Something Happened

INTROLOGUE:

Hero and I just got back from a weekend trip, one which definitely falls into the category of ridiculous adventures, so I thought I would quickly and lazily recap it here:

PART I: The Santa Fe Trail -OR- The Road(s) to Santa Fe (New Mexico)

Awake at 1:30am and on the road by 2:30am, we moved diagonally across Kansas from the northeast to the southwest in darkness. It was sad knowing that out there in the shadows were the Flint Hills, the Smoky Hills, and the Arkansas River Lowlands, all special and captivating, and we were missing them. This feeling was especially pronounced as we drove by Cheyenne Bottoms and couldn’t see anything. But we were headed elsewhere and were making good time.

The sun rose at our backs somewhere passed Dodge City in the High Plains. The light on the fields and the wind farms with thousands of hawks soaring and perching along the roadside made up for the things we had missed earlier. Through Elkhart and into Oklahoma, we encountered a great sight: absolutely nothing. Empty space is really powerful sometimes.

The prairie kind of dissolved into desert and eventually we were closing in on our destination: Santa Fe, New Mexico. The surrounding mountains had snow, the air was chilly, and it all looked pretty amazing. It’s the highest elevation state capital in the country, and it sits 6,333 feet higher than my hometown of Lawrence, Kansas. Both places have basically the same temperatures throughout the year – Santa Fe is actually a couple degrees Fahrenheit cooler than Lawrence on average.

Typically, I got us a bit lost entering town, but eventually we made our way to Paseo Real, a little road that winds by the airport, where we located a sign for La Cieneguilla petroglyph site. The open air rock art engraved there predates European settlement, and there’s a ton of glyphs to find. One general path leads up into the hills and around the site, but when we started rock hopping and just wandering around we found that lots of petroglyphs are in hidden little nooks or under overhanging cliffs. Hero, being a 65 pound, three-legged beast, had a little trouble with a couple of the tougher rock obstacles (we often had to climb over stuff) and I had to make sure he didn’t do anything stupid like step on a cactus or make a foolhardy jump (he’s over-confident in his athletic abilities), but for the most part I was amazed at how deftly he maneuvered the terrain. I’m always amazed when hiking with him. I realized at some point that if he got hurt, there wasn’t really a way to argue that making a three-legged dog climb rocks out in the desert wasn’t a kind of abuse, or at least really stupid of me. But it all went fine and we made it back to HMAS without any catastrophes.

(HMAS is our vehicle: a black 2012 Toyota RAV4 with the back seats laid down and a perfectly sized mattress filling the space. Blankets, pillows, dog toys, and when we aren’t moving too fast and the temperature is bearable, windows down so Hero can stick his head out of the windows. We call it “Hero’s Mobile Adventure Suite” or HMAS, which I prefer to pronounce “Hummus.")

Next, we navigated fairly easily to Paws Plaza, a dog daycare and boarding facility that I had found online and communicated with prior to arriving. We stopped in just to make sure Hero’s vaccine records and other paperwork were in order for daycare the following day, and the super cool ladies working there showed me around the place. Before leaving, they also gave me directions to the downtown Historic District where the old churches were and told me that if I had time while I was in town I should check out Meow Wolf. I was happy to reply, “That’s why I’m putting Hero in daycare tomorrow!”

Downtown, I was frustrated with the city’s broken digital parking meters (I parked in three different spaces, none of the screens worked, so I gave up and decided to just not pay), then Hero and I roamed around for a while. The Cathedral of St. Francis of Assisi (patron of Santa Fe), the Loretto Chapel (home of a “mysterious” winding wooden staircase), and the San Miguel Mission (“oldest church structure in the USA”) were all architecturally beautiful, as were most of the buildings downtown which were a combination of renovated pueblo-style buildings and new buildings created to look like the old pueblos. I saw several little Mexican restaurants that looked fantastic, but I had the dog so I passed them all up.

The evening’s final mission became something of a headache. We needed a place to sleep. Specifically, we needed a place to park HMAS without getting kicked out. I had considered going up to Bandolier National Monument or down to Santa Fe National Forest to camp (tent and gear were stowed under the bed, with the dog food), but I dismissed the idea because I wanted to be in town early, and the bed in HMAS was already made.

