Drought

Glen Canyon National Recreation Area

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Like most people who travel through the crossroads of Page, I paid $10, walked 3/4 of a mile and took a picture of Horseshoe Bend. It’s an easy photo, especially around 2:30 pm, with the sun shining down over your left shoulder onto the deep oxbow canyon below. On a clear day the blue sky reflects in the river, and the height of the overlook makes a photo idiot-proof, easily framing the river bend from cliff to cliff and from horizon to bottom’s edge. Even I, a mediocre photographer at best, got the shot I dreamed about. But instead, I decided to show you the uglier view above.

“a curious ensemble of wonderful features
—carved walls, royal arches, glens, alcove gulches, mounds and monuments.
From which of these features shall we select a name?
We decide to call it Glen Canyon.”

John Wesley Powell, explorer

When John Wesley Powell first explored this canyon in 1869, he and his crew were amazed by the varied beauty of the place. Above all the impressive geologic features, they decided the best part of the canyon were the narrow green glens, teeming with specialized flowers, birds and animals. Less than 100 years later in 1963, the beautiful glens of Glen Canyon were drowned, and in a cruel irony, the temporary bathtub was named “Lake Powell” after the explorer & geologist who most loved the living glens.

In retrospect, Glen Canyon Dam should never have been built. Lake Powell, above the dam at right, is a sad collection of marooned boats with ramps and docks that don’t reach the water, so most of the fossil-fuel burning jet skis, power boats, fishing boats and houseboats can’t keep polluting here anymore. The “lake” is more of a stagnant segment of river with bleached canyon walls and a bathtub ring. Due to low water, neither the ferry at Hall’s Crossing nor the tour boats to Rainbow Bridge run anymore. When the water drops another 30 feet—later this year?—the massive hydroelectric towers above the dam to the left won’t have any electricity to deliver.

Engineers no doubt consider the dam to be a victim of its own success, drawing too many people to Arizona with cheap electricity and “plentiful” water. Economists likely consider the dam a fiasco, since all the expensive infrastructure is practically useless now, long before returning on the investment. Common sense says that dam or not, you can’t have your river and drink it too. Environmentalists, who opposed the dam from the beginning, say “we told you so”. Climate scientists say, “it’s going to get worse”.

After all the park is desert—mostly remote canyons in Utah—, and the river isn’t big enough for people to waste. I drive past a lot of busy car washes and gas stations with patches of grass, while the shiny vehicles burn carbon and diminish the mountain snowpack. On my way southeast, I drove through Gilbert, Chandler & Ocotillo neighborhoods near Phoenix. While riff-raff like me aren’t allowed past the walls, gates and guards, satellite maps show private golf courses, lakes, and homes on private islands, all in the desert. It’s tragic to see glimpses of all that water wasted, while our national recreation areas run dry.

Chickasaw National Recreation Area

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While the Lake of the Arbuckles is popular for wasting gas zooming in circles on the water, I think the hiking is the best form of recreation here. The smaller Veterans Lake is reserved for paddling, but since you can see everything from the boat ramp, there’s no point. I hiked for a couple miles near the Travertine Nature Center through the ecotone that ranges from Redbud to Cactus, along the CCC developed creeks and mineral spring pools, admiring the foliage, the tall Sycamores and various Oaks, and I watched an armadillo digging around in the brush. There are half a dozen simple campgrounds, and when the water is flowing there are many small waterfalls and an old pavilion where they used to bathe in mineral waters. Once tourists observed bison wallowing in the muddy pools, but now the area suffers in man-made drought.

To prevent over-development, the Chickasaw and Choctaw nations sold the springs and surrounding forest to the Interior Department, hence the name. I very much recommend visiting the neighboring Chickasaw Cultural Center, which connects to the park by the pedestrian Inkana Bridge. There I observed a pair of Great Blue Herons, admired the pollinator gardens, toured the replica village, watched a stomp dance, and learned about the tribe in their beautiful museum. The history of the Chickasaw is tragic, fascinating and inspiring, including conflicts with the Spanish, French, British and the US. My trip to the southeast goes in the direction their ancestors traveled many centuries before the tribe was removed to Oklahoma.

César E. Chávez National Monument

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I returned here today to see the exhibits, as they were closed when I visited last year. The black & white photos of the Delano grape strike and Chávez’s hunger strike remarks are particularly moving. Pesticides were not regulated at all then, and labor was denied rights by growers. Chávez’s national boycott of grapes helped change both.

Today, growers drain rivers, lakes, wetlands and water tables, even as the western half of the country suffers in drought. In Kern County, where the Monument is, the Kern River no longer flows to the Kern Lake, due to diversion for agriculture. In order to sell more produce, growers are ruining the environment for fish, animals and people. Climate change and some farming practices also exacerbate Valley Fever, a deadly fungal infection spreading in California & Arizona.

Agriculture is a trillion dollar industry in the US, with $150 billion in exports. But Big Ag prefers to blame Democrats, rather than face the fundamental challenge of the climate crisis. Big Ag needs to convert farm equipment to electric, and they need to stop using fossil fuel to ship their produce around the world. They also need to cooperate to restore wetlands to sequester carbon.

César Chávez devoted his life to raise awareness and lead civil disobedience to make change. He acknowledged that in the struggle against the rich and powerful, poor people only have their lives “and the justice of our cause” on their side. Today, we need more people to be just as devoted to stop the climate crisis.

Wisteria, photographed in my previous visit in 2021.

How the NPS can help fight climate change

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The Climate Crisis is devastating our national parks, threatening the wildlife, forests and beautiful coastlines that many parks were designed to protect. The National Park Service (NPS) needs to change its own policies to stop encouraging fossil fuel use and start encouraging electric vehicles. Right now, the NPS is updating its infrastructure, enhancing campsites, comfort stations and roads to better meet the needs of increasing visitors. They’ve also increased some fees and shuttle-services. Fighting the climate crisis needs to be a priority in all those decisions.

In my recent visit to Death Valley, the campers next to me in Texas Springs campground “bent” the rules. Their large 5th wheel and vehicles exceeded the campsite limit. I paid $2 extra to be in a “generator free” campground, but they idled their trucks for hours to recharge their batteries. They used one of their trucks to try to hold my campsite for themselves without paying. They left their campfire burning all night unattended. They used off-highway vehicles (two ATV’s and a dirt bike) in the park, which is prohibited. Besides being a nuisance, they also emitted more carbon than anyone else in the campground.

Since the Climate Crisis is exacerbating the drought, worsening wildfires and threatening species, the NPS should be more aggressive in discouraging fossil-fuel use. Charge carbon-burning vehicles per axle, charge extra for campfires, prohibit truck idling & alternator charging in no-generator sites and charge for their use in RV sites. Add more EV charging sites and add electric shuttle buses. Large gas-guzzling RV’s are terrible for the climate, and they require more expensive infrastructure (wider paved roads and longer pull-through campsites). They also produce more pollution in the park including noise and light. Instead of letting these fossil-fuel RV dinosaurs roll over the parks, the NPS must take a stand and change policies to be part of the climate solution.