Denver’s Daughter of Adventure

We are back to civilization and it is already the last day of our trip. We are using the time to discover the “Mile High City”, which is exactly 5280 feet (one mile) above sealevel.

 

While Denver itself is not in the mountains, the city is so close that the presence is always felt. This city has the best of both worlds – easy access to the high country and a mild climate that sees on average 300 days of sunshine a year. We saw three of them!! To the west, at the foot of the Rocky Mountains, lies a chain of ochre sandstone ridges, which acts as a primordial picket fence to Denver’s backyards.

We have all heard of the Titanic tragedy. But have you also heard of Molly Brown, one of the Titanic survivors and Denver’s daughter of adventure?

Molly Brown's house in Denver CO

Molly described her experience in the Newport Herald, “I stretched on the brass bed, at the side of which was a lamp. So completely absorbed in my reading I gave little thought to the crash that struck at my window overhead and threw me to the floor. “

After the crash, Molly heard increasing confusion in the hall causing her to investigate further. “I again looked out and saw a man whose face was blanched, his eyes protruding, wearing the look of a haunted creature. He was gasping for breath and in an undertone he gasped, ‘get your life saver’.” After helping fellow passengers she was taken a hold of and with the words “you are going too” was dropped four feet into the lowering lifeboat #6.

Lifeboat #6 was equipped to hold 65 passengers. However, it pushed off from Titanic with 21 women, 2 men and a twelve-year-old boy on board. The women in the lifeboat rowed for hours. At 4:30 a.m. Molly saw a flash of light. It was from the approaching ship Carpathia, which was the first to answer the distress call. After some difficulty, lifeboat #6 pulled up along side of the Carpathia, and the occupants were pulled aboard one at a time.

Molly, though sore, tired and cold, began to take action. Her knowledge of foreign languages enabled her to console survivors who spoke little English. She also rifled through the ship to find extra blankets and supplies to distribute to women who were sleeping in the dining room and corridors. Molly realized that many women had lost everything- husbands, children, clothes, money and valuables- and needed to start a life in a new country. She rallied the first class passengers to donate money to help less fortunate passengers. Before the Carpathia reached New York $10,000 had been raised.

The Carpathia docked at New York’s pier 54 where it was met by a crowd of 30,000 people. Molly was surrounded by reporters and was asked to what she attributed her survival. “Typical Brown luck,” she replied. “We’re unsinkable.”

In the middle of nowhere!

Todays  trip:

Telluride CO – Montrose CO – Gunnison CO – Saguache CO – Center CO – Hooper CO – Great Sand Dunes NM CO – Alamosa CO

or shorter:

Telluride CO – In-the-middle-of-nowhere CO…

Todays weather: sunny with clouds, 79° Fahrenheit

Two days ago we were in a restaurant in Telluride talking to the owner und telling him about our trip. When he heard that our next stop would be Alamosa CO, he said “why on earth would you go to Alamosa???” We couldn’t quite understand his surprise. We wanted to see the Great Sand Dunes and they were close to Alamosa CO.

Today we drove through the middle of nowhere for five hours, we reached the Great Sand Dunes (the tallest in North America!) and all I could think was “nice”… Pinky brought it to the point:  “We are spoiled! Within the last two weeks we saw so many fantastic things, it can’t get greater every day!”

 

And when we reached Alamosa later in the day all I could think was “why on earth would you go to Alamosa???”

I am indeed its child – absolutely earths’s child (Navajo song of the earth)

Two Navajo girls at Canyon de Chelly

The Southwest is often called „Indian Country“, but it is something of a misnomer. Enter different Reservations and you enter different counties. The Southwest may still be the Indians’ Country, but they are not the same. Each tribe maintains distinctions of law, language, religion, history and custom of their own.

Arizona has five of the top 10 most populated reservations. About 20 % of the 4.3 million Native Americans live on Southwest reservations.

Here is a brief introduction to the tribes that we came across with on our USA Southwest trip:

Apache

The Southwest has three major Apache reservations: New Mexico’s Jicarilla Apache Reservation, Arizona’s San Carlos Apache Reservation and Fort Apache Reservation, home to the White Mountain apache Tribe.

The name Jicarilla comes from Spanish  and means “little basketmaker”. In addition to artistic basketery, the tribe is known for beadwork, leatherwork and pottery.

Navajo

The Navajo Reservation is by far the largest and most populous in the US. Also called the Navajo Nation and Navajoland, it covers over 27’000 sq miles in Arizona, parts of New Mexico and Utah. The Navajo call themselves Diné (“the people”) and their land Dinétah. The Reservation boasts numerous natural attractions, including Monument Valley, Canyon de Chelly and Antelope Canyon.