Walmarts across the country are known for letting RVs and cars park overnight, so I stopped at the closest one and found signs all over the parking lot saying something along the lines of “No Overnight Parking.” Inside, a customer service lady told me that Santa Fe had some kind of law prohibiting it, but that the “new Walmart” was technically outside of city limits so I could go there. I confirmed this information with a police officer who happened to be parked outside, then drove over to the other Walmart, where I found the exact same signs as the first one. A manager told me that due to homeless people sleeping in cars and RVs for several days at a time, citizens began complaining and an overnight parking ban was put in place on that specific store. I was tired and angry, but back on the highway just south of town there was a rest stop. It took all of about seven minutes to get there, and was much darker and prettier than a damn Walmart parking lot. It was a clear night and the stars were something on par with what I remember of the night sky in Alaska, Utah, and Egypt.

I believe the temperature got down to around 14 or 15 Fahrenheit that night. I was wearing my wool-lined pants, a longsleeve shirt, a sweatshirt, and socks, in my sleeping bag. Hero had a “dog blanket” (a term referring to any blanket belonging to Hero) and then we both were covered with a thick, fluffy, warm blanket that we only use on road trips. We stayed warm through the night, though there was a layer of frost on the inside of all of the windows when we woke up.

And we woke up around 4am. We killed time driving into and around town, taking a couple walks, Hero ate his breakfast, then around 7am we headed toward Paws Plaza. It didn’t open until 8am, but I noticed that the Pantry restaurant was a couple blocks over. I’d read about it when researching the trip and decided I needed a Santa Fe meal: Huevos Consuelo and coffee. Hero napped in the car while I ate an amazing meal, and by the time we got over to Paws Plaza they had opened. Hero went into daycare, and I went to MEOW WOLF…

PART II: “Something Happened”

The brochure for Meow Wolf’s House of Eternal Return begins like this: “Something has happened inside a mysterious Victorian house that has dissolved the nature of time and space! Discover the story of the fictional Selig family who are caught up in a vortex that brings all of their dreams and memories to life!” 

Hero posing outside Meow Wolf.

The place is a gigantic, interactive, immersive, science-fiction, funhouse, maze, jungle gym, modern art exhibit that spans 20,000 feet in over 70 rooms created by the 500 artists of the Meow Wolf art collective. It’s also a form of non-linear storytelling, where visitors explore and investigate the bizarre space to find clues via journals, newspapers, magazines, books, scrap books, photo albums, video kiosks, and a blog whose URL is only found by using a key to decipher a message written in hieroglyphs. The place is ridiculously, intricately detailed and no piece of any part of any room is not related to the story. Also there are secret passages to hidden rooms and Meow Wolf intentionally offers no maps. I was there for hours before I stopped finding new rooms. I don’t think I missed any large spaces, but the way the exhibit is confusingly designed, I suppose it’s possible I missed something. I am absolutely sure several people I met there missed a lot of it. I heard one visitor say, “We’ve already been upstairs.” If you’ve been upstairs, but haven’t walked up stairs three or four times in three or four different places, you haven’t seen all of upstairs. The place is two stories tall, but not all of the second floor is connected. Everything you find in every drawer and every cabinet is a set piece, some of it completely hilarious and none of it random. 

Inside the House of Eternal Return.

 There’s this broad cosmological mythology that our reality and all universal laws are actually contractual agreements between the Shadow People (order) and the Anomaly (chaos), a contract called the Charter with a team of inter-dimensional police (also called the Charter) that go around looking for anyone breaking the rules. Human beings are Children of the Anomaly and some have the creative energy to break the rules of the Charter (and potentially destroy reality). 

Sci-Fi.

Portal/slide.

You could play the ribs like a xylophone.

The transducer.

 
The House of Eternal Return is a Victorian home originally located in Mendocino, California where the Selig family lived …or is living. The family members are Emerson (a sonic energy researcher who invented a “transducer” to resurrect his grandchildren’s pet hamster), “Master” Lucius Selig (a cult leader running a vacation resort business to parallel dimensions that he has created), Piper Pastore (a painter who went crazy after her son disappeared), Nicolae Pastore (Galaga champion and musician from Lawrence, Kansas who invented a laser harp to harness sonic energy and rip a hole in the fabric of space-time), Lex Pastore (a young boy who is obsessed with defeating death and has disappeared into the Fog World - the space between realities), and Morgan Pastore (Lex’s twin sister who can talk to plants).

Detailed doodles.

Robots.

It’s all really weird and convoluted and there’s too much to the story to really talk about it all, so that’s all I’ll say. Basically, the Selig family tore a hole in reality and all of these other dimensions have opened up inside their house, and a bizarre space police force has quarantined it in New Mexicio.

