Heart of the Needles

At the top of my last post, you can still see a picture of The Needles in Canyonlands National Park, taken from miles away.  I had heard that within that labyrinth of canyons and sandstone spires, lie the most magnificent of all rock formations in Canyonlands.  It’s accessible only by a long rough trail, they say, a difficult rock scramble, with no water along the way.  A permit is required, relieving the government of responsibility, while they tell me the rules and dangers.

So it was that yesterday morning I parked at the trailhead and proceeded with two gallons of water, enough for two days, food, tent, and sleeping bag.  I would penetrate the depths of wonderland to its magnificent heart.  

 

A penguin peers down from an iceberg, wondering what I am doing at midday walking in such a hot place.  He’s been here so long his feathers have fallen off and hasn’t noticed the loss.  

 

A gargoyle, designed to ward off evil spirits, juts out from a cathedral wall.  So easily the builders assign spiritual significance to objects in the natural world and reform them for liturgical purpose.

 

Across Elephant Canyon from where I set up camp, Grumpy stands high and proud, sharing his despondence with all who pass here.

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This whole Needles maze seems inhabited by rare, senescent creatures, frozen hard and cunning.  It’s beyond my ability to grasp or utilize a power that seems innate in the ancient and elemental rocks that surround me.  What wonders lie in the vast beyond, the millions of years these forms have been in the making.  Here before me are bare skeletons of Being, austere, motionless, silent, carrying veils of old mystery.  It evokes in me an elusive hint of something unknown, maybe unknowable, but wanting to be revealed.  Am I confusing the thing observed with the mind of the observer?  Am I painting a word picture of external reality, or is it simply a mirror of the thinker?  Maybe these new and stunning rocks have stumbled me into the audacious error of separating the observer from the thing observed. 

 I will not give you the destination of the last two days, (it’s getting late now), but will delay your gratification until tomorrow night after a day of relative ease exploring the town of Moab.

These last pictures are taken from my camp as the blazing sun settled over the canyon wall, its increasingly red rays mixing with red and white sandstone giants.  

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