Ute

The Southwest has three main Ute Reservations: the Uintah and Ouray Reservation in northeastern Utah, the Ute Mountain Reservation in southwestern Colorado and the Southern Ute Reservation in Southern Colorado.

The Ute Mountain Utes (who call themselves The Weeminuche) are known for their guided tours, e.g. Mesa Verde National Park.

Local voice of Navajo Don Mose, 62: “A lot of people look at us as a real downtrodden and poor people. But to the Navajo people, you are not poor if you have the things that are sacred to you, which for us are the six sacred mountains, our homeland. To have lots and lots of money, sure that is great, but if you don’t have your language, if you don’t have your culture or spirituality, if you don’t know your clan, then you are the poor man! We are trying to live the best we can to stay in harmony and balance with Mother Earth and Father Sky.”

A Walk in the Sky

Todays  trip:

Cortez CO – Durango CO – Silverton CO – Ouray CO – Telluride CO (San Juan Skywalk)

Todays weather: sunny, 87° Fahrenheit

While sitting in my room next to an artificial fire place, I am writing this post – so cozy!

The 236-mile route took us to the top of the world as it twists and turns past a series of “fourteeners” (a Colorado term for peaks exceeding 14’000 feet). We drove over three passes, all of them more than 10’000 ft (more than 3000 m) high.   The present blended into the past as we descended through rotten mines and ghost towns where time has worn away the surface, leaving just the shell behind (and that shell doesn’t always look nice, rather shabby). The air is heavy with history, especially in Silverton, Colorados best rediscovered vintage gem.

Silverton is a two-street town, and only one of them is paved. During the silver rush,  Blair St. was considered “notorious” and home to thriving brothels and boozing establishments.

 

Telluride, our todays final destination, has been a hunting ground for the Utes (native Americans), a mining mecca and a ghost town. Nowadays Telluride boasts not only a well-preserved Victorian downtown but also picture-perfect Colorado mountain views. Our hotel is not right in the center of Telluride, but rather above on the Mountain View village. A 15 minutes gondola ride takes you right into Telluride – by the way, the gondolas are made in Olten, Switzerland…

Step Back in Time

Todays  trip: Mesa Verde NP CO

Todays weather: cloudy, 87° Fahrenheit

To explore Mesa Verde is to travel back through time. More than 700 years after its inhabitants disappeared, the mystery of Mesa Verde remains unsolved. It is here that a civilization of Ancestral Puebloans appears to have vanished into thin air in 1300. Today their last known home is preserved as Mesa Verde, a fascinating national park.

Great crumbled villages on wide plains and tiny, vulnerable homes perched high on rocky ledges equally stun and intrigue us. Ancestral Puebloan sites are found throughout the canyons and mesas of the park.

For only US$ 3 we attended a guided tour to the Cliff Palace: Mesa Verde’s largest cliff dwelling. We descended uneven stone steps and climbed five ladders for a 30 m vertical climb. This grand representative of engineering achievement, with 217 rooms and 23 kivas, provided shelter for 250 people. Its inhabitants were without running water – springs across the canyon, below Sun Temple, were the most likely water sources.  

With beauty all around me, I walk – or drive… (Navajo Night Chant)

Todays (marathon) trip:

Sedona AZ  – Hubbell Trading Post AZ – Canyon de Chelly AZ – Monument Valley AZ – Mexican Hat UT – Cortez CO

–> More than 500 miles (800 km)!

Todays weather: cloudy, 85° Fahrenheit

Canyon de Chelly is an important natural and archaeological area of the Colorado Plateau located in the northeastern corner of Arizona on the Navajo Nation. The name itself is a corruption of the Navajo word “tsegi”, which means “rock canyon”.

The Navajo arrived in the canyon in the 1700s and used it for farming and as a stronghold and retreat for their raids on other tribes and Spanish settlers. But if these cliffs could talk, they would also tell stories of great violence and tragedy. In 1805, Spanish soldiers killed scores of Navajo hiding deep in the canyon in what is now called Massacre Cave. Today, hundreds of bullet holes scar the cliff and bones of the victims remain scattered in the cave, untouched by the Navajos, as is custom.

In 1864, the US Army drove thousands of Navajos into the canyon and starved them into surrendering, then forced the survivors to march 300 miles – the Long Walk – to Fort Sumner in New Mexico. Four years later, the Navajos were allowed to return.