I spent like six hours at this place, and I’m sure I didn’t understand a lot of it.

PART III: Back To Reality

Hero had a great day also! He was in a big play group for his entire stay at Paws Plaza and apparently he made some friends. The staff sent me photos. Looked like a good time.

Hero at Paws Plaza.

We left Santa Fe and headed east toward Amarillo, Texas. When I got tired of driving, we stopped for the night in some middle of nowhere desert rest area and slept peacefully and warmer than the night before. We woke up early again, and by the time the sun was rising we’d reached Palo Duro Canyon State Park.

Lighthouse Rock is kind of the main attraction of the park. Google Palo Duro and you will probably see a picture of it. We, being good tourists, wanted to see it for ourselves. After a few “scenic overlook” stops to take in the second largest canyon in the country, we drove down into the belly of the beast and pulled into a parking lot at the trailhead for Lighthouse. 

Hero at Palo Duro.

Rocks.

The entire 2.72 mile walk out to the “end” of the trail is gorgeous canyon lands and it wraps around Capital Peak. We saw a coyote on the trail, and when he spotted us we watched him silently gallop off toward the side of the canyon. At the “end” of the trail there is a side path that cuts up to the base of the two rock spires. I was again impressed by Hero’s climbing skills as we made our way up. At the base, we located yet another trail that climbed all the way to the top of the larger of the two formations. We wound up all the way on top with spectacular views of the canyon below us.

At the top.

Lighthouse.

On our return trip to HMAS, Hero spotted a roadrunner in a dry creek bed as we crossed it. My crazy dog pulled on his leash as the roadrunner sprinted away and out of sight before I could snap a photo. As we made our way back, thinking about the coyote and the roadrunner we saw, I started looking around for ACME debris.

The hike, water breaks, and time spent relaxing on top of the monument took less than four hours total, and the sun was shining down hard when we were back in the car. I had intended to camp for the night in Palo Duro, but I had also planned on arriving much later in the day. We stopped to hike the beginning of another trail, but I then made a snap decision to get going.

Already ahead of schedule, we drove the four hours to the Wichita Mountains National Wildlife Refuge north of Cache, Oklahoma and arrived at something like 4pm. A friendly, helpful, bearded man at the visitor center told us where to spot wildlife, where to hike, and suggested a drive up to Mount Scott for the views. We followed his advice, and by sundown we had hiked Charon's Garden Wilderness Area, a leg of the Dog Run Hollow trail system, and the very short Jed Johnson lake trail (in the dark); spotted wild bighorn cattle, bison, and prairie dogs; and met a few dog-friends on the rocks atop Mount Scott overlooking the whole place. We could have (and probably should have) stayed the night and hiked more in the morning. But again, I made the decision to stay way ahead of schedule.

Hiking in the Wichita Mountains.

Road block.

Prairie dog town.

From Mount Scott.

We were home an entire day earlier than planned.

OUTRODUCTION:

…I hope it has been clear that despite my usual nature-centric travels, the real reason and best part of this trip was a modern art exhibit. I know, it’s weird.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON THESE COOL PLACES:
https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/la-cieneguilla-petroglyph-site
https://meowwolf.com/santa-fe/about/
https://tpwd.texas.gov/state-parks/palo-duro-canyon
https://www.fws.gov/refuge/wichita_mountains/

Kill Me Now

(Hyperborean Hopscotch 2017: Day Ten)

Back and shoulders aching from the weight of my pack, knees sore and weak from the downhills of the two preceding days, I left for the most difficult hike of the entire ordeal. My “partner” the Belgian gym teacher/mountain climber was fine. I told him I’d be slow on the ascents up to the pass, that I’d be stopping a lot, that he should go his own pace and leave me behind. I saw him several times along the way, but to avoid focusing on the subjectively negative psychological aspect of our objectively positive association, I’m going to cut him out of the story here and say he went on ahead while I lagged behind.

There are not really “parts” or “legs” of the Fimmvörðuháls Pass hike, but for me there were five distinct sections:

1. Gradual ascent:

The road to Fimmvörðuháls Pass.

The trail went up immediately, and the views became more and more impressive as I ran out of breath quicker and quicker. There was a section where hikers have to use an anchored nylon rope to assist in walking across a narrow, steep, high piece of land. This tested my acrophobia, but I made it across without falling. Being afraid of heights, this was semi-terrifying. Luckily, it got worse. 

The path ahead.

Morning views.

