Across the River

We stepped up to the rim of the canyon and peered over the edge. Below and across the sandy hill, our gaze met the slithering flow of the river, with sheer sandstone cliffs on the opposite bank. The late November sun slanted low at midday, casting longer shadows than normal, but lighting well the face of the cliff. A swarm of black birds fluttered in arabesque sweeps through the air, then landed on a lone cottonwood tree next to the river.

This was the feeling of isolation.

Any misstep out here, and your body may never be found.

Jordan and I found a section along the rim where the rock slope was angled not so steeply, that we were able to walk down. We descended to the next level, then found a gully that twisted along the southern edge of the sandy hill. We nimbly maneuvered around prickly pear cactus before coming to a high bank that gave us a front-row seat above the river.

“That's a lot wider than I thought it would be,” I commented to Jordan. The river appeared shallow, not all of it with flowing water, but mud that stretched far to the other side.

“Isn't it going to be cold?” asked Jordan, finally with the realization that we would be crossing in our bare feet.

“Probably,” I replied, “but it's only supposed to be ankle deep.”

We found a small break in the tall bank that allowed us to descend to the level of the water where we stopped at a large bend in the river on a sandy shore.

Anxious to get across, I sat down and unlaced my shoes, then pulled off my socks and stuffed them into the toes of the shoes. With my small day pack back on my shoulders, and my shoes in hand, I set out to test the water.

I became discouraged when I noticed a small sheet of frozen water on the shaded edge of the bank. Then I watched as two chunks of ice floated down the main channel of the river.

Still determined, I stepped into the water and took five steps, then felt a jolt of pain and panic seize my body when the ice-cold fluid took hold. Quickly I backed out, my feet feeling the beginning stages of numbness.

“Aye, aye, aye!” I said as I walked around in delirium for a few seconds. “That is freezing!”

At the moment, I began to rethink my plan. I should have come better prepared, perhaps with a second pair of shoes, or maybe good bags to wear over my feet.

During my ten seconds in the river, however, I discovered a new obstacle—mud. I wouldn't have thought of mud as an obstacle before, but while in the water, it felt as if I was walking on jello, and with one of my steps my foot began to sink. I now feared sinking into a sludge of quicksand.

Jordan, in the meantime, while watching my foray into the water, decided that crossing the river wasn't for him. He would just wait here on the bank. That was fine with me.

After regaining the feeling in my feet, I decided to give it one more try. “If it doesn't work this time,” I told myself, “then we will turn around and go back.” (I knew that we still had a long drive to get home.)

“Jordan, I want you to make sure that you watch me when I cross . . . just in case I start sinking!”

That truly was my fear now—getting half way across the river and then sinking down to my chest in a mud bar.

I stepped one foot into the water, and then another. My right foot began to sink, but I quickly continued to move, and soon I was through the main channel (which only went up to my shin), and standing on a jiggly bar of mud. I trotted to the top of the bar, leaving gashes in the mud, then skipped over a small rivulet of bronze-colored water to another mud bar. I repeated this process two more times, making my way over the multiple strands of stray water that flowed outside the main channel. With one last dash to the opposite bank, I stepped onto the final bar of mud, and instantly my right leg sank down to my knee. In a panic, I lunged to the bank, and used my arms to pull myself from the mud. Finally, I sat safely on the other side.

“Did you see that? I about sank to my death in mud!” I spoke to Jordan, who sat watching me far away on the opposite bank. I used a voice slightly louder than normal, but certainly not a yell. When Jordan spoke back, it sounded as if he were next to me. The acoustics at this bend in the river, with the large sandstone wall that hung over the water, was amazing.

I sat on flattened grass and damp sand and noticed fresh coyote tracks imprinted on the wet mud in front of me. I pulled a water bottle from my pack (the only one I had with me) and drizzled clean liquid over my muddy feet. They didn't become completely clean, but clean enough to then take a t-shirt from my pack and wipe the rest of the mud off. Then I replaced my socks and shoes and was ready to go.

My location on the opposite bank was far from ideal. I still had a jungle of tamarisk to fight with. I began forging my way through, pushing the small but rigid branches forward and stepping through. Hooks on the branches snagged the leg of my jeans, ripping a new hole, and twisting them around my thigh. I couldn't see the ground below me because of the tangle of grass and branches. I prayed that there wasn't a hole in the ground like the tiger pits that you see in the movies.

I made my way to the base of the cliff, hoping to find some sort of trail, or way out of this mess. Twice I found a place where an animal had burrowed himself a hiding spot. Nearby a piece of coyote scat lay on a rock. 

After ten minutes of fighting through the tangle of tamarisk, the thicket cleared and at last I was on open ground. I now walked freely, closely examining the face of the cliff on my right, and admiring the seclusion of where I now roamed.

In another hundred yards, I found what I had come to find.

Pecked into the outer layer of the ocher-colored cliff, I saw two bighorn sheep next to a trapezoidal human figure with an insect-like face. There were others of these trapezoidal figures, most with a different style of head, and some with stick arms and stick legs coming from the corners. Others had no arms or legs at all. I didn't know if these represented different gods, or perhaps a shaman.

I counted six bighorn sheep, one of them with a ring of dots surrounding the animal's feet, tail, and horns, appearing (to me) as if there was a magic aura associated with this ring. Off to the side was a lone deer or elk with what looked like a third growth of antlers, or perhaps an arrow, or a club coming from his head. A human-like figure with feet and antennas stood near the tail of the deer, looking the other way.

A line with seven bends in its projection was carved into the rock, at the left-side terminus there being a dot. This line looked like it could be a profile of a rocky hill or mountain, or perhaps this very descent to the river. At the bottom was the depiction of another bighorn sheep. Was this their hunting grounds?

I found it interesting that many of the figures on the panel came all the way down to the sandy ground and abruptly halted—many of the drawings cut directly in half. It made me wonder if the ground was much lower back then, and perhaps there are more carvings buried beneath the sand.

I stepped back from the petroglyphs and considered for a moment where I was—a place so isolated and so removed from modern civilization that humans rarely step foot upon it. Yet it was a place called home by Indians nearly a thousand years ago. They probably hunted by these very river banks, built fires next to these cliffs, and told stories of gods and skinwalkers next to the fire.

Now it is home to the coyote, the crow, and the lonely flowing river.