Today, about 80 Navajo families still raise animals and grow corn, squash and beans on the land, allowing us a glimpse of traditional life. Apart from the drives to South Rim and North Rim tours are only allowed with a Navajo guide.

We drove to the South Rim, which has the most dramatic vistas. Especially the dead-ending at the spectacular Spider Rock Overlook, with views of the 300 meter free-standing tower atop of which lives Spider Woman. The Navajo say that she carries off children who don’t listen to their parents!

 

Like a classic movie star, Monument Valley has a face known round the world. Her fiery red spindles, sheer-walled mesas and grand buttes have starred in flicks and commercials (remember the cool Marlboro man in the 80s???) and have been featured in magazine ads.

Monument Valley’s epic beauty is heightened by the drab landscape surrounding it. One minute you are in the middle of no-where, just sand and rocks and infinite sky, then suddenly you are transported to a fantasyland of crimson sandstone towers soaring skyward up to 4000 meters.

Unfortunately it was very cloudy when we arrived at Monument Valley. The photos didn’t turn out as impressive as we hoped them to be. Also, there was no sight of the cool Marlboro man. So there was only one thing left to do for me: search the internet for an adequate picture. Here is what I found:

The Spirit of Traveling

Todays trip:

Page AZ  - Antelope Canyon – Wupatki NM AZ – Sunset Crater Volcano NM AZ – Flagstaff AZ – Oak Creek Canyon AZ – Sedona AZ

Todays weather: blue sky, sunshine, 85° Fahrenheit

Antelope Canyon was recommended to us by several people. It was a must on our to do list – and we were not disappointed:

Unearthly in its beauty, Antelope Canyon is a hotspot slot canyon on the Navajo Reservation a few miles east of Page and open to tourists by Navajo-led tour only. Wind and water have carved sandstone into an astonishingly sensuous temple of nature where light and shadow play hide and seek. Less than 400 meters long, its symphony of shapes and textures are a photographer’s wet dream. Lighting conditions are best around mid-morning between April and September. That is exactly when we went. Have a look at the pictures – I can’t decide, which one I like best, maybe you can:

 

Wupatki NM, Sunset Crater Volcano NM and Flagstaff AZ are not worth to mention. But Sedona AZ is a complete different story:

You won’t see tower rock formations the color of Sedona’s anywhere else on earth. They truly blaze with cinnamon, gold and orange, and if the sun hits just right, it seems as though they’re actually lit from within by gigantic blowtorches. With spindly towers, grand buttes and flat-topped mesas carved in crimson sandstone, Sedona can easily hold its own against national parks in terms of beauty.

Native Americans tribes have long considered the area a sacred place, but Sedonas contemporary spirituality didn’t arrive full force until 1987, when thousands of people planted themselves in front of the Bell Rock formation, waiting for it to open and expose a spaceship. The UFO never came, but New Age pilgrims did and continue to do so to this day…

A 4WD Adventure

On our trip from Bryce Canyon to Lake Powell we wanted to see the Pahreah ghost town, where several western movies were shot. The cemetery we found was quite a disappointment and we never saw the ghost town. But, while Pinky was driving and I was looking out of the window, enjoying the scenery, Pinky suddenly stopped. I wanted to ask what was going on, when I saw the snake, that was crawling over the road right in front of us! First I screamed, then we both grabbed our cameras und took photos. The snake was pretty fast, but we got some good photos. The snake disappeared in the bushes and as soon as we didn’t see it anymore, we both started to realize what just had happened. We were both shaking. What if that had happened while we were hiking?? We didn’t want to think about that. But from now on, we always checked twice, before we got out of the car! – Later we found out, that we had seen a King Snake, not poisonous. Ah well, I don’t care, snake is snake and I really don’t need to encounter them!

Multicolored, eroded rock formations dominate most of southeast Utah, though particularly outstanding is the desert either side of the Paria River, beneath the Vermilion Cliffs. Todays trip lead us to South Coyote Buttes, a part of the Paria Canyon – Vermilion Cliffs Wilderness, which was unknown before mid 1990s. There are only 20 people per day allowed to go to South Coyote Buttes, you will need a permit from the Paria Contact Station.

We left US-89 about 2 miles after the Paria Contact Station onto House Rock Road, a dirt road. We traveled past the Wire Pass parking lot at 8.3 miles, and then the Utah – Arizona state line, which is also the border of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah and the Vermillion Cliffs National Monument in Arizona. After another 9 miles we took an unmarked turn-off on the left side of the road. The last 2.5 miles till Paw Hole were pretty bumpy and could only be done by a high clearance four wheel drive vehicle. It was a tough road to drive, but I enjoyed every minute driving in this soft sand – that’s why we had rented a 4WD car!

