Right Between the Ears

Bears Ears #33

2024-06-04

It’s time to gather provisions and gas.  We’ll be heading up the road that cuts right in-between the Bear’s Ears, on top of its head and then onto its back. We’ll be lounging and exploring in the Manti-La Sal National Forest for a week or so.

In Blanding, Utah, I spend too much time for my liking. I’m stuck shoring up home insurance issues over the phone and checking internet texts and messages, after several days of no service. It has been a pleasure to be out of electronic contact, but this is the price. That process of waiting takes us to the visitor center, where I am able to spend some good time with a new hostess. She once lived up in those hills with her mother. I shamelessly grill her for insider’s information.

Just before we leave to backtrack to where we were this morning, which is 45 miles of carnuding. I pull off of the road at that sign that says ominously “Next services 121 Miles.” We strip, stuff away our clothing and resume down the now familiar road, to out west. For now, the wind blows through partly opened windows and the vent, circling, sensuously dancing all over naked bodies.

We find the road that will take us into the mountains. It is soon dirt. After a pickup truck passes,  I get out to switching into 4×4 for stability. We are alone here at the base of this mountain. I turn off the motor. Now in silence, I look up into the steep walls before me. They circle around us. The vast Canyonlands are behind us now. This is the beginning of an entirely new terrain and set of unknowns to set off into, naked. There is a sense of adventure, a new beginning and freedom.

As it begins to climb up the mountainside, in places, it is too thin for two cars to pass each other. It is not unduly steep and graded during the six mile ascent, but many very tight turns, some blind, keep my eyes glued to my task at the wheel. With no guardrails, just a berm from grading between us and the edge of a cliff, it feels very sketchy.

There are occasional soft spots and bedrock making the SUV bounce to the side, or slide, even in the four wheel drive high setting. I’m constantly looking out for the other guy, who may be ignorant about stopping and drifting, when on a graded road. I feel risk, helpless, when at the mercy of a fool’s actions, potentially. I contemplate fate and odds. Only on occasion, do I risk a glance out across the vista to my right side. During a couple of straightaways, I stop to imbibe the wonders.

Along the way, people are camped on outcrops with views, grand views. The vista is indescribably magnificent. It scans the distant mountains and hundreds of square miles of the Canyonlands. They are situated well for the sunsets and the awe of it all. Some are just dusty pull-offs, poor camping, where it is all about vistas.

There are several parked close to the road, but I consider that if they are that close to clouds of dust, then there must not be very many clouds of dust. That is an encouraging clue about what we may find ahead for our purposes of solitude.

Bears Ears are two buttes at about 8900 feet, which should put our camping at around 8500 feet. A good height with forest is 7500 to 8500 for a fine temperature. The forecast is sunny this week.

The ears, which we have been seeing from everywhere for the last few weeks, become two buttes. They are less storied and more geological close up. We find ourselves passing through rolling hills, as the vegetation gets taller.

Soon, we find a very healthy pine forest. Carpets of bright green grass gather florescence in the late afternoon light, which beams through the canopy.

I’m surprised at how few people are up here and how few spots there are to camp without disturbing the vegetation. Off of the main road, we come to a crossroads of sorts. It is two two-track trails, perpendicular, off of the graded minor tributary to the main road that we are traveling on. Each looks like they might lead to possible campsites. One however, has a deer standing next to it and not bothered by us in the least. DF is snapping pictures out of the window. In my mind, heart  and soul, with intuition, my mind says, “Take this one.” The deer’s attitude, like a sign, an omen from the cosmos, this place is laid back. There is nothing else to say but, “That’s it!”

The deer hardly moves, as we turn and approach. There is no fright to flight caused by the large rumbling red being with two naked humans with devices hanging out of its windows. Not too far down the path, we find a nice campsite. The deer comes back with a pal. There are now two, one only 50 feet from our truck and camp. In a primitive time, long long ago, is this how naked people found themselves? Is this what unblemished nature was like? When a native refers to animals as “my brothers,” was it a profound imaginative notion, or this obvious quality that was what they meant?

By my reckoning of the map, from this spot, we can hike a couple of miles out to cliff edge views and vistas of oceans of canyon lands on two sides of this. It is like a peninsula on an island in the sky.  

Our campsite is on a nice quiet easy slope, so it is pretty much level in a wide area. We expect no rain, but if that changed, there would be no concern for a flow, or flood. The green ground-cover should keep mud away.

There is a campfire already set.

The ground isn’t fine sand anymore, like the past several weeks, but actual intact soil. The grasses, clover, tiny plants, yellow dandelions, are a barefoot all over delight. We’re no doubt going to spend a couple of days. There will be no breaking camp in the morning, no hurry, a sunrise, a fire, just spontaneous walks and following our noses, re-adjustment and finding restful solitude, off of any schedule or plan.

Coyotes howl in the distance at sunset. They are eerie. This pack sounds like Banshees, but coyotes are never of much concern, nor a Banshee.

There are a few chores to take care of. When we get around to it, I’ll fix the tent zipper and we’ll get the truck reorganized. The first order after a warm meal is to get in bed to sleep late, together. We can shake on that and curl up, appreciating each other’s bodily heat, snug under a woolen quilt.

The next morning, the sun comes bursting into the tent. I must have miscalculated the eastern opening in the trees. I’ll have to adjust that. For now, I’ll roll over on my other side, hugging DF like two spoons, with my back to the bright globe.

To be Continued….

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