I’ve been trying too hard to be eloquent. Maybe it’s the paradox of trying to speak about a land that keeps a lot of secrets and tells its stories subtly. It might also be that after talking to hundreds of visitors over a few days, tapping my knowledgebase and feeble attempts at wit, my narrative well has run dry. Here I can look across hundreds of square miles and know that there is not so much open water that one could even submerge their big toe. A charming trio of young Japanese men walked up to the desk with big smiles and asked, “We would like to know where we could go swimming?” I had to chuckle apologetically and suggest “The Colorado River? The Holiday Inn Vegas?” Either one a couple hours drive. This new knowledge of just what kind of exotic landscape they had found themselves in seemed to ameliorate their disappointment and they left as enthusiastically as they had come in. Inspiration, I could hope, was not about quantity and is not a reservoir of limited capacity. That perhaps like so much of the biota around me though constrained by blunt realities, imagination has rich and varied forms.

The desert might insist that we learn a few things. Willful ignorance is the dominant theme of the pioneer history in the Mojave from the Death Valley ‘49ers suffering across the one of the most difficult landscapes in the world unwilling to follow the humanitarian assistance of people who had been able to live there for generations, to today’s Vegas politicians saying with a straight face that shoving a longer straw into the diminishing punch bowl of Lake Mead can somehow allow the continued expansion of the city with the highest per-capita water consumption in the country. Our largest Southwest river can’t slake our bourgeoning thirst, grow melons in the desert, fill all those swimming pools on The Strip and still make it all the way to the Sea of Cortez. Some or all of these things will have to give. One of them regularly does.

The mythology of an empty place to relieve us of our burdens still overpowers the truth that solitude, like water, is a finite resource that has yet to be given its full value. Perhaps we will eventually know that there are no empty spaces; that all the puzzle pieces were in place long before we got here and that we are simply replacing them haphazardly and generally making places poorer for it. The fiction of a “useless” wasteland to dump in as the companion to the myth that the Earth’s bounty will provide without restraint. I’ve encountered a new mode of travel out here “in the middle of nowhere”. Daily I meet people who, as if they jumped into their car with a kidnapper’s hood over their head, made their way out to the desert and now that their telephone mysteriously doesn’t work they quite literally don’t know where they are. Captive to their own willful ignorance of place and navigation, dumped on the side of the highway with no memory of the twists and turns that got them here or how to find their way further. I don’t believe this behavior existed 5 years ago, definitely not 10. This particular ignorance is not a luxury afforded to those who have lived in this challenging environment.

The Desert Tortoise has lived in the Southwest of North America for a couple million years. It has been the creature we recognize through untold changes in the landscape. Mountains have folded upward, then spread apart opening vast basins separated by layered outcrops, forests have carpeted the hills then receded into cool canyons and high peaks sheltered from the desiccating heat of surrounding bajadas. Wetter times have filled long valley lowlands with sprawling lakes supplied by rivers that in these dryer times vanish underneath sandy flats occasionally resurfacing for short stretches at rifts in the land. Dry lakebeds and sandy washes still mark the ancient hydrology that sporadically gets revived in sudden downpours, the desert still shaped by water sometime violent, sometimes subtle.

You can see it somehow in their eyes. I wouldn’t know if it is wisdom but a purposeful clarity is communicated as if it knows what kind of emotional mess we humans find of ourselves and the tortoise can only hope we can come to know ourselves as well as it does. Here’s our Desert Tortoise Video.

It possesses a form of patience seemingly beyond our comprehension. A tortoise might have to settle for just a few months when there is enough plant matter that it can eat, its metabolism slow enough to allow dormancy for up 6 months of the year. Part of that in the winter, hibernating, the other part when heat and lack of food force them to wait for better conditions. The Mojave Desert itself follows this pulse. The twiggy brush and denned up animals of winter flourishing into spring in a fecund display of green plants and progression of colorful flowers. By mid summer that land is stilled again as weeks of cloudless sky heat and dry the land. If lucky the chance scattershot of monsoonal downpours could liven the landscape again before the year finishes and the days shorten. These limits on productivity are expressed as a kind of patience. When you can only afford to have leaves for a few months of the year, or can only open your stomata and acquire CO2 at night it may take a decade to get to full size. That Catsclaw Acacia or California Barrel Cactus is probably much older than you’d guess.

Perhaps we could be the beneficiaries of this patience. In this parable our Tortoise will eventually outlast the frenetic Jack Rabbit of our insatiable desires. In a receding tide of tract homes and big box stores we can build a tumbledown castaway’s shack from the flotsam and jetsam of all this culture. We’ll look up from our now useless screens and maybe we’d notice that all this sparseness holds more than we ever swept into all our landfills.

