I thought I could do some fishing for (spotted?) bass that seem to be active in the ripples of narrower sections of the river canyon. Fishing in small streams of the Sierras doesn't open until April.

The cows at the entrance gate to the trail were all heifers so I wasn't too put off by their presence. The first thing I noticed different about the trail on this hike was a lot of new flagging dedicated to trail maintenance plans. That's a good sign. The maintenance of trails around Millerton has often been overlooked, and can sometimes lead to dangerous trail conditions. The beginning of the trail can be misleading. The first section is uphill which seems like the wrong way considering the trail leads downstream along the river. But eventually the slope heads back down and steeply at times. I was hoping to see some active wildlife such as Turkeys (not native) but the real points of interest turned out to the be small things that usually escape notice, like the new mushrooms, the new leafs budding out on the oaks and the brightly colored lichen on granite rocks. And the coolest thing I saw was the germinating buckeye nut (below left).

The buckeye leaves are already well developed (see above right) as they are usually the first to bud out. They are also the first to fall in the summer while other trees are busily carrying out photosynthesis. Last year's nuts have started to sprout and give children (or adults) a good look at seed germination in action due to their size. The shoot first reaches the ground and then splits somewhere between the nut and the ground where the first leaves push skyward. The tree starts forming while still connected by the umbilical-like connection. I collected a few nuts that had just started to sprout from the sand below the high water line of the river. Those trees weren't going to make it anyway so I didn't feel too bad about taking a few home to try growing in the yard. So far they have survived in a planter but don't appear as healthy as they were in situ.

I like to pick up a few buckeye nuts during the fall before they sprout too because they have a very smooth seed cover once they come out of their leathery outer cover. A buckeye makes a perfect 'worry stone' (other than the fact it isn't a stone). You can keep one in your pocket and rub the tough smooth cover when you're anxious. I'm not into new age philosophy but I find that using a worry stone does have a therapuetic quality like rocking in a rocking chair, swinging in a hammock or floating in a boat. They're also pretty to look at but they tend to shrivel after being kept in a dry environment for a few months.

The one thing you don't want to do with a buckeye nut is eat it. According to everything I've read on the subject they are toxic. Native peoples used mashed up seeds in streams to stun fish but they would only eat buckeye themselves after repititive leaching as with oak acorns. So while they may provide a great science lesson for kids, don't leave the nuts where children can grab them.

There are some interesting man-made items to be found along the river as well. You can find anything from the usual bass lures and driftwood to toys, construction tools and cut lumber. As disappointing as it can be to see trash on a hike, you can find some great subjects for found art out there if that's your thing.

About two miles in on the trail there is a must-see natural feature. As you approach this point on the trail you will sometimes hear a waterfall like sound or feel the temperature drop depending on the time of year. The cool air and rushing water sound are the product of a 'cave' that may have been formed by the drilling action of rocks spun by water pressure. It's a narrow slot canyon shaped cave. This time of year cold water rushes through, creating air displacement. Later in the Summer and Fall the water flow drops enough that an adventurous spirit may climb upstream to explore the cave further. In the Winter and Spring the water flow causes the rock surfaces to be extremely slippery. A few openings above allow shafts of light to descend and make for tricky contrasts for photography. Though it's just a few feet underground, the rush of the water and the dark cool air make me feel like I'm in a different world where I might find some creature new to science.

I came down to the water's edge to see about fishing but there were two large log flotillas. I'm not sure if you could call them log 'jams' as they weren't jammed into the space between the rocky shores and they only appeared to be on the surface. In fact as I sat and watched the lower log flotilla it continued to move upstream at about 1-2 mph probably on account of wind. Boats were kept from moving upstream even though the current water level would normally allow passage further. I tried fishing for a few minutes but it seemed like a dead day on the river. Besides I had so much fun stopping to photograph mushrooms, buckeyes and the cave that I had left no time to fish! So I made the steep hike back uphill to the trailhead parking lot.

The smog/haze was so thick it was like a dirty grey fog upcanyon. The smog can actually make for good sunsets photographs (as long as your subject isn't far away) so I stopped to take a few. But for the very first time in central California I actually could feel the bad air quality in my throat and chest after hiking uphill. I've had that feeling before when hiking near Los Angeles, like I could't breathe in all the way or a horrible pain would hit me below the throat. It was a sobering realization that the air quality in the Fresno area can really take me down a notch.

I'll be sure to add more information about the San Joaquin River Trail as I move further back and forward through the timeline of my hikes in the Sierras. If you want to visit it yourself you can click on the map (above left) to see where the trailhead is located in relation to the several trails in the area. Or you can go the Millerton State Recreation Area map, which shows the entire 14 mile segment. To get there take Friant Road past Millerton Lake where it turns into Millerton Road and past the Table Mountain Casino. Take a left on Auberry Road and drive through the town of Auberry. When you reach a fork in the road above the school at the end of town you should take a left again. Now you will be on Powerhouse Road as you pass a trailer park. Eventually you will have to take a hard right on to Smalley Road where there is a BLM sign for the San Joaquin River Gorge. Follow that down to the trailhead campground and park.

All photos for this post were taken with a Canon Digital Rebel XT camera.