To read Part One, click here.
H. is unwilling to give up and is looking more closely at the little hole we might be able to climb in. I back up and find a passage behind a fallen slab about the size of a pancaked SUV leaning against the wall of rock. I tell H. and [...]
Every year an old friend and I undertake an adventure. H. and I are middle-aged now. Past our prime and youth when our adventures were bolder and more carefree. I can remember when we then, full of laughter, took his new pickup and rubbed its shiny sides against aspens for luck while searching out some [...]
Parts one, two, three, and four.
The mid-sized Ancestral Puebloan site sitting up on that “erosional layer of lower strata” (love that phrase) of Crossfire’s east cliffs is one of my favorites because of the serene view it offers down-canyon. From what I’ve seen of that portion of Crossfire, including about a mile or so of [...]
Part One. Part Two. Part Three.
As we’d searched for the incised grooves and then the tower, the archaeologist and I traded small details about our families. He mentioned how, when he takes his kids for hikes, they’re always running up to him and asking, “Is this an artifact, Dad?” I told him how, when we [...]
Part One here. Part Two here.
The rain that earlier diluted a few thoughts in my journal failed to commit, but the overcast thickened. Light making it through the clouds fell flatly. Trees in the juniper forest through which we walked cast no shade that could be distinguished from cloud shadow. Below us on the creek’s [...]
Part One below on the “Home” page or click here.
As the archaeologist and I pushed uphill through sage and rabbit brush, he stopped to explain, quite diplomatically and in precise language, that he was in the canyon doing work pursuant to the BLM’s weighing a county government proposal to establish an ATV right-of-way through Crossfire, [...]
As often happens, this offering of field notes runs long–so long I’ve broken it into parts. Even more of interest to me than usual unfolded during this trip to Crossfire Canyon (not the canyon’s real name). Because of the nature of this experience, some of the material leans toward the technological, so many thanks in [...]
March 15, 2010. This winter paved the desert over, storm after storm laying down two-to-three feet of whitetop, setting spring back by more than half a month. Since December 21st, I’ve been out only rarely, the deep snow creating hazards well beyond my abilities to negotiate them. Who knew that when I moved to southeastern [...]
Warning! Warning! Long post.
Dec. 21st, a.m. As I started out, temperatures bumped around in the low 20s. A ragged ceiling of waxy yellow clouds sometimes let through bright sunlight. Mostly, though, the cloud cover took the polish off the snow. An unexpectedly cold breeze chilled the denim of my jeans and cut through my gloves, [...]
I live in the Pittsburgh area, in the suburbs. Several mornings ago I was up a little earlier than usual, and the sun seemed to be coming up later than usual. I had the opportunity to watch out my kitchen window as dawn came to my neighborhood. Looking one direction out my window gives me [...]