I could hear something in the hushed surprise in Rachael’s voice “Tim…” She’d spotted it. “…it’s right here.” I held my breath.

The desert has inspired our imaginations with mythical beasts and fantastic dangers from long before we began to write our stories down. To get to the elaborate oasis your need to cross the dust storm wastes, keeping an eye out for serpents and predators while avoiding treacherous quicksand. We don’t need fantasy to wonder at the beasts of the Mojave and as spring has arrived so have plenty of visitors to the Preserve. Many are on a quest of their own, eager to know where to see Desert Tortoises or Bighorn Sheep and, of course, “where are the best flowers?”   The Tortoise, once so plentiful that they we collected as souvenirs have since become rare enough to warrant state and federal protections. They’ve been out here as long as anything, their ancestry going back millions of years and they are pretty charming. The Bighorn as well were once around in larger numbers before overhunting and disease from domestic animals nearly wiped them out. Both animals have active programs to increase their populations and with the space they have here there is plenty of hope for them to thrive. They are also rare and exciting for those who encounter them and folks who spot them bring their stories into the Visitor Center, which we are glad to record and share with park biologists.

Other visitors come in with anxious questions about Mountain Lions or snakes. They are clearly worried and I can quickly assure them that these animals want little to do with humans and that for the most part if you use sensible precautions you’ll never see these creatures. In fact most of the time a Mountain Lion is in the presence of a person, that person will have never known. Along with some relief is also a palatable sense of let down. Our biologically ingrained fear of the serpent and the beast conflicted with our desire for the exotic. This is also the home of a serpent that has near-mythological standing. In the class of hazardous rattlesnakes the Mojave Green has earned the reputation as the most “aggressive” and possesses a particularly dangerous combination of hemotoxin and neurotoxin in its venom. Aggressive in this case means that they are slightly more likely to strike when they feel threatened. This means we need to be wary in rocky or brushy areas where we may surprise one but, by far, most snake bites are inflicted on young adult males that were harassing the creature. When I spotted one sunning on a dirt road nearby it was so frightened by me that I barely had time to snap a photo of its tail as it hid itself in a thick bush, the unmistakable sound of its rattle the only indication it was still there.

Rachael and I have started doing a Sunday morning Nature Walk that begins with coffee at the Visitor Center. At our first stop I point out that despite the proliferation of tracks in the washes and burrows in the sand, we don’t see too many of the desert animals. While pointing out the jumbled entrance of a Desert Wood Rat midden I discuss how most of our critters are nocturnal and elusive, but with a keen eye there are plenty of signs to their presence. We’d had some reports of another iconic Mojave Desert creature in the convoluted volcanic rock formations of nearby Banshee Canyon, so at the end of our walk we did a bonus side trip to see if we could spot the Chuckwalla. These dark lizards that can get up to 16 inches long are known to escape into rocky crevasses and puff up the loose skin of their bodies wedging themselves as way of preventing predators from extracting them. Apparently the rowdy bunch of Boy Scouts from the day before didn’t scare off these reptiles but our quiet bunch of nature appreciators slowly dwindled away with no lizards making an appearance. Walking back to the Visitor Center with our last patient attendee I causally glanced at the nearby rocks and caught the eye of a handsome specimen of a Chuckwalla proving the universal truth that our affections are more readily accepted if we are not too eager or desperate about it.

We’d had a busy weekend that had both formal campgrounds filled and late arrivals scattered about the Preserve. I thought we’d come out to the desert for solitude and plenty of meditative time. Spring break had brought the throngs and we were kept busy helping folks with flat tires, innumerable questions and an anxious young couple whose cat had filled its poor mouth with Cholla spines. Late Saturday evening we got caught up in the search for some overdue hikers who thankfully I found as they stumbled in from the edge of the campground. Rachael and I needed a hike.

The morning of our day off began with assisting campers who had endured another night of gale force winds some with damaged tents (our tally of dumpstered tents is something over 12 for the season so far). We even pulled the government truck around to give a jumpstart to a camper who had left her lights on all night. If we don’t get away from the campground we always get roped into something so we set out to explore another part of the Preserve. On the edge of the New York mountains are a few enticing canyons lined with Pinyon-Juniper groves. Wandering up one of the washes quickly brought us into a grotto refuge hidden from below and rewarding our imaginations. Seeps of rare water allow the fragrant Desert Almond to grow into dense thickets alive with tent caterpillars and varieties of bees attracted to the tiny yellow blooms. The rocky embankments held flowering Globemallow and Mojave Mound Cactus, western fence lizards showing off their push-up skills. Each bend was a surprise of enfolding topography.

