Anza Borrego Part IV - Women's Intuition

“On the fourth day, God created bad weather…again.” Book of Genesis

Yet again, we awoke to snow in the mountains, and a steady cold rain in Agua Caliente. It made for a long night, which was compounded by our Korean “neighbors” who slept in their van with it running all night. Nothing like engine noise and choking fumes to help you sleep…they must have been North Koreans. Seeing that extended hiking was out of the picture, again, we decided to go ahead and do our laundry and get more groceries. After yesterday's Julian blunder, we decided to head south for warmer climes, to the bustling City of El Centro.

Driving to Interstate 8, we went through the “burgeoning” metropolis of Ocotillo. It had a bar called the Lounging Lizard, which Analee noted had several patrons at 10 AM on a Saturday, so this town was happening! Upon reaching I-8, we saw that the weather was so bad to the west of the park that the State had shut down I-8W through the Laguna Mountains. There were people parked for miles on the shoulder, median, gas stations (probably at the Lounging Lizard, too). Luckily, our destination lay to the east.

Although our stay in El Centro was brief, it was nice to get out of the cold and spend some time in civilization. I do believe we were the first white people in eons to step into the Laundromat, to which Analee whispered “Are we in Mexico?” Laundry went off without a snag, and afterwards we went next door to an awesome Mexican restaurant. I don’t know if it was the tuna skroodle we had the night before, but I think that was some of the best food I’ve ever had. Afterwards we went to a real grocery store, Vons (hallelujah, not a country store), and got twice as many groceries for half the price. In retrospect, our trip to El Centro seems really boring.

From there it was back to Anza Borrego where we had our first encounter with the United States Border Patrol. Analee got really excited because we had seen the checkpoint before, but no one was ever there (actually, on the way back we drove past it, saw them setting it up, then we turned around so we could go through it…hah!). When we reached the patrolmen, our great, grand and glorious security asked, “Are you citizens?” To which we replied, “Yes”, and that was it, checkpoint inspection over. What a letdown!

After that intense interrogation, we proceeded to “car hike” the rest of the day. This entailed Analee gleefully driving over every square inch of desert in the south end of Anza Borrego. Near Ocotillo, we drove back to a place call Shell Canyon (aka) Fossil Canyon). We hiked up the canyon about half a mile, and saw some interesting coquina (coquina is a type of limestone (a kind of sedimentary rock) that is mostly made of shells and shell fragments). As the canyon snaked back, the walls became closer and higher. It was definitely an intimidating site seeing where water had carved huge slices in the canyon walls and had deposited massive boulders in the streambed. This experience was worsened by the fact it was raining, too. Eventually, we turned back towards the Blazer, and Analee took a 5 minute movie of the hike (unfortunately, this movie was deleted for future picture space).

Enjoying the hike in Fossil Canyon

Next we headed off towards the Dolomite Mine wash. I was not expecting an exciting drive on this one, as it was mainly flat and expansive, plus, I have no idea what dolomite is. However, it did turn rather interesting. As we bounced back towards the mine, Analee noticed some interesting tracks in the sand. Since it had just rained, it was apparent that these tracks were fresh. For a while we couldn’t figure out what the tracks were, a horse? a cow? Nope, human footprints. Mind you that we were in the middle of nowhere and foot hiking this area was out of the question. Remember that checkpoint station? Well it appears that some immigrants had recently strolled through, successfully evading the rigorous US Border Patrol interrogation techniques.

Which way to Home Depot?

We never made it to the mine, however, because road conditions got too bad. Yet, I did find an interesting rock sculpture in the shape of a rattlesnake. Based on the coins left at the site, it had been there since the 60s (It is my impression that hikers, etc. place coins of the year they were there on interesting objects they see).

Rattlesnake Rock Sculpture

With daylight fading, we thought we had time for one more trail to drive, so we headed down the Mortero Wash, which leads towards Dos Cabezas and Indian Hill. I will tell you right now, based on weather and daylight we should never had gone down this wash. We drove back about 7 miles into the canyon (over and down some very precarious rocks/hills…did I mention that Analee is a great offroad driver?). When we reached the Dos Cabezas rail station, we found some spoil from an old mine located nearby. Turns out it was some sort of “ite” (Dolomite I think - I told you I can’t identify rocks).

At the rail station we found a blue 55 gallon drum marked “Water / Agua”. As we learned on NPR (due to the immigration bill in the Senate) when we got back to NC, humanitarian groups place these drums in the desert to provide water for illegals. While I don’t condone illegal immigration, I was glad to see some sort of compassion for their hard journey. Thinking that we could possibly do a hike to Indian Hill, we headed even further down the trail (now about 10 miles deep).

Dos Cabezas Rail Depot

Let me admit right now, I am not Magellan. When Analee would ask which direction, I would cleverly say “Over there…I guess.” Needless to say, we never made it to Indian Hill that day, but we did see it, “I guess”. Now the rain and wind started to come strong again. It was definitely time to turn back. As we retraced our steps, Magellan here (i.e., me) suggested we turn down a different wash (Jojoba Wash) to get back, which seemed quicker. We drove down this wash about 4 miles, and then it the road conditions worsened. We noticed the wash was becoming rockier and was narrowing. Thinking this the way to go, I navigated us onward.

Soon the wash was littered with basketball sized rocks. I urged us onward. At one point I had to get out of the car and direct Analee around a tricky spot. Once I got back in the car, women’s intuition set in. The sun was sinking, the rain was coming, the wind was gusting, and the canyon walls were narrowing. Analee immediately said “I don’t like this.” At that exact moment I spied a toy lighthouse up on the left, and I said I wanted to get out and look at it. Analee, sensing danger, said “then go f^@#@#$ look at it, I’m getting out of here” (the first and only time she has ever cussed at me – with good reason).

As Analee was completing a 27 point turn in the narrow canyon to get the Blazer going in the other direction, I walked over to the “toy lighthouse”. The lighthouse was a trinket left on a marker which was the grave for Mark Piepkorn who “died at this spot” in November of 1996. Suddenly I felt the urgency of getting out of this canyon, as if Mr. Piepkorn kicked me in the ass and told me to get moving!

Analee got us out of the canyon, and after a while we were back on good old asphalt roads. I didn’t tell her about the grave until we were well away from the canyon, and our bones were soaking in the pool. I’ll never doubt Analee’s intuition again. (As a side note, upon returning to NC, I found a map listing this canyon as one-way, guess which way Magellan was leading us?!)

UP NEXT – Anza Borrego Part V: Magellan Strikes Again!