Sun & Sandstone

I wrote 15.5 single-spaced pages about this last-minute weekend road trip in my journal, and now I feel like I have zero words to say about it here on my blog. 

But hey, let me give it a shot before my word faucet (ew?) dries up. 

We were outside.  There were rocks.  One canyon we drove past was very Grand.  The sun was there, and so was a river.    I met three dogs.  And ate some pizza. 

Are you done reading yet?

Okay, I’ll be normal.  RPH and I drove up into northern Arizona, close to Page, just south of the Arizona/Utah border.  I was really entranced by the idea of hiking through a slot canyon, and while we were in the vicinity of the Antelope Canyons, we decided to skip the formal tour, keep our $50, and do our own thing.  RPH is a tour guide after all. 

First, we drove past the strikingly magnificent Vermillion Cliffs, stopping in Marble Canyon in the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area to take a stroll around Lee’s Ferry and wade into the Colorado River at the start of the Grand Canyon.  The water was refreshingly cool and clear, and felt like a secret oasis in the middle of the desert expanse. 

Probably my favorite thing was hiking into the slot canyon.  After a short scramble into the Waterholes Canyon (during which I had to stick my water bottle in the waistband of my stretchy pants because I’d been too embarrassed to wear my fanny pack), we ended up at the sandy bottom, surrounded on either side by narrow sandstone cliffs, the sedimentary layers curving and waving and swirling around the bends in the rock.  It was unlike anything I’d experienced, and I wanted to live down there. 

Something I kept fixating on while we were out exploring was how quiet everything was, so still and natural, sacred even.  I also kept verbalizing how desolate the desert felt.  I admit I’ve grown accustomed to CONTSTANTLY being connected (to wifi, the internet, technology), and to be so completely out in nature, so remote and removed from civilization, was terrifying, exhilarating, isolating, and humbling. 

We also visited Horseshoe Bend, which deserves its own moment of silence.  It was way bigger and more expansive than I anticipated, and I loved standing at the edge of the canyon cliff, the wind whipping my hair, feeling small and insignificant, gazing into the canyon at the river looping below.  

In a time when we are perpetually inundated with photos, videos, clips, memes, gifs and all kinds of media designed to astound, shock, and entertain, it felt refreshing to go outside and be awed by the grand still sensation of nature.  Whereas my generation is fixated on instant gratification, consumed by the NOW of our expectations, I felt such respect for the thousands and thousands of years of erosion it took to carve these canyons.  As Dominique Ansel likes to remind me, “time is an ingredient.”