Sunrise Push || Arches National Park

I figured it was only appropriate to listen to Mr. Abbey’s, Desert Solitaire, while I made my way in the dark to Arches National Park. The road into the park has long been paved and the visitors, including me, come in our automated, steel wheelchairs to see the park in the most comfortable means possible. I will never know Arches in the way Mr. Abbey did, his 33,000 acre terrace he woke up to each morning. I am envious of his time here, in the quiet, without a paved road.

Now, where the asphalt ends in large circular parking lots awaits every convenience necessary - bathroom and garbage receptacles, and water from shiny metal fountains. The trails are graded and wide, lined with sticks and stones so us wayward visitors don’t wander off. Needles to say, things have changed since Mr. Abbey was a Park Ranger here. Thousands of people flood every corner of this special place. Is it us in general or just the sheer number of us that is responsible for its desecration? Just because we can drive a bus to the base of Delicate Arch, doesn’t necessarily mean that we should. We are comfortable and coddled and we would have it no other way.

And yet, I drive my mechanical wheelchair hundreds of miles just to drive a little more, to see what it is that brings the hordes to base of arch after arch after arch. There is something more than entertainment here. The wild lurks here, just there, in the golden glow of a sunrise and the call of the black ravens circling overhead. We - photographer, influencer, tourist, retired white-hairs, family vacationers - come from far and wide to see something we haven’t seen and perhaps, just maybe be humbled beneath it. Isn’t that what we’re all in need of? Is this not why we come?

Work finished at 5:30 pm - I have no control over this - I left when the last patient was done. With a 13-hour drive and an hour time change that is not in my sunrise favor, I have to get moving. I stop at a food truck and order two burritos. Being a veggie, sometimes the 5-star birria taco reviews don’t translate. Tonight, they did not. The veggie burritos are dry, bland, disappointing. One-star.

I make my way southeast from Kennewick and within minutes find myself along the Columbia River, entering Oregon. Darkness has settled, the last embers of sunset consumed but the racing black. I have nothing to do but drive and listen to Mr. Abbey’s stories. Miles roll by.

I make it the rest of the way across Oregon and into Idaho. After going through Boise I begin to see signs for a winter storm. I notice that rest areas are full of semis. Undeterred and ignorant, I drive on. Sunrise calls.

And then it hits. Wind and snow are upon me. My headlights light up the white streaking flakes. While I can see beyond the flakes, it feels as though I am in a tunnel of glowing white. On the bright side, the warm roads are, for now, bare and wet. the snow unable to gain any significant accumulation. Visibility becomes rubbish. My snow tunnel  thickens, and for a moment it feels as if I am not even moving, perhaps even going backwards, the context of road and world beyond completely obscured.The only sign of movement is the thrum of my engine.

By the time I am through Ogden, Utah, the snow begins its accumulation. I contemplate pulling over, to wait out this building storm, but bare strips remain on the road where tires have repeatedly pushed snow to the sides, piling on the dotted lines and under chassis.  I encourage myself to keep driving, for now, and re-evaluate shortly. I must keep moving.

I am almost through Salt Lake City, when the snow diminishes, my wipers bumping along a drying windshield. The roads become bare and wet, as if oblivious to the melee happening to the north. My body begins to relax. I become aware of an aching in both wrists from the apparent tension of my last 90 minutes of driving. I pull over to get gas. The snow continues to fall, but feels more magical than life threatening while standing in this Maverick parking lot.

It is 2:30 am. I am almost there, but I have a pass to cross before having the chance of standing under any arch for sunrise.

Through Spanish Fork, up and over the pass, and I am relieved to find there to be less of a storm here than the one brewing west of SLC. I descend and I am done with the snow for the rest of this drive. I push hard for Moab. Mr. Abbey has come and gone from the Arches, his words of preservation and warning echoing in my brain. I cannot wait to be there. I want to hear the great-horned owl hoo hoo-ing into the night and the coyotes howling across canyons. I want to see stars with a clarity I cannot get at home. I want to sit, resting in the rhythm of sunrises and sunsets.

I cannot be stopped. I pull into the parking lot of The Windows as dawn makes this day’s debut. The walls and monoliths and arches find their orange glow. I take advantage of the bathroom, my fourth poop tonight (half a star?).

And I am off. I am here to see whatever is given to me this day. I run towards Double Arch, cameras dangling and my fingers already numb from the desert cold. The sun’s rays rest on the arches' uppermost reaches and scroll, slowly, towards the orange sand.

Double Arch

I made it. Mr. Abbey would be proud and likely a little dismayed that I only had to walk 0.2 miles from my mechanical wheelchair atop fine, black asphalt to find myself underneath Double Arch. One day, I am certain - because humans - I’ll be able to drive underneath these lovely arches. Wouldn’t that bring in the dollars? I’m certain Mr. Trump is already on this good idea, because he has them all before anyone else has a chance to be so brilliant.

Parade of Elephants (everything has a name)