Mojave preserve offers views and plenty of Joshua trees

The world’s largest concentration of Joshua trees grows in the Mojave National Preserve. (DEBORAH WALL/SPECIAL TO VIEW)

By DEBORAH WALL
SPECIAL TO VIEW

Beckoning seductively to city dwellers who long for elbow room, the 1.6 million-acre Mojave National Preserve lies in Southern California, barely an hour’s drive south of Las Vegas. While it has fewer than a dozen developed hiking trails, some of those are great ones. Among the best is the Teutonia Peak Trail, which boasts spectacular views of the east Mojave and beyond.

The moderate 4-mile round-trip trail takes you up to a steep outcropping on Cima Dome, at an elevation of 5,755 feet. The first section of the trail passes through the largest concentrations of Joshua trees in the world. While you will be hiking on the geologically interesting dome itself, the dome is best viewed from afar to see its almost-perfect symmetry, rising 1,500 feet above the desert.

From the signed trailhead, which is at an elevation of about 5,030 feet, follow the abandoned gravel road toward the obvious granite outcropping to the southwest. The first part of the hike is fairly flat and easy, so children will enjoy it. But once you’re hiking up the outcropping, it becomes more strenuous and extremely rocky with uneven footing, unsuitable for small children.

In the first mile or so, you will be surrounded by Joshua trees, remarkably odd but beautiful members of the lily family, with twisted, scaly limbs bearing long leaves only at their tips. They look like the fanciful trees in some children’s book by Dr. Seuss. Joshuas usually grow at an elevation between 2,000 and 7,000 feet, in sandy soil on flat or rolling terrain, so the foot of Cima Dome is one of their favorite places. Some along this hike are more than 20 feet tall. Other vegetation here includes yucca, cholla, blackbrush and Mormon tea.

After about a mile, you will come across timbers and mine tailings, evidence of an old silver claim. Take a glance, but stay away, as many old mines in the Mojave Desert are notoriously dangerous. Leave it alone and continue toward the outcropping.

Once up on the outcropping, follow the faint path along the ridgeline as far as you feel comfortable. The actual summit is difficult to access without a lot of rock scrambling. Indeed, you won’t need to reach it to take in the best of the far-reaching views. To the west, you will see the cinder cones and lava beds, which are part of the Cinder Cone National Natural Landmark, designated in 1973, and within the confines of the park. A bit past that, if you look carefully, you can even make out the world’s largest thermometer in Baker, Calif. Beyond, you can see the outline of the San Bernardino and San Jacinto Mountains.

To the south, you can see the Kelso Sand Dunes, and to the north, you can see Clark Mountain, the highest peak in the park, at an elevation of 7,929 feet. Clark sits just north of Interstate 15 near Mountain Pass.

While you are in the park, take time to head over to the Kelso Depot Visitor Center. The Mission-Revival style former train station was built in 1924 by the Union Pacific. The restored depot building is now the park’s main visitor center and has wonderful displays on the early mining and ranching history of this area, as well as Chemehuevi and Mojave Indian tribes. While trains no longer stop here, they roll through about once an hour. It’s a thrill to watch them from the station platform, thundering past at what appears to be full speed. And it’s safe to do so because a sturdy fence protects onlookers without obstructing their view.

The depot is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Fridays through Tuesdays but closed Wednesdays and Thursdays. Its Beanery Lunch Counter is closed, so bring your own picnic supplies. There are picnic tables at the depot, but just about any location along one of the hundreds of side roads in the uncrowded preserve offers an inviting spot to spread a tablecloth. Gas is not available in the park, so before entering it, fill up in Primm or nearby Baker.

Deborah Wall is the author of “Great Hikes, A Cerca Country Guide” and “Base Camp Las Vegas: Hiking the Southwestern States,” published by Stephens Press. She can be reached at deborabus@aol.com.

Utah counties want to take the roads less traveled -- and keep them

The Island Park Road, which descends 17 miles through sagebrush and pinyon and juniper trees before ending on the banks of the Green River, is one of more than 12,000 roads Utah has claimed under R.S. 2477. (Photo by Phil Taylor.)

Phil Taylor
Greenwire

DINOSAUR NATIONAL MONUMENT, Utah -- A bullet-riddled sign in Utah's pinyon-juniper desert warns of a winding highway ahead.

It's a harbinger of the tortuous political and legal fight among Utah's counties, environmental groups and the Bureau of Land Management that could dramatically change management of the area's stark deserts, red rock canyons and backcountry lands.

Key witnesses say they remember Island Park Road being used by jeeps and trucks at least as far back as the 1950s for livestock operations, farming, fishing and other recreation.

That, according to an 1866 mining law, means management of the road rightfully belongs to Utah, not BLM or the National Park Service, over whose land the road crosses.