From the parking area we could see the small, but interesting arch at the top of the first hoodoo. The southeast side of the trailhead offered some nice formations as well and toward the northeast there was a beautiful sandstone bowl at the end of the dunes. From the parking area we headed for the buttes. There were no established trails, instead this route was more of an exploration around the rocks. That was a bit scary, I was still thinking about yesterdays snake… And we knew that there could also be scorpions and even cougars around! Fortunately we did not encounter any of these animals, but we did see the skeleton of a cow – just like in the movies!

We hiked around the bowl and along the sand toward the hoodoos. A variety of oddly shaped, upright rock structures became visible. It was fascinating, we couldn’t take enough photos! This beautiful nature was formed over thousand of years by sand and wind.

Have a look:

A Ghost Town – uninhabited, but not forgotten

On our way to Zion Nationalpark we discovered the ghost town of Grafton UT.

In 1859, Nathan Tenney led five families – the Barneys, Davies, McFats, Platts and Shirts – from nearby Virgin to a site one mile downstream of todays Grafton. In January of 1862 the town was completely washed away by a flood. The people rebuilt the town a mile further up stream at its present site. By 1864 about 28 families lived here. There were many log houses, a post office, church, school and community hall.

When the Utah Territory was settled, the upper Virgin River valley was already inhabited by native Southern Paiute peoples. Pioneers, by necessity, settled the same places required by these preexisting people for their subsistence. This competition for land and scarce resources led to conflict. At the same time, Navajo people living south of the Colorado River were squeezed between pioneer settlement in Arizona to the south and Utah to the North.

In the four years after Graftons founding death came in its usual manner, taking the young, the sick, the old: Mary Lavina Andrus died at one year of age. Mary Jane York, 28, died of tuberculosis, Byron Lee Bybee, 65, died of poor health.  And there were accidents:  Joseph C. field, 9, was dragged to death by a horse.

A visit to the Grafton cemetery demonstrates that 1866 was a very hard year along the Virgin:

Thirteen people died in rapid succession, taken by epidemics, a tragic accident and by the friction caused when new folks rub up against old.

Loretta Russell and Elizabeth Woodbury, two young girls, were both killed in 1966 when the swing they were playing on broke. The girls, best friends, were buried together.

On April 2nd 1866 the three Berry brothers (and one wife), were all killed by Indians.

 

The five children of John and Charlotte Ballard, all of whom died young between 1865 and 1877, none living for more than 9 years.

By 1920 only 3 families still lived here.  Today you can see the school/church that was built in 1886 and a couple of deserted houses – a ghost town. And so it remains – uninhabited, but not forgotten.

Grafton has had parts of several movies shot here. One movie that was partly shot here was Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid with Paul Newman and Robert Redford in 1969.

Bryce Canyon – A history…

In 1916, Reuben (Ruby) and Minnie Syrett brought their family to the wilds of Southern Utah and established a ranch near the present site of Ruby’s Inn. Shortly after their arrival a local rancher told Ruby of the canyon called Bryce. When the Syretts saw the canyon, they were so impressed by its beauty that they told their friends about it. Soon they began hosting visitors. In 1919, Ruby built a small lodge near the brink of the canyon and “Tourist Rest” became the first lodging at Bryce Canyon.

In 1923, when Bryce Canyon became a National Monument, Ruby moved “Tourist Rest” to the location of his ranch and named it Ruby’s Inn. The National Monument grew to a National Park and soon Ruby’s Inn became a large business operation. What started with tent houses and a place to serve meals, paved the way for today’s modern facilities. Ruby’s Inn is owned and operated by Ruby’s family.

Why am I telling you this? I am impressed by the history, I am impressed by what people built up in the beginning of the 20^th Century, when there was not much civilization around here, when they started to culture this wonderful land.

Graceful spires of pink, yellow, white and orange hoodoos *) stand like sentinels at the eroding edges of the vast plateau that is Bryce Canyon. Bryce Amphitheater, which is the spot I like most, stretches from Bryce Point to Sunrise Point, where hoodoos stand like melting sandcastles in shades of coral and magenta, ochre and white, set against a deep-green pine forest.

 

Today the park’s 18-mile-long main road roughly parallels the canyon rim and makes it easy for every 200-meter-tourist (as I call the lazy tourists – and from time to time I am one of them!) to get a perfect view of this stunning Nationalpark. Can you imagine, what it must have been like 100 years ago?

*) Hoodoo = a pinnacle or odd-shaped rock left standing by the forces of erosion