Say Yo to a Threatened Species...

Meet a Desert Tortoise (Gopherus agassiziiand Gopherus morafkai).  

One would have a greater chance of seeing Sasquatch or Nessie the Loch Ness Monster than one of these units. Besides being rare, they spend 95% of their time in burrows. Out of sight, out of mind. 

I felt blessed to be on the receiving end of this close encounter of the Tortoise kind. 

There numbers have been greatly reduced by the usual suspects: loss of habitat (run over by strip malls, roads and subdivisions),  ATV'ers (run over by motorized vehicles), diseases (infected by pet tortoises released into the wild), and predation (Ravens really do a number on the soft shelled juveniles). 

In other words, it's not easy being green/gray.

In all the years and miles of wandering in the Southwest deserts, this is only the third one I've ever seen.  

However for some reason, this one made the tastiest soup!

Only joking! I would never harm a hair on its thumb sized head. That is if it had hair.

I hope one day you get the opportunity to see a Desert Tortoise. Hanging out with Horace the Tortoise made my day. It should do the same for you.

They live from 50-80 years. They know how to pace themselves. Maybe slow and steady wins the race after all. 

Cheers from Frigid Flagstaff, Arizona 

Jeff

Last photo: the road does go on forever.

A Stark Reminder:

Bad things can happen in National Parks. 

When a park's name is Death Valley, I'm extra careful. 

However it doesn't matter how safety conscious a hiker is; sometimes Mother Nature can turn bitch. Like the time I was exploring here in February, 2016. Who knew the rock I was standing on would slide? Why wasn't there a warning sign? 

Because it's a wild place and that's the way it's meant to be.

A typical day for me is to inhale two pots of coffee, washed down by breakfast and head out. I'm not really sure where I'll end up. Oftentimes, I get side tracked. No one knows where I am. 

A lot of the times, I'm unsure of where I am too! I think a lot about Aron Ralston. He's the dude who amputated his caught between-a-rock-and-a-hard-place arm in a Utahan slot canyon. No one knew where he was either. In fact, no one noticed he was gone. 

People are BUSY.  They don't have the time or energy to ponder about other humans precise locations. My black comedy joke with my family is, "if you don't hear from me in a few years, read my last blog. At least you will have an idea on where to start searching for my bleached bones." 

I don't wish to ever write a blog or book about limping out of a scary situation. Doh!  I've already did that! 

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/02/as-i-was-falling-over-backwards.html

Now I have a gimpy left knee. It's better than what the final alternative could have been. 

I'm running out of my Nine Lives. 

With all these morbid thoughts in my brain, I don't take unnecessary chances. When I see a rough route in an unnamed side canyon, I'll look at it from below. Is it worth the risk to see where it might lead? The answer is "No!" If I got into trouble there, Search and Rescue would never find me. Unlike Mr. Ralston, I don't carry a Swiss Army Knife in case I needed to perform an emergency surgery. 

My point to all this? There are risks in everything we do. Try to hedge your bets to see another day. Injury or Death can really screw up your future plans. 

I'll paraphrase World Class mountaineer Ed Viesturs, "Getting to my destination is optional. Returning back to Barley the Van is mandatory." 

Speaking about Survivors! Check out this male Wood Duck doing laps at the Stovepipe Wells pool. A wetlands duck in a vast desert? Talk about misreading your map. 

Be safe out there,

Jeff

Death Valley is sort of Dead...

Compared to mid-February when I was fortunate to be here at the height of the Super Bloom.

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/02/super-bowl-vs-super-bloom.html

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/02/i-bloomin-in.html

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/02/parting-is-such.html

All those lovely blooms have now gone to seed. However, that's not what's making Death Valley seem lifeless. There's hardly any people here. Measured by the National Park Service's barometer of crowds, the Selfie-Stick Index, the Park is a virtual Ghost Town.

What's the Selfie-Stick Index you ask? Why it's the number of visitors welding Selfie-Sticks/100. The Index was pegging in the 80's when the Park resembled a Flower Shop. Now it's down to a more manageable 20-30 range. This makes walking around the overlooks a lot safer. Have you ever been "cloths lined" by a Selfie-Stick? 