At the end of our wandering, cross-country loop I suggested to Rachael we go check in on our owls. Several days before, while installing some fence post to keep the scofflaws from driving into a wilderness area I had noticed some droppings and pellets beneath a Juniper tree. Stooping down for a closer look I spooked a pair of napping owls and immediately felt guilty about my bad manners. We’d come back to the spot a few times to unobtrusively scan for them again, once seeing a still unidentifiable owl fly off nearby. Quietly peeking into the Junipers, camera ready, we gotten just to the point of defeated expectations when Rachael’s voice froze me in my tracks and I slowly turned towards her. A day that had started with the winding down of manic visitor needs was ending with a silent staring contest between Rachael and a beautiful and elusive Long-eared Owl. Clapping its bill at us in agitation and our curiosity more than satisfied we decided that having encroached closer than intended we should leave it in peace. That is why most of us find ourselves in the desert isn’t it.

Anyone who has spent time in your typical campground vault-type toilet knows that they can have some interesting acoustics. I was wondering if the Cactus Wren that had alighted atop the vent chimney above me knew just how loudly his morning song reverberated inside. These charming birds with a raspy call are one of the year-round residents here and they were the first to welcome us. Not terribly shy they hop through camp able to discern sand from seed from tiny insect across the gravelly ground. As I stood outside the door of our now semi-permanent home one scampered to within a couple inches of my foot, its feathers fluffed out against the morning chill, cocking its head to get a better look at me before hopping along, not begging, just curious. Among birders the voice of the Cactus Wren is often described as unpleasant but I enjoy it and the rough edge of its dry trill has a mysteriously appropriate quality synonymous with the breaking dawn in the Mojave Desert. (Listen Here)

After a year of near-constant movement it is a joy to get to know a specific place through a whole season. A desert is a place that can teach you to see. The vegetation is never thick here but I can detect over the past few weeks the hint of extra green across the slopes of the nearby buttes. Barren clusters of twigs have flushed with subtle leaves and created an Easter egg hunt of tiny flowers. This is a place of interesting contrasts, a place of hardy plants with aggressive and pain-inducing defenses. The same plant that the Spanish explores dubbed bayonet has stabbed my shins and thighs leaving scars. These Yuccas are currently putting out fleshy maroon buds the size of footballs that then explode in a profusion of lemony-white flowers, home and food source for a delicate moth. The barbed spines of Buckhorn Cholla that find their way into my skin on a daily basis are sheltering the first hint of red fronds that should blossom within the month.

A home range that one gets to know intimately is a customary domain of the naturalist. Thoreau had his Walden Pond and rarely strayed from New England. However this is also a wanderer’s vocation. John Muir is known for his passion for Yosemite, but he also tramped near and far from Ohio to Georgia to California and Alaska always in awe of what his great Creator had to offer in nature’s grandest cathedrals. Being a naturalist is less about having all the answers or knowing all the things so much as it is about being wiling to see and to ask questions that might lead to a handful of understanding. In this way it is a portable avocation.

A year of practiced observing on the move has made our senses keen to the subtle changes of this place that is often overlooked and hard to appreciate. Having worked outdoors most of my life I’ve long been sensitive to the weather as something I feel more than I see. In the Bay Area I trusted my gut more than the online weather robots and I was usually right. It has been fun to learn new patterns. February came in with snow and 50 mph winds and left unseasonably warm, enticing an early bloom. The interim has gotten us accustomed to wind, frequent and chilled out of the north, gusts announcing their arrival in rumbling preamble moments before they buffet our wobbly home. Most often winter weather has simply been a hint of more robust events to the west or north of us. The moist Pacific storms of this long anticipated El Nino struggle to reach this far across the dry ranges of the Mojave. Each scattered mountain range, the San Gabriels, the Tehachapis, the El Pasos, gleaning moisture successively until out here we’re often given only a hint of damp air and high wispy virga.

Our fixed location allows the sky to inform us in other ways. The sun crests the angled butte to our east right about 6:40 am, its procession towards equinox stunted by the mountain slope. Sunset over the crags of volcanic tuff to the west has been stretching later each day. At night we watch as Orion marches westward, as a winter visitor he’ll exit the nighttime stage in a few months. We knew we’d been up late the other night we saw him reaching the western horizon.