After more climbing, the trail leveled out a little, but eventually I came to a mountain.

2. "Steep" ascent:

Believing this was the climb up to Fimmvörðuháls proper, I paced myself and stopped a few times as I worked my way to the top. It was tiring - because I’m out of shape and my pack was very heavy. But once I reached the top, I felt accomplished and happy. I took some time to relax and enjoy the view. 

This is not the top.

Continuing on.

3. The real ascent:

Shortly after the previous ascent, the trail ran into a much bigger, much steeper, much scarier mountain. It took me a while to comprehend what was happening: the previous ascent was a hill compared to this monster. How was I going to walk up that thing? 

Neil Peart is my favorite drummer and one of my favorite authors. His books Ghost Rider and The Masked Rider are among the best adventure travelogues I've encountered. In The Masked Rider, a book about riding bicycles through West Africa, he captures the painful truth of in-the-moment adventure:

“Some people travel for pleasure, and sometimes find adventure; others travel for adventure, and sometimes find pleasure. The best part of adventure travel, it seems to me, is thinking about it. A journey to a remote place is exciting to look forward to, certainly rewarding to look back upon, but not always pleasurable to live minute by minute. Reality has a tendency to be so uncomfortably real."

The climb up to Fimmvörðuháls Pass took every iota of energy I had. It was uncomfortably real. Including constant breaks to take off my backpack and sit down, this portion of the hike took a lot longer than it should have. I have never been more aware of my lack of physical fitness – but I made it! Other hikers did not struggle as much as I did, though it wasn’t easy for anyone. All three people I saw during this climb were fighting to the top. I was pathetically gasping for air and on the verge of vomiting by the time I got there.

But I got there. And this time, it really was the top. 

Finally.

4. Ice Land:

This was the actual Pass, Fimmvörðuháls, that crosses between the glaciers Eyjafjallajökull and Mýrdalsjökull (each with large, active volcanoes under their icy caps). It was here that I saw the landscapes I most wanted out of the whole endeavor. Mountains of ice on either side, snow and ice underfoot, whites and blues with stark black rock outcroppings. I was so far from home, but I felt…at home. I took my time wandering the trail, mesmerized by the sheer existence of a place like that. I drank water running directly from the glaciers, rubbed some ice on my face and neck. Despite walking for three days without bathing, I felt clean. 

Eyjafjallajökull.

Snow patches.

Ice.

As Neil Peart put it in Traveling Music:

"Fully appreciating the moment, I chuckled to myself and said, 'Just kill me now.' "

Why I'm here.

Kill me now.

5. Waterfalls:

Reaching the mountain hut, I knew it was time for the slow, long descent to Skógar. The trail here follows the Skógá River, which in my mind is not so much a real river as a series of waterfalls leading to the ocean. 

Falls.

River.

Falls.

More falls.

Yep.

Constant falls.

"We have an unknown distance yet to run, an unknown river to explore."

- John Wesley Powell, as quoted by Edward Abbey in The Journey Home

Mountain, falls.

Four falls in twenty seconds.

I honestly think there are something like thirty astounding falls in a row, broken up by several less-astounding falls. It’s like there’s more falling water than running river all the way to Skógar, the town where the final, dramatic waterfall – Skógafoss – greets tourists pulling off the Ring Road for a photo op (as I did in 2014). 

Locals.

Gorge.

More falls?

More falls!

Captivating.

And finally, Skógafoss.

Back in civilization, I staggered into a restaurant and ordered a victory meal: Fish and chips with beer. It was 7pm so I took a nap in a nearby hostel lounge chair until my bus came at 9pm, and I slept again on the whole ride back to Reykjavik City Hostel.

The God of Walkers

(Hyperborean Hopscotch 2017: Day Nine)

As I was finishing my last entry, about the first day of my Laugavegur hike, Facebook alerted me of a memory from two years ago. I had posted a quote from Bruce Chatwin's book In Patagonia:

"I haven't got any special religion this morning. My God is the God of Walkers. If you walk hard enough, you probably don't need any other God."

That is just about the most pertinent thought for my time in Iceland. It's also appropriate for today, as I think back through it all. I must have had the God of Walkers on my side. Or luck.

Anyway, back to August 23...

Toward Mýrdalsjökull, the glacier covering Katla volcano.

If we were going to finish the trail on day two, we had roughly 30km to go. While Ani and Sourabh made their breakfast I set off alone around 6am. They planned to catch up with me at the next stop.

Going it alone.

