Denver appeared on the horizon as a relief. I must have looked a little worse for wear checking into the downtown hotel. I stumbled out of my car reeking of peppermint mouse repellent, bug bitten, unshaven, and unshowered for a week. It felt good to be back in civilization.
What I was worried was a mouse last night turned out to indeed be a mouse. Around 12:30 am, I woke up to the sound of a mousetrap slamming shut. As much as I despise mice, I don’t like killing living creatures of any sort. Disposing of a dead mouse is never pleasant, but even less so in the middle of the night in the middle of a forest. Cautiously optimistic that my mouse problems had ended, I tried to fall back asleep. But then, suddenly, more pitter-patters. A second mouse. Number 2 never touched the remaining traps, but he scampered around enough to keep me anxious and unable to sleep the rest of the night. I put on music to drown out his footsteps and lay in bed awake until 7 am. The mouse was going through his morning routine when I finally got up and started the car, sending him scampering back to hide in what I assume was a burrow in my engine block insulation. I was exhausted but the day had begun.
Stressed by lack of sleep and the mouse problem that would undoubtedly continue the following night, I headed into the nearby city of Montrose to straighten out my head with a decent cup of coffee and a breakfast burrito. I ate at a sidewalk table alongside my car, casting angry glares through the windows at the mouse who was surely still holed up inside somewhere.
After breakfast, I entered the national park. The park is divided into two main zones, one along the south rim of the namesake canyon and the other along the north rim. I started the day on the south rim. The park road passed an incredible viewpoint even before arriving at the visitor center. From the canyon rim, I stared down into the immense depths of dark, shadowy, striated rock. It’s a nearly sheer drop down to the flimsy ribbon of river lying on the bottom.
I was early enough that the viewpoint wasn’t terribly crowded. Remarkably, every single person was wearing a mask regardless of whether they were within six feet of a stranger. I snapped a few photos at the first viewpoint before continuing on to the visitor center. From there, I made my way through the network of south rim hiking trails that passed by stunning vista after stunning vista. The Oak Flat Trail wound down slightly below the rim but still left thousands of vertical feet between me and the river.
I was the only hiker keeping my mask on all the time. Some would put a mask on or pull up a handkerchief when passing a stranger. Some would pass strangers with a half-embarrassed “Whoops, I can’t believe I left my mask in the car.” Sometimes parents were wearing masks but their kids weren’t. Sometimes only one parent had a mask. Sometimes the kids had masks and the parents didn’t. Some people had no masks and didn’t seem to care.
The trail system passed through stunted and scrubby Gambel oak, sagebrush, Ponderosa pine, and juniper. The flora was as rugged as the cliffs it topped. The immensity of the canyon was mind-boggling. A dad hiking behind me with his family summed it up best in a thick Texas drawl: “It’s so big, no one can fathom it. Well, maybe Einstein could but I ain’t him.”
Throughout the entire hike, I was dogged by band-winged grasshoppers. They blended in with the gray dirt of the path until they spread their wings to reveal sunflower-yellow coloration. Curiously, they made a snapping sound as they flew. It sounded like crackling electricity from a Tesla coil. Supposedly, the sound was part of a courtship ritual. It must have been Grasshopper Valentine’s Day.
After the hike, I returned to the car and began to think more about the resident mouse. The mouse problems had exhausted me physically and mentally. Although I’d prepared for mouse issues and had been taking precautions, I genuinely didn’t think I would encounter any, especially in summer. I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep until the second mouse had been caught, which could take one more night or several more. It was in that moment that I realized I wouldn’t be able to enjoy the trip any longer knowing that more mice would likely following the current one in the coming days and weeks.
On my big 2018 road trip, I’d dealt with similar mouse problems. That time around, it had felt like part of the journey and it had been worth the unpleasantness in order to have the overall experience that I had. In 2020, however, COVID-19 had seriously limited the range of experiences I could have while traveling responsibly. No more visiting friends or family, no more hikes or beers with strangers, no more diner breakfasts, no more wandering around Walmart to kill time. I was avoiding all human contact in order to minimize my health risks and the risk I posed to others. The result was a profound loneliness and a hollow feeling that the mice had exacerbated. There was no way to enjoy the roadtrip the way I had hoped to while also taking proper COVID-related precautions. The trip needed to end.
I made a plan to get back to Massachusetts as quickly as possible, reducing what I had imagined would be a three-month saga to a little over a week. I would finish a few afternoon hikes in the park before heading for Denver. In Denver, I would stay in a hotel. Otherwise, I would spend the entire night anxious about the mouse and wouldn’t be rested enough to drive in the morning. Before starting the return trip, however, I was determined to see all I could of Black Canyon.
Visiting the north rim was out of the question due to time constraints. Instead, I made my way down the park road, stopping at every viewpoint and turn off. It was drizzling slightly, and the canyon air was a misty haze that added to the shadowy mystery of the canyon walls. The famous Painted Wall cliff stood over 2,000 feet high, a sheer face of ancient, reddish-brown gneiss riddled with lighter-colored pegmatite veins that looked like the work of Jackson Pollack.
At the final viewpoint on the south rim, High Point, it started to rain harder. It felt like a fitting end to my time in the park and my time roadtripping west. As midafternoon turned into late afternoon, I set a course for Denver. US-50 carried a steady flow of RVs, campers, and SUVs with kayaks on the roof. Every vehicle seemed to be towing something. A tow truck towed a broken down pickup truck that was towing a camper trailer.
As the road entered Salida, a roadside sign had a picture of a cartoon facemask and greeted drivers with “Welcome! Please mask up.” The background of the sign was a faded, dull red with an almost vintage look, as if Salida had been asking visitors to mask up years before COVID made it cool. The flow of RVs continued. Every time the road went up a steep hill, a second lane opened to allow slow cars and trucks to be passed. There was always someone in a rush.
Near Nathrop, a sign pointed towards a massive mountain a few miles off the road. Mount Shavano, 14,232 feet. Nathrop and the surrounding plain sit 7,680 feet above sea level. As unfathomably high as the mountain appeared, the distance from its peak to base was still less than the difference between Nathrop and sea level. Colorado sure is elevated.
As the sun began to go down, the small towns I passed through became more and more frequent. Each was just a brief blur. A motel, a liquor store, a gas station with rusted out antique pumps, a store selling wooden sculptures of Yogi Bear, a handwritten sign advertising firewood.
Denver appeared on the horizon as a relief. I must have looked a little worse for wear checking into the downtown hotel. I stumbled out of my car reeking of peppermint mouse repellant, bug bitten, unshaven, and unshowered for a week. It felt good to be back in civilization.
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