Interstate I-40 East, From Winslow, Arizona to Gallup, New Mexico
In May 2011, I traveled from Winslow, Arizona to
Gallup, New Mexico. Most of my trip was along Interstate I-40, but I did
detour to parts of Old-66 at Holbrook, the Petrified Forest National Park and Gallup.
Whenever I am in Winslow, I stay at the Homolovi State Park campground. Although close to town, Homolovi itself feels like a place lost in time. From its Ancestral Hopi Indian
ruins to its often-deserted campground, there is plenty of peace and
solitude to go around at Homolovi. Departing at noon that day, I was the
only human visible anywhere in the area.
From
Winslow, east to Gallup, I-40 obliterated much of old Highway US-66.
Side roads to the current interstate highway are the only remnants of
Old-66, the “Mother Road”. Taking advantage of a gradual ascent towards
Holbrook, the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad (BNSF) parallels the highway on the south side. Following the gentle gradient of the Little Colorado River,
this transportation corridor takes the shortest and flattest route
available. For those thirty-five miles of travel on I-40, the sagebrush
desert stretches almost unbroken to the horizon.
To break the monotony of this stretch, travelers can
marvel at the advertising signs along the way. For reasons unknown,
most Indian trading post billboards have yellow backgrounds, with hand
painted red lettering. Some of the signs harkened from an era when clean
restrooms were a rarity, and thus a major draw. Other signs tout “cold ice-cream” or “Indian Blankets - $9.99”. Some of the billboards date back to the heyday of old Route 66. A few
billboards were so well built against the wind, if not the weather,
that only a trace of paint hints at their original subject matter.
In several places, the BNSF railroad tracks are
close enough to the interstate highway for motorists to see the action.
Years ago, workers laid a second set of tracks adjacent to the original
east/west line. Rather than waiting on sidings for opposing trains to
pass, this stretch of track is like an expressway, with trains operating
in both directions, and around the clock. Elsewhere in the High
Southwest, you might still see trains pulled by old Santa Fe Railroad
locomotives. Here, however, there is a need for speed. The raw
horsepower required to pull these long trains at 5,000-foot altitudes
dictates the use of newer BNSF engines.
Painted in variations of orange, yellow and black,
the Burlington Northern Santa Fe locomotives look clean when they are
dirty and dirty when they are clean. Even when speckled with their own
diesel exhaust particulates, they always look tailored for business.
With their yellow lettering on a dull orange background, the BNSF
locomotives reminded me of highway billboards advertising, “Chief Joseph
blankets - $9.99”.
In Snowflake, Arizona, my friend Kathy Hemenway
has a Route 66 vintage trailer stored in her yard. Outfitted to shield
sensitive individuals from aberrant radio-frequency waves, its classic
single-axle chassis belies its stainless steel interior. From its lonely
perch along a High Southwest ridge, the little trailer appears ready to
hit the road to high adventure. Although I would not relish sleeping on
cold stainless steel, Kathy's trailer might convert well to a mobile
kitchen.
Exiting I-40 East at Holbrook,
I stopped for supplies at the local Safeway market. While waiting for
service in the deli department, I spoke with an old-timer about the
petrified wood trade around town. Although just a handful of shops and
yards seemed to have the whole business tied up, he assured me that
“almost everyone in town” had crates full of the scarce rocks in their
garages. If I wanted a bargain on some rocks that had once been trees,
he would have been happy to oblige.
Leaving
Holbrook, I traveled eighteen miles southeast on US Highway 180. As I
turned to pick up the highway to the Petrified Forest National Park, I
glimpsed an industrial-sized yard full of petrified wood for sale. To
the rear were the manufacturing and sales buildings. Well into the
twentieth century, locals and opportunists often ignored bans against
harvesting petrified wood from government land. Today, with legal
collection of petrified wood from public lands long gone, I wondered who
had gathered so many large chunks of our nation’s heritage and placed
them in private hands. With so much petrified wood scavenged from the
land, would there be any remaining for me to see at the Petrified Forest
National Park?
Having turned sixty-three years old a few weeks
earlier, I was intent upon buying my “Golden Age Passport” at the first
national park I visited. After rolling up to the booth at the park
entrance, I paid my ten dollars and received what the National Park
Service now calls a "Senior Pass". As it turned out, I had been eligible
for the pass since the day I turned sixty-two. With
my lifetime pass, I can now gain entrance to any national park in the
U.S., free of additional charge. As a reward for all of the federal
taxes I have paid in this lifetime, I am happy to accept this federal
government largess.
The young woman at the entrance booth reminded me
that it was illegal to collect or transport any found item from the
park, especially petrified wood. I assured her that I had no interest in
collecting anything at all. In fact, it looked like the locals from
times past had removed almost all of it anyway. She said that illicit
collectors often develop remorse and return their ill-gotten rocks to
the park headquarters. Although the park will accept such “donations”,
they cannot return them to their natural place in the park since no one
knows exactly where that place might be. Once taken from their original
place of rest, these rocks become vagabonds within the mineral world,
with no home of their own.
To
a new visitor, most of the Petrified Forest National Park looks just
like the surrounding desert. When we think of a forest, we think of
trees standing upright, whether they are petrified
or not. Actually, the Petrified Forest was a place where millions of
years ago, large tree trunks washed into ravines, and then became
covered with silt. Over the millennia, iron and other minerals
infiltrated the cellular tissue of the logs, replacing cellulose and
wood fiber with stone.
From about 12,000 BCE until 1300 CE, three distinct
prehistoric cultures (Anasazi, Mogollon and Sinagua) occupied various
parts of the park. As is true with almost all of the Southwestern United
States, the climate today is drier and less hospitable than it was
during the days of early human habitation. This land was not immune to
the Great Disappearance of early tribes around 1300 CE.
