Creek Running North

North of Barstow, the old lifted lakebed sediments of Rainbow Basin crumble in the winter rain. Fourteen million years ago this was a verdant lake, fringed with oak, palm, willow. Sabertooths and mastodon, camel and pronghorn, rhinos and sloths drank here. Sometimes they died, and the silt covered them. Now their bones tumble from the cliffs after a rain.

At night the distant roar of jake brakes echoes off the mud hills. Hidden by a low rise, Barstow lights the hazy sky. Most people never come here. Even hardened desert rats speed past Barstow, disinclined to linger. And of those who come here, most never leave their cars. The short loop road provides ample photographic opportunity, and one must after all head on to Furnace Creek if one is to make check-in at the Lodge.

At Arches a few years back, we were kept to the pavement by our long-suffering dog. We hung our feet over the rock, looked into the Fiery Furnace, and longed for the feel of dust beneath our boots. Other tourists, dogless, sped up to the official scenic vistas, left their car doors open and their engines running, and sprinted to the rail and back and drove away, never once removing the viewfinder from their face.

There is little of that kind of behavior here. The road is unpaved, and the nearest tourist attraction is the Calico Alleged Early Man site, and aficionados of actual fossils find little of interest there. This place is not on the way to anywhere, excepting the gate to Fort Irwin. Anyone who finds herself here meant it. Still, more than two-thirds of visitors drive around, kicking up dust to settle on the dish antennae at the Goldstone Deep Space site, and never take their foot off the gas until they are back at the stoplight on Old Route 58.

The road has barely enough room to pull off, but I do, and walk away from the truck through bands of red, brown, green. It is a bit of a stretch to call this stuff “rock.” It crumbles beneath my boots, multicolored pebbles left where my feet fall. I struggle up the pictured ridge, careful not to fall off the declivitous far side. Below, a rainbow talus pile. I sit and watch the ravens circle. It is warm. I imagine a smilodon sneaking up behind me, wanting a drink.

This is the eighth in a series of ten photo-prompted posts.