Crossing another small stream, my feet were refreshed in cold, cold water. After a long walk through magical lava fields surrounded by fairy tale mountains, I came to Hvanngil ravine with its smaller hut and campground, where I discarded trash I’d been carrying and refilled my water. Just after Hvanngil was a bridge crossing the Kaldaklofskvísl River, and farther south the unbridged Blafjallaksvísl River. This one came up over my knees and was maybe thirty feet wide. Very cold.

Another lava field.

River crossing.

From the bridge.

Cold, knee deep water.

The trail then led into a vast, time consuming desert plain of black sand. It was an unearthly, intriguing place, and it was easy walking. But it seemed to go on forever. When the way finally opened and turned down a mountain path, the hut Emstrur/Botnar came into view. I was more than ready for a break.

Desert.

In the desert, I remembered Abbey.

In the desert, I always remember Abbey:

"Life has come to a stand still, at least for the hour. In this forgotten place the tree and I wait on the shore of time, temporarily free from the force of motion and process and the surge toward - what? Something called the future? I am free, I am compelled, to contemplate the world which underlies life, struggle, thought, ideas, the human labyrinth of hope and despair."
- Edward Abbey, Desert Solitaire

There were no trees here. I would see those later.

Desert solitaire.

Eyjafjallajökull in the distance.

Anirudh and Sourabh caught up with me at Botnar as planned, where we ate lunch with a Belgian guy and a Brazilian girl. We all drank tea together, then Ani, Sourabh, and I left, expecting the other two to catch up soon after.

Glacier foot and river.

Anirudh’s knees didn’t seem to suffer as badly as Sourabh’s and mine as we climbed down a steep, steady slope to a bridge crossing Syðri-Emstruá canyon. 

Bridges.

The river below.

On the southern side we walked through the Almenningar valley and up another ridge with breathtaking views all around. 

Almenningar.

Greens, reds, greys.

360 views.

Rounding another ridge, the Belgian guy from lunch (I’ve forgotten his name) caught up with us, saying the Brazilian girl (I’ve forgotten her name) was too slow. She did eventually catch up but always wound up behind again. We all continued together for a couple hours, until tragedy befell the group. Something was wrong with one of Ani’s feet, possibly blisters, but he was in pain walking and announced that he could not continue for a while. He and Sourabh decided to set up their tent and stay the night so Ani could rest. I gave them a slip of paper with my name and email, we shook hands, and that’s where we parted. 

The Belgian and I continued on, but I was sad that my impetus to try the hike in two days – Anirudh and Sourabh – were no longer walking with me. For my journey, however, they had served a significant purpose: they put me a day ahead of schedule by suggesting the 2-day itinerary. It’s too bad that they ultimately had to wait until the following morning.

Into another lava field.

Somewhere after that, the Belgian stopped for a snack break. A high school physical education instructor and avid mountaineer, he was light-years beyond me in fitness. He was also a sincerely nice guy, but we didn’t have much in common. He was hiking the Laugavegur for sport, as exercise. I was there for something else. I opted to carry on when he stopped, hoping that would be the end of our alliance. 

Eventually I had to take my boots off again and cross the braided Þrönga River over into Þórsmörk Nature Reserve. Þórsmörk is a land of forests. Forests! It was such a strange thing to see forests on an otherwise treeless trek. (Þ is pronounced "Th" as in Þor - Thor.)

Trees!

Forest! Glacier!

Cave!

Field!

By the time I reached Básar Hut on the far side of another braided river (this one had bridges), I was exhausted, excited, and had been curiously rejoined by the Belgian. We would be hiking the Fimmvörðuháls Pass together.

At Básar, a motherly warden checked us into the campground and gave us two tips:
1. The night’s aurora forecast was about as high as it could be and the skies were mostly clear. Northern Lights were likely.
2. It would get well below freezing in the night. Expect to be cold.

I climbed into my sleeping bag with an alarm set to wake up and watch the sky. By the time the alarm sounded, both tips had come to fruition: I was freezing, but the lights were out!* It was really a stunning show, though not as vivid as some I’d seen in Alaska. I suspect at other times in the night it was even better, but I could only stay out of my tent for a few minutes before retreating back to my sleeping bag to warm up. After doing this several times, I gave up and fell asleep. Another big hiking day was ahead of me – the biggest of the trip – and I needed to get up early. I knew the Fimmvörðuháls would be tough for me.

I just didn’t know how tough.


*Again, I am not posting my aurora photos because my iPhone does not do them justice.