I love the names of things out here. Canyonlands. Zion. Where I live, we have names like Huckleberry Trail, Maple Ridge, and Meadow Run. Here, signs frequently include the words canyon, desert, cliffs, and a variation on the hottest color: crimson, vermilion, or plain old red. But my very favorite, the place that has the best, most intense name, that as soon as I saw it, I thought, “I want to go there,” is the Valley of Fire. The Valley of Fire! So I was super excited that my friend Amy suggested we kill time there on on our way to Vegas to pick up our friend from the airport.
The Valley of Fire is a state park in Nevada, and the colors and temperatures lived up to its name.
We did a short hike to see the Fire Wave, and at 10 o’clock in the morning in April, it was already brutally hot. There is no escape from the sun, and its heat radiates off the red sandstone. But boy was it gorgeous. We even saw a bighorn sheep!
It’s a good thing we checked the map before driving down to the Grand Canyon yesterday. As far as the North Rim is concerned, winter isn’t over yet; the road to that entrance doesn’t open until May 14. I will not be able to visit the Grand Canyon on this trip. I guess I’ll just need to come back. Amy recommended October when the Aspens are all yellow.
For this trip, though, we pivoted in the high school parking lot. We decided to go in the opposite direction, to Bryce Canyon. Wow, what a landscape!
We hiked a 3 mile trail down to the bottom and back out again, and we had beautiful weather for it: short sleeve temperatures, sunshine, and a cool breeze under a bright blue sky.
On the way down, I stopped every few steps to take photographs. The hoodoo rock formations were so cool. I couldn’t get over them. Plus, I am a sucker for red rocks against the blue sky. Luckily, my friend did not get annoyed with my slow progress; she warned me that she would want to stop frequently to catch her breath on the way back up.
Thor’s Hammer
We took our time. We admired twisty trees. We marveled over geology. We talked about how this used to be an ocean, and that the rock is sedimentary — literally sediment that settled to the bottom of the sea. It cemented together in the pressure of its young days and by the minerals that crystalized together to give it structure. It is soft rock that eventually comes full circle and transforms back to sand.
Amy and I made lots of friends on the trail. We chatted with other folks resting in the shade — two friends from California, a couple from Italy, a father and son from North Carolina. I snapped photos of hiking partners with their cameras. We had a gorgeous day together outside in the fresh Utah air, laughing and talking about life and our kids and the nature of rocks.
Today, we pick up our friend in Vegas. On the way we’re going to stop at a place in Nevada called Valley of Fire, which may be the best ever name for a state park. I’m hopeful we can also hit a Mexican restaurant that I’ve been craving since I last came to Amy’s over a year ago.
Now that I’ve finished the hard labor in our garden, my primary obligations are complete and I don’t need to squeeze things into super short snippets of time. Instead of snapping pictures with my phone because it’s convenient and no-fuss, I feel like I can get out my real camera. It’s a little more effort to adjust the aperture and shutter speed, but that means I also take a little more care in framing a photo and paying attention to light. The photographs are more satisfying when I put that little bit of extra effort in.
We had a weekend of arts in Richmond, from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts to a 7 o’clock showing of Loving Vincent – a film in which every single frame is hand-painted in the style of Vincent Van Gogh – at the Byrd Theatre. It was awe-inspiring. The museum and the movie made me wish I were an artist.
Photography is the closest I can get to feeling artistic. Besides writing, it is the one craft I have have even a modicum of patience to develop. I had fun with my camera on our trip to the Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden on Sunday. The flowers did all the work of being beautiful. Very little was required of me other than to frame the shot, check the light, and appreciate the colors and textures with my camera.
I made sure to stop and smell the roses. There really is no fragrance quite as lovely. Only a handful of the thorny bushes were blooming among the hundreds still in bud. I bet in a month the rose garden will be spectacular. The air will be heady with their scent. I could go back in a few weeks to experience it. I have that kind of time right now.
I have spread all the mulch. Today I can rest. Thank heavens.
I’ve spent the past 3.5 days almost fully outdoors, shoveling, carting, and spreading 1.5 tons (12 cubic yards) of shredded tree bark across all the flower beds. I took breaks to move plants around, eat lunch, go to the nursery to buy new plants, stand panting to observe my work, and talk to my mom and dad on the phone. I just need to spread weed and feed on the lawn this morning while the dew dampens the grass, and then I’ll really truly be done. Well, done until May when I will be back in town and can go plant shopping, which I am very excited about. Sabbatical is the best!
It should be warm enough to eat my lunch outside in the sun today. I’m eager to sit on the deck and admire the plants I put in yesterday, especially the bleeding hearts which are just a marvel. Sometimes I look at things in nature, like a flower shaped like a heart, or the brilliance of the peacock, and my mind is blown. How did these things happen? How many mutations over how many millions of years? Why this? It’s staggering to think about. Incomprehensible. I feel awe that in my lap right now is a purring animal that’s not going to kill me, that posing around a resort in Punta Cana are iridescent birds with tail feathers that spread like a fan and are covered in eyes and rattle a rhythm as the peacock struts its dance, that in my garden is a plant with pink heart-shaped flowers.
Bleeding heart
As I eat my lunch and gaze out at the freshly mulched beds, my mind will race about what plants to put in when I return from a few upcoming adventures. There are a lot of empty patches to fill. I’m going to need to be careful with my budget.
Photos from the garden
Vinca and the vexing Virginia creeper I need to rip out. I’m re-reading The Da Vinci Code, and the five petals and the five-pointed star in this vinca flower remind me of the five petaled rose that symbolizes the sacred feminine and the five stages of a woman’s life: birth, menstruation (maiden), motherhood (mother), menopause (crone), and death.Tulips!Dogwood 🩷The hill is mulched!
Temperatures have stayed below freezing for multiple weeks. Most nights last week were in the single digits, with highs in the teens when the sun was up. My husband texted during the week, do you want to hike the Cascades Saturday morning? I want to see it after all this cold.
When we pulled up to the trailhead at 10 am, the thermometer still below freezing but at least in the 20s instead of the teens, the parking lot was full of cars. Everyone in town wants to see the frozen Cascades.
It snowed and sleeted here a couple of weeks ago, and plenty of people have hiked to the falls since. The trail was slippery and treacherous as a result. The snow was packed tight from all the footsteps, and we had to use hands, feet, and butts to make our way without breaking any bones or falling into the frigid stream. On several short descents, we got down to the ground and used the path like a slide. About a hundred times, I thought, I wish I had a hiking stick. That, and hand warmers.
But oh my God, was it worth it. I really struggle photographing snow, and I could barely manage my camera because my hands were ice cubes, so my photos don’t do it justice. And of course, pictures don’t capture the hollow percussive sound of the stream glooping against the crust of ice above it, or the glitter of sunlight on the snow when the trail broke out of the shadows. They don’t capture the sounds of the college kids’ laughter as they slid on sneakered feet and bowled icicles on the frozen pool at the base of the waterfall, or the smell of cold forest air along an icy mountain stream. But they do capture some of the pretty shapes created by shadows, water, ice, and snow.
Stream from above on a trail bridgeSo smooth!The first hint of sunlightStream under iceI love this rock and its shadowCool blueIce palaceOn the waterfall pool
Butterfly Mind 