Strangers In Southwest Utah

By Chérie Newman

We flew in from all over the United States and met for the first time at the Las Vegas airport. I’m surprised by my first impression of these women. Although their average age is about 64, growing older has, paradoxically, infused them with youthful vigor and vitality. They absolutely glow! As one of the youngest members in our group, I’m forced to ask myself some disquieting questions: Will I be capable of going on an adventure like this in 15 or 20 years? In my early 70s, will I be able to hike miles and miles in steep, rugged terrain at high altitudes? Facing questions like these was not part of my plan when I signed up for an all-women’s hiking week in the National Parks of Southwest Utah.

I must admit I was leery of group travel at first. My tendency has been to travel alone, free of the hassles created by differing personalities and preferences. Uncomfortable around new people, the thought of rooming with a woman I had never met made me uneasy. What if she snores? What if I can’t sleep and need to turn on the light to read at 2am? But, happily, sharing with “strangers” turns out to be the best part of the trip.

During our first morning — after a two-mile hike to The Narrows in Zion National Park — we splash our bare feet in the cool waters of the Virgin River, joking about the possibility of her restoring our bodies to girlhood. Our light chatter echoes gently off of the varnish-streaked red cliffs as we discuss the identities of the flowers, birds, and geologic features surrounding us. The sweet scent of cliffrose provides aromatherapy. A pair of swallows flitting in and out of a nest above the riverbank captures our attention until a small boy throws a rock and scares them away. Our indignation, vocal and unanimous, rouses the boy’s father from his riverside reverie. I sense that the other park visitors see us as a peculiar bunch of guidebook-toting old ladies.

Even though Zion, Bryce, and Capitol Reef National parks receive about five million visitors every year, at this time — the beginning of May — the crowds have not yet arrived. With the exception of the easy trails in Zion, we typically have the parks to ourselves once we are a mile or more from the trailhead. These parks are exploding with brilliant colors, bizarre shapes, and odd names. We hike past Thor’s Hammer, Sinking Ship, a vast landscape of hoodoos, fins, and spires, the Temple of Sinawava, the Great White Throne (think kingdom, not bathroom), Checkerboard Mesa, Angel’s Landing, the Frying Pan, Altar of Sacrifice, Wall Street, and Fairyland Canyon, just to name a few. Every day, the thought of one more enchanting landscape drama propels us up and over mountains of multihued rock. And we are never disappointed. On every crest, we stand gaping at yet another spectacular spectacle.

Almost as interesting as the sculpted landscape of each park, is its human history. Ancient people left intriguing displays of “rock art” for us to ponder, but not many other clues to their cultures. The first white people to relocate near the impressive scenery in southern Utah were Mormon and Scottish settlers. During the 1850s and ‘60s, Mormon leaders sent church members to settle land near Zion and Bryce canyons with a mandate to grow cotton because cotton shipments from the south were scarce during the Civil War. This area is still known as “Utah’s Dixie.”

Capitol Reef also sports an amazing array of colorful cliffs, canyons, domes, arches, and spires. Native people occupied the fertile valleys along the Fremont River and Sulphur Creek until they inexplicably vanished around A.D. 1300. In 1880, Mormon settlers moved into the Fremont River area, planting their orchards next to mysterious petroglyphs and pictographs displayed on the canyon’s multicolored walls.

During the last 160 years, people have gone to Southwest Utah for many reasons. I thought I was going there to hike through new landscapes and to collect new stories. But, the experiences I came away with turned out to be richer than even the most vivid colors radiating from the towering monoliths of petrified sand.

Southwest Utah taught me a smattering of geology, history, archeology, and anthropology. It also taught me to remember, as someone once said, that strangers are just new friends I haven’t yet met.

Chérie Newman is a writer and adventurer based in Montana.