I'm now in Barley the Van, getting a bit seasick as we get jostled by northerly Banshee breezes. Unfortunately, it's not the "When this Van is rocking, don't come knocking,"  kind. Rats! It's also raining. A lot. But, it's a warm rain. Oh yeah, there's flash flood warnings too. 

These photos were taken above DV today, before the wind and the rain came by. 

Excuse me while I blow up my water wings. 

This sure beats White Death. 

Jeff

PS. If you care to visit, get here soon, it's 20 degrees cooler than normal now. That won't last and neither will I. Triple digit temperatures will be returning next week. The NPS closes all the campgrounds in the Valley by May 10. I suppose it's a way of preventing heat related bad things from happening to the clueless. Think of it as a form of Heat Hibernation. 

PPS. Last photo, there were pupfish swimming near Barley this morning.

Clara Sambur didn't raise a schmegegge...

G(Yiddish for a stupid person)

As told in my last post, 

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/04/bryce-canyon.html

Barley can get kind of cramped when I'm forced inside by inclement weather. So after another frigid night being buried beneath five blankets, I figured somethings gotta give. 

I checked weather forecasts for the Red Rock destinations of southern Utah. It was a litany of White Death at the higher elevations and cool and sodden at the lower ones.  Incessant cold winds were added as a garnish. No Bueno.

Hmmm. I might not only have to lower my altitude, I needed to lower my latitude. 

I checked the forecast for Death Valley National Park. OY! Perfect! Tank tops, flip flops, baggy shorts and sleeping once again with all my windows open. Is that not  Heaven on Earth? 

So I drove through one cold front after another for 300 miles to sit outside in Shoshone, California. There's no wind, the Bluesy Bullfrogs are croaking from a nearby spring fed pond and I'm wearing a sweatshirt and a grin. 

I can now drink beer without hiding it from the authorities like I did in Utah. I'm in California, the Land that elects movie stars for Governors. 

All is Bueno.

From my Super Bloom posts of Death Valley from February.

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/02/super-bowl-vs-super-bloom.html

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/02/i-bloomin-in.html

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/02/parting-is-such.html

Come on Summer!

Jeff

"Little Bryce Canyon"

Is the US Forest Service's term for Red Canyon. This amber colored area sits down yonder from that much ballyhooed National Park. 

I wandered around for 11 miles in Red Canyon. I think its wishful thinking to say it's a baby Bryce. However, you won't hear a molecule of complaint from me. I liked it for what it didn't have. And what's that, Jeff?

Bus loads of selfie stick wielding mobs on a "National Lampoon Vacation" journey. 

"There's Bryce Canyon!" 

Snap! Goes the I-Phone on a Stick.

"Everyone back on the bus! We have another three parks to see today before we eat our next buffet!" 

It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye to a selfie-stick.

I think Red Canyon is sort of a local's secret. The trailheads aren't signed from scenic Highway 12. The parking lots are camouflaged behind ponderosa, pinyon and juniper pine trees. You need a Forest Service trail map to figure this all out. Most of the time the Visitor Center seems to be shuttered. This year was the first time I've passed this way to find Old Glory fluttering in the breeze. I scored a map and now it has opened up another play venue for this WWJ. 

Speaking of breezes, I've been seriously windburned in the last few days. There's been Amphetamine-type gusts that even judder Barley the Van to and fro. What really stinks on ice, it's a cold wind. 

This life I lead is very weather dependent. Barley the Van sports about 78 square feet of living area. The Queen sized bed (more wishful thinking) takes up most of this space. In other words. Barley can get very claustrophobic during a bout of marginal weather. 

The Forecast? Marginal weather including the possibility of White Death. That won't do. 

Out comes the maps and the Weather.com app. 

It might be time to lower my altitude, but not my attitude. 

Come on Summer!

Jeff

Try to figure out which photos came from where?

PS. My IPA supply is down to one storage area. I don't think I'll need an emergency air-lift to get me back to the more IPA friendly Colorado. Touch wood.

