We may have made a few terrorists uncomfortable for a short period of time in order to get information that we felt was essential to protecting the United States. Deputy Director of the CIA, John McLaughlin.
There really weren’t many surprises in the Senate Torture Report. When it was reported that Lynndie England, Ivan Frederick – who his friends affectionately called Chip – Megan Ambuhl, et al, posted pictures of their torturing prisoners sometime in 2003-2004, I didn’t believe that they were Lone Wolves. To me, and everybody I talked to who had been in the military, they were just too far down the ladder to have made that decision and then blithely photograph it. I thought that the decision had been made much higher up and, when the Privates and Spec 4s had been caught, they were scapegoated.
It really didn’t surprise me that the CIA was lying, anybody who read about the CIA fighting and redacting the Senate Report. Speaking of which, I was surprised that Senator Feinstein took such a strong stance. Pleasantly surprised.
What also surprised me was that the CIA paid something like 80 million dollars – EIGHTY MILLION – to a couple of consultants to torture people.
Peter Kuhlman, on facebook, linked to an article in The American Conservative that makes as much sense as anything I have read. As Peter said, Money quote:”Willingness to torture became, first within elite government and opinion-making circles, then in the culture generally, and finally as a partisan GOP talking point, a litmus test of seriousness with respect to the fight against terrorism. That – proving one’s seriousness in the fight – was its primary purpose from the beginning, in my view. It was only secondarily about extracting intelligence. …It was never about “them” at all. It was about us. It was our psychological security blanket, our best evidence that we were “all-in” in this war, the thing that proved to us that we were fierce enough to win.”
In the meantime, Michele and I are heading south to see a special show on the art of the Bugatti brothers at the Mullin. We will try to not think about torture.
We spent the second night on a sandy bench under a huge wall on the outside of a meander with the sky trying to clear. After our morning toilette, and instant oatmeal with dry fruit for breakfast, we wandered around the area for a few minutes. Up until now, we have been walking through Navajo Sandstone, but, now, the creek – brook? stream? – has carved its way down into another layer or, more accurately, down into multi-layers; and the canyon starts to take on a different character.
Today we walk under Coyote Bridge, following the stream, and nobody is around. Yesterday, we walked by Jacob Hamblin Arch, probably the most famous – using the term famous relatively – place in Coyote Gulch, but there were two large parties camped there, so we kept on walking. For the most part, we are hiking alone, although we do run into people going the other way or going faster (we don’t pass anybody who is walking slower than me). The first time I came here, we didn’t see anybody and now there are probably thirty people spread out along the thirteen mile canyon.
We are in an official park, the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument but this is land that is administered by the Bureau of Land Management rather than The Park Service. It is the BLM, to anybody who lives in the Rural West. The BLM which administers over 245 million surface acres and 700 million acres of subsurface mineral rights. The BLM: giver of grazing and mining permits, regulator – over regulator or under regulator depending on you point of view – of fracking. Normally they do not administer parks and I really don’t remember the political reasons that brought this on except that the Monument was set-up under Clinton/Gore and Gingrich was running the House at the time.
What ever the reason, the BLM is much less formal than the Park service. In Zion National Park, many of the trails are paved, even in the Yosemite highcountry, some of the trails have wooden boardwalks and, in The Valley, some have guard rails. In Coyote, there are no trails, there is only the way (as in this way may go through, or this way is better, or no way!). Sometimes the way is over a sandy bench covered in wild grasses, sometimes the way is in the river, sometimes it is through Gamble Oaks and Willows, but the way is always down into the canyon. Sometimes we take a break, just to bathe in the beauty, the wildness, but the way always takes us deeper into the canyon. After a small waterfall, we ran into a slickrock section that required help from a stick that Courtney found. I kept thinking, I have been both down this section and back up, it is very doable. But I am older and stiffer and more brittle and, looking down at the landing zone, I realized that I would not make it without the stick. We slid halfway down on our butts, scooched to stage right, and then slid off the ledge to the solid sand landing zone. It was one of those places that is physically pretty easy, psychologically scary, and takes lots of time-consuming discussion. The last night in the canyon, we camp in a huge alcove. Alcoves are not my favorite place to camp because they seem so well used, maybe overused. I know that the Anasazi must have stopped here because they like alcoves, but they abandoned their major cities like Mesa Verde and Chaco near the end of the 13th century, and this is far from those cities. The magic, if it ever existed, is gone, wiped clean by years of ranchers and cowboys using this place. After our morning meditation, we hike the last couple of miles of Coyote Gulch,
Coyote Gulch ends at the Escalante River at just about the place that the Escalante River, itself, ends at Lake Powell. It is as deep as we can go. But there is a way out – a long walk up a sand dune, just before the end – that leads to the Crack In The Wall. This sand dune has been a major worry for me, it is steep, sandy, and doesn’t have any shade, so Michele and I started while Gina and Courtney explored downstream. The hike up the sand dune is much worse – and much shorter – than I remembered it and my tactic becomes look up the trail, pick out a destination 15 to 20 feet ahead – like an Opuntia – then hike to that point to take a break and catch my breath. I repeat it about 50 times. Finally, we get to the Crack and it is much narrower than I remember – I am almost too fat – but I am able to squeeze through, only to be stopped by a block that has to be climbed. At this point, the only way out is to go up, going back is a two-day slog, at best. With Courtney directing my feet and Gina pulling, I get above it and then scramble to the top of the plateau and, shazam!, we are out (with only a tiring, flat, walk back to the car). That night, we have a delicious dinner at the Hell’s Backbone Grill.
