Snowpocalypse!

This is the third essay in a series about trying to relive my middle school's "Indian Unit" on an Indian ruins road trip through the American Southwest. Read the first and second essay for the whole story.

S

OMEWHERE NEAR CORTEZ, Colorado — We spend the next two days on a whirlwind tour of Indian ruins sites managed by the National Park Service. First, we hurry to nearby Montezuma Castle National Monument, an impressive Sinagua 20-room cliff dwelling overlooking the Verde Valley. We learn that the Europeans who discovered the Sinagua ruins in the 1860s assumed incorrectly that the ruins had been constructed by Montezuma and the Aztecs, and the Monument’s name is a misnomer. We start calling the ruins “Montezuma Castle (No Relation.)”

“I feel like a tourist,” Rich says disappointedly. We’re all staring at a National Park diorama depicting a scene of Sinagua living in the cliff dwelling, complete with a blind man being led around by his wife and a misbehaved child running around on a mud roof. The diorama’s “Audio-Program” sign and activation button looks like it time traveled to us from 1950.

I, too, feel less like Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark and more like Clark Griswold in National Lampoon’s Vacation. It’s significantly more rewarding finding ruins hidden on the rim of an obscure Canyon than visiting a castle and diorama at the end of a path paved by the National Park Service. Montezuma Castle (No Relation) seems like moose stew made with grocery store beef.

We catapult ourselves during the night toward northeastern Arizona’s Canyon de Chelly National Monument, and at 7 AM, we begin hiking into the Canyon on the White House Ruins Trail. Unfortunately, it’s the only trail visitors are permitted to hike without paying a Navajo guide, due to a special arrangement between the Park Service and the Navajo Nation. Though the temperature is below freezing, we take our time enjoying the Canyon’s fantastic scenery: towering red rock mesas, mint-colored Cottonwood trees, snow covered valleys, and buttes made of stretched orange sandstone. There’s some not-so-attractive scenery too. At the bottom of the Canyon, we pass a pile of trash, lawn chairs, and jeep tracks left by previous tourists before we arrive at the White House Ruins. The chain link fence that keeps us far from the cliff dwelling punishes us for the misdeeds of our looting ancestors in 1900.

“The Anasazi built these cliff dwellings in the Canyon between AD 700 to 1200. Then, they mysteriously disappeared,” I, in middle-school-teacher mode, tell the group.

“Yes, yes, we know,” Wendy says. “But where the hell did they go?”

Kids today, I think.

We stand at the fence, staring at the ruins. My eyes run over the aging, cracked red rock and the dwelling’s strangely small windows. I see a few pictographs etched into the rock: one that looks like an alien wearing a condom on his head, and another that looks like a planet from another galaxy. I wonder whether the Anasazi were abducted by strange, condom-wearing aliens or were in fact aliens themselves. I don’t share any of my absurd theories with the group.

As we hike back to the Canyon’s rim, snow starts to fall. The oversized, cottony flakes come slowly at first, sprinkling our clothes and eyelashes. The air turns quiet, in the way that it always does during heavy snowfalls, and the sky and air become white and opaque. By the time we’re near the top of the Canyon, we’re walking through a full-fledged snowstorm.

“That may have been one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen,” Vik says about the storm as the four of us, covered in snow, pile back into the car.

By the time we get to the entrance to Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado, we’ve been driving through what seems like an enormous bale of cotton for six hours. I learn from my iPhone that the media is calling the storm Snowpocalypse 2010. We’re surprised to encounter a closed, locked gate, and a Park Ranger stops us when we try to drive around it.

“The Park’s closed,” he explains. “Too much snow.” Doesn’t he know that we’re trying to fit a ten day road trip into four days, and we only have one day left to find out what happened to the Native Americans of the Four Corners? I think. He tells us that, if we’re lucky, the Park may open again the next morning.

“Quickly — to Hovenweep!” I urge my travel companions, hoping that we can squeeze yet another ruins site into our trip. As Rich drives away, Wendy programs the car’s GPS navigator to direct us to Hovenweep National Monument, the site of six prehistoric, Puebloan-era villages. Forty five minutes later, we find ourselves driving through rural prairies, near the intersection of Road P and Road 18, somewhere not at all close to Arrida, Colorado — which is to say — nowhere. In every direction, we see seemingly infinite swaths of snow fields. The blizzard, which had let up temporarily, starts again, slowly at first, then intensifies. We see no Puebloan villages. The snow makes me wonder whether the Hohokam, the Anasazi, and the Sinagua fled the area simply because they couldn’t handle the cold and crazy snowstorms. The car’s GPS navigator appears to have tired of sending us to the ruins of ancient civilizations. We’re lost. Rich stops the car on the side of the road.

“Snowhere,” Rich says. “We’re Snowhere.” Without explanation, he steps out of the car and starts walking slowly across one of the snow fields. Vik then gets out of the car too and follows him, about fifty feet behind. As Wendy and I watch, Vik bends down, builds a snowball in his hands, and pelts Rich in the back with it. When Wendy and I get out of the car, she too grabs some snow from the side of the road and then throws it at Vik when he’s not looking. I, the eternal travel documentarian, take photos until thousands of falling snow flakes render my camera inoperable. I pack it away, join the group, and start throwing snowballs at Rich.

Orbs of snow and ice fly chaotically through the air. One smashes into Rich’s shoulder. Vik’s jeans soon become soaked with snow. Wendy’s snowball weapons become the size of human heads. One bombards me in the neck.

My middle school teachers never would have allowed this, I think.

It’s an all-out snowmageddon. We never make it to Hovenweep.

Read the final essay in this series, in which a woman throws a shoe and a bar glass at Hank and his friends.

Comments

• February 21, 2010, 5:24 PM

  sylvia

  Hey Hank- I somehow happened across your blog a while ago and I'm glad I checked in. I have to put my 2 cents in for the Gila Wilderness in NM (bit far for a road trip from LA but WORTH IT). The place is gloriously empty, and the ruins & hot springs beautiful. I had a fantastic time exploring the area on a bike trip, years ago. Silver City is a fun town, too. Put it on your list!

• February 22, 2010, 2:01 PM

  Diana Hossfeld

  I didn't feel jealous that I wasn't on this trip until now. I love snowball fights. I used to pelt people in the face at Northwestern. And by "people" I mean strangers.

• February 23, 2010, 12:34 PM

  Hank Leukart

  Thanks for the advice, Sylvia! New Mexico is definitely on my list for an upcoming trip.

• February 26, 2010, 9:15 AM

  sylvia

  Hank--glad to hear it!