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/03/be-prepared_24.html

April 22nd: A Trifecta of Dates...

Yesterday, it was Earth Day, the first day of Passover and Sid Sambur's birthday. He would have turned 97. May he RIP with Clara. 

So as I strolled around the Hoodoos of Bryce Canyon National Park, I gave thought to two out of three of those days.

I'm not a practicing Jew. Even as a youth while fidgeting in the Young Israel of Ester Gardens Temple I didn't get it. The Rabbis droning their Rabbi-speak, the Congregation murmuring back their reply. The sermons that made no impressions on me and the uncomfortable wool suits I had to don. It wasn't me. 

That being said, I'm very Jewish in a cultural manner. I'm proud to be a member of a this very determined and hardheaded Tribe.

What do you get when you put ten Jews in a room? Eleven opinions! We challenge, we question and we can be a real pain in the tuchas. We are lovers of animated conservations, and the characters who express them. We can be passionate in our beliefs.

We are the underdogs who somehow managed to survive a Pharaoh,  the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, the Pogroms and worst of all-the Holocaust. It was the last episode that brought Sid and Clara together on a blind date in the safety of the Bronx. The US granted them entry and escape from Hitler's Final Solution. For this, I will be forever thankful for. 

So Happy Passover to Jews and non-Jews alike. It's a celebration of Freedom and who doesn't love being free? 

Back to Bryce: While being exfoliated by the wind, I also thought about my father. I often wonder what Sid would think about my present living situation. 

He probably would have used his classic query to no one in particular. "How can a man have three sons and each one be so different?" 

I'm sure he would think I'm strange, meshuggah (crazy) but figure I'm not bothering anyone. I'm staying out of trouble, and I'm paying my bills and taxes. In other words, he'd be OK with it. 

Jews love our Freedoms in whatever form it comes in, including being homeless by choice.

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2016/03/three-years-of-homelessness.html

In the last photo, that's really a matzoh PB&J. I spilled my Nalgene bottle of water on the cardboard carbohydrate and it swelled up to look just like bread! Like I said, I'm not a practicing Jew. 

Happy Passover to all and Happy Birthday to you Sid. 

L'chiam (To Life!)

Jeff 

There's more on Bryce from last year's post.

http://jeffsambur.blogspot.com/2015/04/the-land-of-giddy.html

Zion Finale...

It seemed fitting to finish off the Zion portion of this roll with a two night camp out at La Verkin Creek. This waterway lies in a separate unit of Zion NP named Kolob Canyons. It's about as cast off from the main part of Zion as a crushed beer can along a busy highway. It's stand alone beauty could make it a separate National Park on its own merits.

I chose campsite #12 to be my temporary home. My nearest neighbor was over a half a mile away. That's about right for backpacking. 

The Season of Death (Winter) was beginning to yield to Spring. Brush oaks, Box Elders and Cottonwoods were leafing out. In the meadows, lush grass was tall enough for a horse or cow  to notice. Flowers were blooming everywhere. I could almost hear the exponential green growth, and I'm sort of deaf. 

Campsite #12 lies in a thin part of La Verkin Canyon. I lost the sun early in the evening and gained it back late in the morning. In those hours, the sandstone radiated a warm red glow. It felt cozy. The creek made gurgling sounds 24/7. The down canyon winds  shook my tent and woke me from my dreams. I went back to sleep in a New York nano-second. It was all wonderful.

I hiked, I looked around and I read. I managed to consume 300 pages of "Theodore Rex" into my BUSY schedule. The book is over 700 pages. I'm glad I brought it along. Teddy Roosevelt would have said "Bully!" (TR's word) to know I shlepped a two pound book in and out for eight miles. 

Today, I'm off to Bryce NP. I'm about to enter a "Food Desert" where fresh fruits and veggies are about as rare as Wandering, Wondering Jews are in Utah. As always I'm prepared. I provisioned up in Cedar City, Utah. Barley the Van is stocked full of a colorful harvest. Scurvy shouldn't be an issue. My IPA and coffee supply are holding up too.

This trip has been a lot of fun so far. I hope it continues.

Cheers,

Jeff