Our seasonal changes have stimulated some of the dormant neighbors we hadn’t meet yet, exothermic creatures can’t do much if the temperatures drop. A few lethargic lizards have been around since January but our newly arrived warmth has them scampering and doing push-ups in escalating numbers. The insect spattered windshield of a recent evening reminded us that we hadn’t seen much in the way of bugs for a while. Their flourishing has attracted some more accomplished wanderers. A new bird seems to arrive each day to join the company of our Cactus Wren and Phainopepla residents. The Phoebe was an early newcomer, followed by humming birds, hawks, and swifts darting along the cliff faces quickly silenced by the presence of a Peregrine Falcon. New birdsong has entered the morning wake-up call. Even an exceedingly common sight of a Turkey Vulture is notable when they have been gone for months. I wonder if the Cactus Wren was as pleasantly surprised to hear the sound of his cousin as we were. Thinking they prefer more water than the Mojave can provide I didn’t expect to be visited by Canyon Wrens. It sings one of my favorite birdsongs and hearing its descending notes echo down our canyon walls like I have in some of my most beautiful memories across the west reminded me that sometimes home is more of a feeling than it is a location. (Listen Here)

The hottest and desert in North America seemed like a great place to spend the winter in our tiny house that has scant insulation and no central heat or actually any heat to speak of. We soon learned that while some parts of the Mojave can hit 120 degrees in the summer, this is a diverse landscape of mountains and broad valleys. The cold north wind pushing snowdrifts against our tires and creeping in through the numerous gaps in our walls as we were being buffeted by the 50mph gusts which rattled our “stick and staple” construction was a tangible reminder that in the higher portions of this desert there is plenty of winter.

After weaving our way through a surprising amount of Federal bureaucracy, Rachael and I landed a remote and extended volunteer posting in the Mojave National Preserve. The National Park Service (NPS) uses over two-dozen acronyms to differentiate the more than 400 units in its system. When we imagine a National Park many of us envision the stunning scenery of Yosemite or Southern Utah, or the wildlife and exotic thermal features of Yellowstone, maybe glaciers and grizzly bears in Alaska. These are certainly the heart and soul of the system but as a great physical representation of our democracy the idea has evolved to include an invaluable collection of historic and cultural resources. There are National Seashores (NS) and Lakeshores (NL), National Scenic Trails (NST), National Wild and Scenic Rivers (NWSR) and National Historic Battlefields (NHB) and all kinds of other bits and pieces.

There was hope that this section of the Eastern Mojave would be designated as a National Park, however a lot of people in the area were opposed to the greater restrictions and a compromise was made to designate it a Preserve. This means that many historic uses of the land are still allowed. There are a few cattle grazing allotments that remain active, some small mining claims are still recognized and limited hunting is permitted. The nomenclature also seems to limit the number of folks who visit. Even though this is one of the largest properties in the NPS this big green blob on the map gets only a small fraction of the people that visit Joshua Tree or Death Valley, the two Parks that bookend the Preserve.

The marks of human activity are well evident throughout the Preserve. Some have argued that this was reason enough to disqualify it as a National Park. It hasn’t taken me long to come to learn the value of this place. It is tempting, even for me, to use words like desolate, barren, forsaken or inhospitable when describing our great deserts, if only for dramatic effect. However even the smallest effort to look more closely reveals a place that is not only rich in life and natural wonders but one that amazes us for it adaptations to adversity and its exotic forms of survival. There are chuckwalla lizards that wedge into crevices and inflate their bodies, preventing predators from pulling them out. Many animals can go months if not years without drinking a sip of water. Plants might die off after spreading prolific seeds that will wait a decade for the rainfall that inspires them to grow once again.

The physical landscape here is full of its own wonders. From a mineral encrusted dry lake bed that once fed the massive sand dune field that remains from over 20,000 years ago to the peaks over 7000 feet that have remnant forests which tell of a wetter time, this is far from the monotonous waste that travelers drawn to the glow of Las Vegas moan about. A 30-minute detour from the interstate could put them on a lunar landscape of cinder cones and lava beds or into the bizarre arms of the densest Joshua Tree forest.

Because of the former and continuing uses of the land the Mojave Preserve is in many ways the ideal place to test our willingness to save wild and natural places, to give lands a chance to heal from our many wounds and continue to be wild. That this place is less visited and has subtler joys is a resource in itself, a place to find a bit of solitude and discover on your own. Over the next few months we intend to listen to what this place can teach us. Some of the human markings here date back thousands of years. Though we can only guess as to what ancient petroglyphs and artifacts are saying we can see that people once lived here with humility. Our modern scars are at times the evidence of modern hubris. Over time, if we are willing they could become symbols of how we relearned humility and restraint.

I wasn’t surprised that this adventure would become a creative project that Rachael and I would dive into together. I was pleasantly surprised though by how rich and inspiring it has become. There are plenty of stories from the past year that still beg to be told. There are plenty more to come and possibly new ways to tell them as well. We intend to continue to be Vagabond Naturalists, no matter where we are, and that we can bring our experiences to others in a creative and constructive way.
We met many folks along the way that encouraged us that our adventures and insights were worth while, that we had something of value to share. One of these people planted a seed about crowdfunding and led me to Patreon.

I have reservations about dipping into the well of support that we’ve already gotten from people here. It has been motivating to know that a lot of wonderful people have spent some time with our journey.  We thought we could put this further out into the Universe and see where it can go.