I discovered the American Desert in the late spring of 1976 – my mom took me to Death Valley when I was about eight but I’m not counting that although it probably did plant the seed – it was a spiritual experience.
On the first trip, I drove a 1974 BMW Bavaria 4 door sedan. A friend had called and said that he had just been to Death Valley, it was fantastic, and he wanted to go back (in retrospect, he probably wanted somebody else to take their car). We drove across most of the Mojave Desert, in the dark, and camped in an empty Mahogany Flat Campground at 8,133 ft, on Telescope Peak. I slept on a cot so that I wouldn’t be attacked by snakes.
It did not take very long – but longer than it took to fall in love with the desert – to figure out that a Bavaria was not the ideal vehicle to get into the desert. The next vehicle was – and here I am quoting from a list of my cars that I made in 2003 – A 1976 GMC 4 wheeldrive pickup: desert tan with whorehouse red vinyl interior and a GMC, OHV V8, big enough to pull a tree-stump out of the ground. It burned more gas than a 747 but was a very handy vehicle: four people could ride in the front (only) seat and drive to Death Valley. The truck really wasn’t mine, it was a company truck used by one of our superintendents, and I would use it the couple of times a year that I went to the desert.
Next was an almost new Jeep Cherokee that I bought from a friend. He sold it cheap because his parents had spilled milk and then let the milk dry under the seats and the Cherokee smelled. I don’t remember how we got rid of the smell, but it became Samantha’s car except when I wanted to go the desert. Finally, in 1988, I got a new Range Rover, described in my Car Log as A 1988 Range Rover: Olive Drab with grey interior and powered by a Rover V8 (really a modified mid-60s Buick V8 that Rover bought from GM). The perfect car for me at the time, it would go anywhere from the symphony to Coyote Gulch. And finally, A 1992 Range Rover: white. Same-o, same-o.
But it wasn’t the Same-o, same-o the 92 Rover took us all over the Western Outback – mostly the Eastern Mojave Area, the Escalante area in Utah, and Northwestern Nevada – for over ten years. It wasn’t particularly reliable, but it never left us stranded until March 29th, 2013 – about 4 o’clock in the afternoon when it gave up on 395, just north of Minden.
Before that, we did have a couple of close calls. One memorable close call was when the alternator gave out in Soldier Meadow – probably 40 miles from the nearest pavement – but we were able to limp home.
As an aside, that problem taught me a great lesson on a difference between Rustic and City Dweller Morality – or, at least, Guiding Principles – that I think is part of the Red/Blue conflict. When the Alt light came on in Soldier Meadows, we immediately decided to try to get as close to help as possible. We got all the way to Bruno’s Texaco Station in Gerlach where we consulted with Bruno’s son-in-law, Cecil. Of course they did not have the parts to fix it, but they suggested giving the battery a very slow charge over night. They thought that would get us to Reno. We spent the night and, the next day, drove to Reno. The Guiding Principle in Gerlach is to help a stranger (and, I suspect even more so, a neighbor). Just outside of Reno, we stopped at a shop that specialized in foreign cars but they didn’t have the parts either (no surprise). When I asked them for suggestions, they said that they couldn’t give us any because they didn’t want to be responsible if anything went wrong. I suggested recharging the battery and they said they would do that if that was what I wanted, but it was my responsibility. We charged it over a very long lunch and departed for the Bay Area, with no real idea of what our range would be. To be safe, the next stop was an open Amoco shop near Vacaville, California. They couldn’t fix it and, when I asked about a charge, they said that they wouldn’t touch the vehicle because of the liability. We were back in the City where not getting sued was the Guiding Principle. We limped home. End aside.