Looking for evidence of running water in the park, I
stopped at the confluence of Dead Wash and Ninemile Wash. Here, near
the Puerco Indian Ruins, a confluence of two meager streams forms the Rio Puerco,
which in turn flows into the Little Colorado River. The Puerco River,
here flowing under the roadway in a culvert, looks more like a drainage
ditch than a river. Although it still flowed sluggishly in May, I doubt
that one would find running water here in late summer or fall.
After traveling almost half way through the park, I
found the first petrified wood visible from the road. Stopping my rig, I
confirmed that there was still some petrified wood left at Petrified
Forest National Park. Until I saw tree rings in stone for myself, I had
my doubts as to the authenticity of the whole enterprise. Until then, I
wondered if the entire national park was perhaps an elaborate hoax.
To document the authenticity of the place, I got both of my Kokopelli and Coney
(the traffic cone) out of my travel trailer. Posing them on one of the
large petrified specimens, I took their picture as documentary evidence
that the place still exists, and so too, do they. Reflecting my own
stubbornness, sometimes they are hard to convince. In the second photo
of my superhero friends, I unwittingly captured a picture of the Other, casting his shadow across the hard stone. It was late afternoon and I still had many miles to go before camping at Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. I ensconced all of my little friends in the cab of my truck and headed for the eastern exit of the park
After passing under I-40, I found myself stopping to
stare at The Painted Desert. As a child, I grew up watching old Walt
Disney documentaries about the desert, but I never imagined how
realistic the Disney artists’ recreation really was. From each turnout, I
could see a different view of a pastel colored desert, with subtle hues
reflected in late afternoon sunlight. When architect Frank Lloyd Wright designed the Grady Gammage Auditorium at Arizona
State University, in Tempe, critics cried foul at its pastel color
scheme. Its exterior seemed to glow, with a pastel pink tone often
predominating. Those who claimed that Wright’s colors were not true to
any real desert should visit The Painted Desert. There they shall find
proof of Wright’s veracity. His vision presaged the contemporary trend
toward natural color schemes for Southwest houses.
Before leaving the Petrified Forest National Park, I
came across the Painted Desert Inn. In 1947, Fred Harvey brought his
famous "Harvey Girls" to the Painted Desert Inn, operating it as a hotel
and restaurant for many years. In 2006, the National Park Service
completed a major refurbishment of the original buildings, which are
open for food service and souvenir shopping today. Gone now, are the
only overnight accommodations anywhere in the park. I would not be
surprised to find that this is the only national park to close its gates
at sundown, reopening again after sunrise each day.
As
I exited the park, the ranger on duty at the booth asked if I had
collected anything during my visit. I answered, “No, I don’t believe in
it”. Carrying with me a copy of Craig Childs' new book, “Finders Keepers
– A Tale of Archaeological Plunder and
Obsession”, I had lost all desire to collect artifacts or natural
objects from any public land. OK, I do admit to bringing one souvenir
piece of Redrock home each time I drive to Moab. If each of us collects
only a few rare items, soon there will be no natural or ancient
artifacts for humans to find and contemplate.
Now, when I find a potsherd in the desert, I observe it, photograph it
and then return it to its place of origin. Unburied by my boot heel, it
shall lay there until it welcomes its next visitor. If the next
"finder" is also a "keeper", it shall be, "Goodbye, in-situ potsherd".
With the fragility of desert environments, it is best to conduct one's
search along established trails or in dry-washed arroyos. There, your boot can do no further damage. And if you do
find a piece of hard-baked white ware, with indigo lines painted on to
its white glaze, you will know its beauty immediately. Once removed from
its rightful place, its value is nil. It may have taken eleven hundred
years for our potsherd to make it from its original camp to a floodplain in the desert. I believe that each artifact is imbued with the Spirit of the Ancients.
With that knowledge, one can see that the spirit accompanying that
potsherd chose to bake there in that wash. Until the keeper found it,
the spirit of the potsherd waited patiently for The Flood
to carry it further on its journey. Having that potsherd in one's
dresser drawer does not further the cause. Simply put, humans should not
abscond with ancient potsherds, nor pieces of petrified wood, for that
matter.
After seventy-two more miles of driving on I-40 East, I arrived in Gallup, New Mexico. Gallup is a regional center for Indian Country,
with a business district that speaks to its long history. Pawnshops,
Indian art galleries and trading posts occupy many of the old brick
buildings in town. Drawn out over Old-66,
the town appears larger than it is. If one drives only a mile north or
south from the highway, there is more desert to see than there is city.
Still, with Old-66, newer I-40, plus the BNSF rail line all running
through town, Gallup is the largest transportation and lodging center
between Flagstaff, Arizona and Albuquerque, New Mexico.
As I drove through town late that May afternoon,
there were vehicles everywhere. On either side of the old highway and
along the center median, I saw huge wicker baskets resting in truck beds
and on trailers. Although there was not a hot air balloon in sight, it
was obviously a rallying point for hot air balloonists. As if it were a
normal occurrence, many balloonists were testing their propane gas jets
right in the middle of the highway. Within a few blocks, I had passed
the balloon-less balloonists and once again had the road almost to
myself.
With
sunset about an hour away, the light was low as I pulled away from the
corner of Highway 66 and Second Street. On my right was a long block of
gritty buildings. To my left, I saw an Amtrak train stopped at the
Gallup Amtrak Station. Originally built as the El Navajo Hotel in 1918,
the train station now shows a more contemporary front to motorists.
After stopping for fuel, I headed east on I-40. With Chaco Culture
National Historical Park as my targeted resting place, I hoped for a
long dusk to light my way.
By James McGillis at 07:13 PM | Travel | Comments (0) | Link