| DEDECKERA CANYON
RE-VISITED by Pat Acheson |
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In the September Sage, I reported on the stir kicked up over a miner's attempt to build an access road through Dedeckera Canyon, which lies in the Saline Corridor and in an Area of Critical Environmental Concern. I promised to follow up with a personal visit to the area so I could report from first hand observation on actual damage and reparations.
My husband Dean and Ron Jones agreed to go along, and Steve Smith (Ridgecrest BLM) was kind enough to offer to personally escort us through the Corridor. We met at the Ridgecrest BLM office at 8:00 am on December 14, loaded our gear into a small Cheve S-10 4-wheel drive and proceeded up 395 to Big Pine and the entrance to Eureka Valley via the Big Pine -Death Valley Road.
After a short stop for lunch at the Eureka Sand Dunes, we headed south through the Saline - Eureka Vehicle corridor. It was early afternoon when we came to the narrow gorge, which was the beginning of the earlier dozer damage as well as the beginning of the reparations. Steve and Ron had good memories of how the road had been originally, and both were impressed with the results of the restoration.
The reparation work was obviously not that of amateurs. The road appeared to be naturally made, and there were very few signs of any original damage or repair. Large boulders had been moved back, gravel removed or redistributed, and the original washed rock bottom re-exposed, re-creating the narrow challenge to 4-wheelers who dare to risk their bottoms for some of the most exhilarating scenery in California.
After a close walking inspection of the gorge, we headed on up to Steel Pass, making a short side trip to Marble Bath, the site of a mix of early Indian and early miner petroglyphs. (One message was scratched into the wall along with an arrow pointing downward towards a tenaha which was filled in with deposit from the runoff of a million storms. The message told a hundred stories in one word: "WARTER.")
We proceeded down the long winding road to a point just opposite the White Cliffs where the petroglyphs referred to in my September report are located. It was nearly dark, and we made camp near the road.
We hiked up to the White Cliffs the next morning. The petroglyphs in. this canyon are some of the best I have seen. Deeply carved, they are easy to make out. The bird sketches were beautiful, almost majestic. We saw at least half a dozen panels with various figures, some familiar, some unique, and each one begging for more viewing time.