A year and a half ago, when the 92 Ranger Rover gave out, it was the first time since 1976 that I haven’t had a vehicle to go to the desert. Anything reliable would be in the 20 to 25,000 range and I began to think that the money would be better spent in restoring the Rover. My complicated theory was as follows: old car prices – and I am using the term car, very loosely – start going up again when men, and it is overwhelmingly men, get enough money to buy the cars they lusted after when they were twelve. That means that old Range Rovers should start increasing in price as people who were twelve , or so, in 1988, reach their 40s. And prices are going up, especially in England.
There are so many things to like about the Range Rover, it has a super cachet, is rugged and will go almost anywhere, has heavy-duty leather seats, a nice bin sunk into the dash for an altar, great visibility and…well, there must be other things, too, but there are also some real problems.
The Range Rover was designed for Royals to drive in Scotland or, maybe, a lance corporal in Northern Europe when it was a military vehicle. It does not do dust very well – about 99.999% of the dirt and gravel roads in the west are dusty although we did cross a creek once in Soldier Meadows so maybe it doesn’t like water either – and, at almost any speed on a dusty road, the dust seeps in through the back window. Well before the Rover croaked, the electric doors and power seats no longer worked because the contacts were clogged with dust.
The Range Rover was noisy, not noisy in a good way like a Ferrari, noisy because it was shaped like a brick and had a rain gutter – an actual rain gutter – around the roof, noisy. Oh, and the radio didn’t work, grounding out with a 90 dB squeal at random times. The biggest downside to the Range Rover, however, was its miserable gas mileage, 15 miles to the gallon. The Rover’s V8 engine was originally designed by Buick in the late 50s/early 60s, in terms of engine design, the late 50s were the late Pleistocene and everything done to this engine since has been pretty much makeshift resulting in the lousy gas mileage.
None of the problems were deal breakers though, until we rented a cheap Chevy to go to Oregon.
The Chevy was ugly as sin – indeed, if sin be ugly, as my mother used to say – quiet, comfortable and had a great radio. Its power seats and door locks actually worked, and the Chevy got spectacular, by our low standards, gas mileage. At 60, on a dirt road, no dust came in as we rode in air-conditioned comfort. Intellectually, I know that a cheap 2014 car is a better transportation appliance than an expensive 1992 car, but – driving around Oregon – we became believers.
Now the question becomes what next. The Range Rover is at a repair shop in San Francisco and that is part of the problem. I asked the shop what it would cost to get the Rover restored and, clipboard in hand, the owner said my timing was perfect because he was just getting into that business. He said he would work up some numbers and get back to me, that was in April and I still haven’t heard from him. I called Landrover Ranch in New Mexico and left a message asking about restoration, they never called back. Meanwhile, Michele is starting to read reviews of VW Tiguans and I am starting to wonder about all the restored and updated Toyota Bj61s I keep seeing.
As for the Rover, it occurs to me that my first off-road car described, again in the Car Log, as A 1948 Pontiac 4 door sedan: faded blue with chrome stripes on the hood and an Indianhead hood ornament that lit up; powered by a OHV straight 8. My maternal grandparents’ car I was asked to buy (for $300) when they got too old to drive. They had covered the seats with thick plastic seat covers so, when I got the car, it was a 8-year-old beater with new gray wool – derogatorily called mouse fur – seats. About this time I started camping and this car did many uncomplaining miles on dirt roads. had a good life.That car eventually died on a dirt road near Longs Peak, Colorado while being driven by the second owner after me. He, fittingly in my opinion, left it by the side of the road to exfoliate back into the earth.
In Northwestern Nevada is an oasis named Wall Spring (for a spring in the closest canyon, Wall Canyon, I think). The Wall Spring in the canyon is a result of geology, the namesake Wall Spring is a collaboration between geology and Mike Moore. Geology provided the aquifer and Moore tapped into that aquifer with two artesian wells, one around 100′ and the other 180′ deep; provided judicious use of rented skiploaders – or backhoes, if you prefer – over several years to make ponds and waterways; and pole-planted trees (sourced locally, he tells me).
In the past, I have referred to it as Mike Moore’s place in the Smoke Creek Desert, but it is as much Linda Fleming’s – Mike’s wife’s – as his and it is now becoming a home to some major pieces of her art. Linda is an artist who creates, among other things, Wall Art and Sculptures. Her work hangs – stands? – in such diverse collections as the Stanford University Museum of Art, the Albuquerque Museum, the Berkeley Art Museum, the Oakland Museum, the U. S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, and, I want to add, Michele’s and my home where we have two of her drawings. Now some of her major pieces are at, or are moving to, Wall Springs.
