The desert will invigorate you before it will kill you.

There were plants and birds and rocks and things

There was sand and hills and rings

The ocean is a desert with it’s life underground

And a perfect disguise above

I could not describe it better than America did in their hit song a Horse With No Name.

The desert holds a special place in my heart. On my visits to my dad in Las Vegas I always feel the magnet of the desert pulling me in to walk in the Mohave Desert.

Now I finally realized why…

Each footstep on my hike makes a crunching sound as my boot rattles the gravel. It’s dry and dusty. The temperature is in the upper 90’s with a gusty wind. I am working hard but don’t even have a bead of sweat on my forehead, as the moisture evaporates immediately.

Every minute I walk bleeds out a little more of my anxieties, problems, and worries. The trail is down a wash full of every color and shape of rock. It’s easy to trip and twist an ankle. I glance at my phone watching the service bars drop like the setting sun.

It’s a nice uphill climb to the distant mountains. That have a hidden gem, it’s a place the little rain and snow that does fall, slowly percolates out of the ground in a rare desert spring. Theses places are the spiritual lifeblood of the desert inhabitants, providing life-giving water to animals and man in an otherwise bone-dry environment. These random spots become permanent part of all desert dweller’s genetics, whose location is passed from one generation to the next.

The blurred green haze at the bottom of the distant mountain slowly transforms itself into a forest of pine trees and scrub oak.

Then the magic happens. Slowly, but surly your senses come alive.

Your mind starts to clear and your senses come alive. Slowly but surely your eyes begin to notice tiny movements all around you, your ears hear each flapping of the birds wings and insects as they fly by, and your nose begins to smell the sweet desert aroma.

I have learned the desert will invigorate you before it will kill you. Your mind clears because it has too; in all its beauty, danger is everywhere. Drop and spill your water bottle and you can die of thirst, put your hand on a rock to climb a dry waterfall and a rattlesnake or scorpion can bite you, lean to the side on a narrow trail and the cactus needles will stab you, walk without looking and fall into an abandon mine. The danger list goes on and on.

So why do I still crave to go? I have finally figured out some of the reasons.

First, the desolation feels good mentally, physically and spiritually. It is the polar opposite of the daily hustle and bustle most of us experience. And you get a free bonus; the exercise in hiking and climbing alone is worth the price of admission.

But the real reason I keep on coming back is to experience and learn how resilient life has to be to survive in these harsh conditions. And then realize, not only does it survive it prospers!

How? The desert forces life to adapt to the conditions throw at it, or it extinguishes your life. It’s that simple.

I step back and think of the desert, every time I think how my life is difficult, unfair or not going how I want.

How will I make it thru the next tough period in my life?

The desert showed me the answer, one way or another I will have to morph and adapt to what life has sent my way, as the alternatives are not acceptable.

Desert Porn

Only 2nd time in 15 years I have seen a herd of Desert Big Horn Sheep, they are almost impossible to distinguish in the pictures as they blend perfectly in the mountainside.

Casey looking for frogs at our objective a spring in Red Rock National Recreational Area west of Las Vegas.

Finally made to the green zone, another couple of miles to the mountains (the spring was on the right in the canyon between the mountain peaks).

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