Day 12, Part 3: Wednesday, May 3rd, 2006
Escalante, Utah to Moab, Utah

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I pay attention at the national park long enough to read a sign that enables me to differentiate, for the first time, the round, buff-colored Navajo sandstone from the harsh, gray-green Chinle formation from the dark red, dramatically vertical Wingate sandstone. Apparently, the Navajo sits on top of the Chinle, which, in turn, sits on top of the Wingate. In moving east from the park, I discover that I am leaving the Navajo stuff behind and entering a world of Chinle.

One of only two towns in this part of the world is a small, ranching settlement known as Caineville.

Caineville is surrounded by a madhouse of jagged rocks and lonely, untouched buttes. The cowboys have been out among the rocks in their ATVs, leaving dark swirls of petrified motion on the slate grey surface of the slanted desert.

East of Caineville, I pass through a ghost town called Giles which isn't on my road atlas map, and am surprised to see a genuine round-up taking place there. About a hundred cattle are kicking up dust while a handful of cowboys riding horses are trying to huddle them all into a corral. I'm so surprised by their presence out there that the thought of taking a picture doesn't even cross my mind. For their part, neither the cowboys nor the cows seem particularly excited to see me.

Further down the road, north of another cowtown called Hanksville--the last human settlement I'll see for 60 miles--I stop by the side of the highway to get a picture of a series of strange rocks standing out in the nothingness of the desert. A collection of non-telescopic sights by the road picks each one out for me and tells me what it has been whimsically named by the cowboys who have lived in this part of the world for over a hundred years. The one on the right is called "The Prairie Dog," and the second one from the left is called "Brigham Young," for reasons I can only imagine.


Solitary lumps of rock poke out of the desert floor as I keep driving down what has to be one of the loneliest roads in Utah.

In the distance, I can see the jagged "dragon tooth" ridge of the San Rafael Reef, and the thunderstorm that's been pursuing me ever since Capitol Reef. I had been thinking of taking a side trip to Goblin Valley State Park in this neck of the woods--simply because it has such a cool name--but with the weather the way it is in this isolated place, I decide against it in favor of trying to make it to Dead Horse Point in time for the sunset.

After a frantic drive through Moab to eat dinner and check into my hotel, I race up into the Island in the Sky and get to Dead Horse Point just in time. The view does not disappoint. I can see the Colorado River, two thousand feet below, as it bends through a yawning gulf of time and space.

What I can see up there does not fit into one camera shot--much less five--so I run around in a giddy delirium for awhile, rapidly shooting through half a roll of film in an attempt to take it all in. I don't succeed, but I do get some good pictures of the vast, scenic madness of the canyonlands in the process.

Along with the majestic scenery, this place has an interesting human story to tell. Back in the day, cowboys realized that they could create a natural corral on this plateau, since it's surrounded on three sides by vertical drop-offs of about a thousand feet. They therefore constructed a fence across the narrowest neck of the peninsula and then drove all the wild horses they could find to the point at the end of the peninsula. There, they would close the gate in the fence and sort through the horses, keeping the ones they felt that they could use, while leaving the rest behind.

A plaque in the park claims that, even though the cowboys would open up the gate after they were done with their selection process--so that the rejected horses could leave--the horses would just stay there. Legend even has it that those horses would die of thirst up on top of the ledge, even though they could see the waters of the Colorado River, rolling in the canyon far beneath them. Hence the name--Dead Horse Point.


I walk around the ledge for awhile and check out the old fence that the cowboys used to use for their round-ups. Looking over towards Moab, I can see an unknown butte jutting up in front of a thousand red ripples of rock. That's where I'll be headed tomorrow--to see the Arches that I first crossed paths with nine years ago. Until then, I watch and wait for the silence to come to me as I enjoy my third fantastic sunset in a row.

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