On our way to Portland, Oregon to go to nephew Jason’s wedding, we decided to go via Wall Spring, in Nevada, for dinner with Linda and Mike (it makes more sense if you have the roadtrip gene). It turned out that Mike’s brother Kirk and his sister Kathy would also be there to make it a party. We were bringing much of the dinner because we had stopped at the San Mateo Farmer’s Market and we wanted to tout our fresh produce over what we assumed – wrongly, I think – to be their meager desert fare. We are also on a barbecued goat-leg jag and we brought one with us, it is perfect for a party of six.
We wanted to be there by four to get the goat on the barbie, and catch the 5 o’clock tour of Linda’s work – and we were running late, having diddled away an hour in Truckee – so the last hour and a half of our trip was at 60 miles per hour, or so, over gravel roads. Windows up, cool air blowing through the quiet car from the A/C, the desert, almost motionless in the windshield, with only time rushing by, was a new experience for us. We were in a rented Chevy Captiva, a compact SUV, that is just sold to Car Rental Companies. I didn’t know it at the time, but it was the start of the end of our Range Rover adventures.
We got to Wall Springs on time, and while Mike prepared the barbecue, Linda took us on a tour. The one time I had seen more than one piece of Linda’s – often – huge sculptures was at a show in the Esprit Sculpture Garden in about 1988, and I was thrilled to see some more ( it even included a nice wine, like any uptown opening).
Michele, Kathy, and LindaMike and myself with “Necklace” [steel; 2000] in the background
As an aside, the lines on the Buffalo Hills are old beaches where the water level was during the last Ice Age. End aside.
On her website, Linda says My works hint at the co-existence of the mundane and the cosmological where two realities simultaneously exist including the possibility that the past is also present. The structures are diagrams of thought that provide a glimpse of the strangeness beyond the every day world; opening a place where thought becomes tangible, history leaves a trace, and information exhales form. My reaction, seeing the work here, is visceral; they just seem to fit, to be part of the geological province.
“Insinuation” [steel; 1997]
As an aside, the dog is Lefty who is a rescue dog. Lots of people I know have rescue dogs – or cats – but they don’t know they are rescue animals, but Lefty does. Mike found him with his left foot caught in a coyote trap about 70 miles from the nearest paved road (for the longest time, I kept calling Lefty, Lucky, and still want to call him Lucky for what I think are obvious reasons). End aside.
“Pink Glass” [cast glass/steel; 1988]“Grey Matter” [laser-cut powder coated steel; 2006]“Hercules” [wood and steel;1988] with the Granite Mountains in sunlight
The tour ended as the shadows stretched out along the Buffalo Hills, we retired to the back porch for drinks and appetizers.
Sitting on the back porch, drinking my wine, eating Linda’s appetizer of heirloom tomatoes, and watching the alpenglow glow on the Fox Range , I am struck by two, almost diametrical, thoughts. Why does this austere, inhospitable, landscape so pull me? How come it doesn’t pull everybody?
We had roast goat leg, corn brought by Kathy and Kirk from Truckee, and salad for dinner as the Terminator – the line marking the earth’s shadow – under the pink Belt of Venus, ended the day.
The air is soft in the Gloaming and the Silence flows in off of the desert floor. On the back porch, we soak up the moment, knowing it is valuable for being transitory. Tomorrow, the heat and the glare will return; the air so dry it buzzes, the light harsh, and the heat an overbearing physical presence.
The next morning is Monday and getting our usual late start, we turned off the gravel Smoke Creek Road onto an actual paved road at about 11:30. In this case, the paved road is Highway 447 which goes north into Cedarville and beyond.
![Insinuation [steel; 1997] with Lefty-1835](https://i0.wp.com/srstern.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Insinuation-steel-1997-with-Lefty-1835.jpg?ssl=1 "\"Insinuation\" [steel; 1997]")
![Pink Glass- [cast glass-steel; 1988]](https://i0.wp.com/srstern.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Pink-Glass-cast-glass-steel-1988-4044.jpg?resize=604%2C339&ssl=1 "\"Pink Glass\" [cast glass/steel; 1988]")
![-Pink Glass- [cast glass-steel; 1988]-1855](https://i0.wp.com/srstern.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Pink-Glass-cast-glass-steel-1988-1855.jpg?ssl=1)
