Following my amazing southwestern recording trip with Lang Elliott, I stopped at Bears Ears National Monument on the way home. I had my sights set on two areas to explore: Comb Ridge and Cedar Mesa. I whet my appetite for the place with a recently released book, Behind the Bears Ears, by R.E. Burrillo, which covers the anthropogenic history of the what is now known as Bears Ears, a giant tract of colorful sandstone canyons and mesas that cover a good chunk of the southeastern quarter of Utah. The book was fascinating, but confirmed my fears: the area had been “discovered.”
This region has been occupied and celebrated by America’s first peoples and their descendants for at least 13,000 years. Their history is written in the petroglyphs and dwellings left behind; a vast library documenting the development of peoples and cultures and adaptation to an harsh, often unforgiving landscape. The rugged canyons also attracted more modern explorers and relic hunters, and more recently have felt the impacts of an increase in tourism, overgrazing, and exploration for oil and gas deposits. With so many varied interests and lobbying groups, the road to protection for the area was long and tortuous; it wasn’t until the very end of President Obama’s tenure that National Monument status was finally achieved, with 1.35 million acres protecting sacred lands of the Navajo Nation, Hopi Tribe, Ute Indian Tribe, Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, and Pueblo of Zuni.
Less than a year later, President Trump rescinded protection for 1.1 million acres, leaving most of the protection in two chunks – the Indian Creek area in the north, and the Comb Ridge area in the south. This opened vast tracts of this land to potential mining extraction and impacts, and increased looting and destruction of Native American relics and fossil sites. On October 8, 2021, President Biden restored the protections to Bears Ears and neighboring Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument which had also been cut back by President Trump. The new proclamation withdraws the lands from disposition and mining, and requires a new management plan with much input from the tribes. The proclamation also allow the continuation of cattle and sheep grazing in the area, but it does allow permittees to retire their permits.
The rocky, austere topography of southern Utah was one of my dads favorite places, and I visited various portions over the years – long before it was a designated monument. It is one of those landscapes that is so inviting and intriguing that it’s always beckoning. The crowds really became noticeable to me in the last 10 years or so. What used to be weekend and high season crowds at the national parks started to seep into more remote areas. Yet it is such a vast area, I thought if I stayed away from the national parks, drove away in on some dirt roads, I would find the solace I was seeking, and be able to listen quietly to the rocks, the desert, and the ancient voices of the earlier inhabitants of this country.
I first visited the new monument in September, 2017, as I was moving from southern Arizona to northern Nevada. After finding all of the campgrounds in Canyonlands National Park full, I stayed in the Indian Creek area. I couldn’t resist another stop at Newspaper Rock, an incredible petroglyph wall.
On my latest trip, I arrived in mid-May, 2021. My first alarm sounded when I pulled into the formerly sleepy town of Bluff to get gas. Buses, tour vans, and rental RV’s crowded the town. Wait – this wasn’t high season or a weekend! I filled up my tank, and quickly headed west, seeking a dispersed camping site along Butler Wash, on the east side of Comb Ridge. Comb Ridge is an amazing stretch of white sandstone that stands out among the red sandstone of the surrounding area, looking like a giant zipper from the satellite view:
From Butler Wash, it is not quite as impressive, but still looks like a fun place to hike and explore.
Many of the dispersed campsites along Butler Wash were already occupied when I arrived, so I continued driving up the road. I finally found a small pull-off that ended next to the wash, with tall cottonwoods for shade. The wash was dry, but the cottonwoods had leafed out. Orioles flitted among the branches and towhees scratched through the leaves. Also noticeable was the near-constant air traffic that continued past midnight, and a slow but steady amount of SUV traffic up and down the road paralleling Butler Wash.
We, the dog and I, arrived in mid-afternoon, plenty of time for exploring. We clambered down into Butler Wash (very dry) and I was surprised to find fresh bear tracks. Surprised because I don’t think of this sparse, dry desert as bear habitat, and yet tickled at finding bear tracks in Bears Ears.
We poked around the nooks and crannies of Comb Ridge before heading back to camp for dinner. I set up the mics to run overnight near the cottonwoods close to camp. Not much activity (I was hoping some owls might stop by) except planes. But in the morning, I was greeted with a lovely twitter-fest from some Spotted Towhees and Lucy’s Warblers. Pretty quiet for a dawn chorus this time of year, but given how dry everything was, lovely nonetheless.
After breakfast and another quick exploration of the area, I decided to head down the road to Grand Staircase and see if I could find someplace less trafficked and hopefully away from the constant airplanes. I drove up the incredibly fun and scenic Moki Dugway, and along the road that follows the spine of Cedar Ridge. Capital Reef was packed, with every pull off and trailhead full. As I approached Boulder and Escalante, I was shocked out how these quiet burbs had been transformed into tourist meccas, with new tour companies offering rafting trips, ATV tours, mountain bike tours, and scenic van tours. Escalante was also full of new hotels.
I headed past Kodachrome Basin State Park, and followed a few tourist vans into The Cockcomb (a very scenic canyon). I found a small side road that led to a nice dispersed camping site on top of a mesa, arriving just before dark. A stiff breeze dampened the sounds of the few birds in the area, which was still subject to tons of aircraft noise.
After being on the road for 6 weeks, and running low on food, I gave up exploring Bears Ears and Grand Staircase and headed for Nevada. I’m sure there are still remote places in these huge areas where one can get away from the crowds. It’s just not as easy as it used to be and will require more dedication and time to explore.
A good read with a similar perspective
Photo of Bears Ears: brucerinehart (Bruce Rinehart, CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0), via Wikimedia Commons