The 17-mile road, which winds past ranchlands and American Indian petroglyphs to a historical ranch along the Green River in Dinosaur National Monument, is one of more than 12,000 roads that Utah and its counties last year claimed as their own in federal district court.

Spanning about 36,000 miles, the road claims represent one of Utah's boldest bids yet to assert control over federal lands and, according to conservationists, the most serious threat to Utah's remaining wildlands.

Utah claims the roads at stake have been used for decades by hunters, cattle ranchers, mineral speculators and motorized vehicle enthusiasts, and have either been shut down or restricted, or are in danger of closure by the federal government.

"There will be economic benefits derived from these roads if they're kept open," said Anthony Rampton, Utah's assistant attorney general and lead litigation counsel for the roads lawsuits. "That benefit will come from ranching enterprises, oil and gas development, wind development, solar development, tourist income, hunting and fishing income."

But unlike similar campaigns by Utah to "take back" federal lands through eminent domain or by hamstringing federal law enforcement agents, the law appears to be on Utah's side in its road battle.

In March, Utah's Kane County claimed a major victory when a federal district judge awarded it rights of way over 12 of 15 roads it had claimed, four of which run through the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument (Greenwire, March 25). Some of those 89 miles also run through the Paria-Hackberry wilderness study area, which BLM recognized for its roadless characteristics and which environmentalists have eyed for future wilderness designation.

"Given the facts that we have and the law, we're going to be able to prove the vast majority of these roads," Rampton said of the state's Revised Statute 2477 claims, which are located in 22 of its 29 counties. "It shouldn't have been a surprise to anyone."

The ruling was a shot across the bow for conservationists who fear the road claims, if successful, would fragment Utah's best remaining backcountry, including scenic national parks and monuments. Solitude would be lost, invasive weeds would spread and archaeological sites would be exposed to looters, they say.

Conservationists have assembled a legal team of more than 25 attorneys from national and local law firms to work alongside federal attorneys against the state's claims.

Steve Bloch, conservation director for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, said a majority of Utah's road claims are primitive dirt tracks, not the "highways" that the 1866 law aimed to protect.

"The overwhelming majority of these routes simply noodle out into the desert," Bloch said.

The claims run through every national park except Bryce Canyon and Arches and through at least two designated wilderness areas and would fragment habitat for vehicle-skittish elk and sage grouse, according to SUWA.

The road claims also travel more than 500 miles of wilderness study areas, 2,000 miles of national monuments and 3,600 miles of proposed wilderness, SUWA said. Few of them lead to grocery stores or schools or promote commerce, Bloch said.

"They're really out to thwart congressional wilderness designation," he said. "That's why the stakes are so high in Utah."

Barring a settlement, the legal battle promises to be a costly one -- one rural county in southeast Utah has already spent $1 million litigating a single road in Canyonlands National Park -- and could easily last decades.

"If we can't resolve them ourselves amidst negotiation, we have no choice but to go to court," Utah Gov. Gary Herbert (R) said in an interview. "I'm not willing to continue to kick the can down the road and put off getting that answer."

If Utah prevails, experts say other Western states could follow suit, kicking off an even larger battle.

'Short, sweet and enigmatic'

Utah's road claims -- filed in several massive complaints in spring 2012 -- fall under an obscure 1866 mining law designed to promote settlement in the Western frontier.

"And be it further enacted," R.S. 2477 read, "that the right of way for the construction of highways over public lands, not reserved for public uses, is hereby granted."

The law was "short, sweet and enigmatic," according to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in a 2005 ruling.

The law was an opportunity for miners and homesteaders to build trails or roads over any public lands not yet reserved or claimed for private use. Most of the roads in the West were established under its authority.

As Utah's Supreme Court noted more than 80 years ago, "It was a standing offer of a free right of way over the public domain," which required no formal acceptance or approval by the federal authorities.

That all changed in 1976 when Congress repealed R.S. 2477 as part of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, a watershed law that directed BLM to retain and preserve its lands rather than dispose them for private development.

But Congress grandfathered any valid R.S. 2477 right that existed at the time.

As a result, counties seeking legal recognition of their R.S. 2477 claims must prove -- through historical records, photos or witness testimony -- that the roads were used as far back as the 1960s.

But witnesses who can testify to using the roads are getting old and dying, creating a sense of urgency for Utah counties.

"We've probably lost between half and three-quarters of our witnesses to death," Rampton said. "We're losing more every day."

The state is currently deposing hundreds of "at-risk" witnesses in courthouses, schools, county commission chambers, BLM offices and people's homes.

"'I killed my first buck here. We corralled cattle here,'" Rampton said. "That's the kind of detail we're able to get from these witnesses."

Last month alone, attorneys from the Justice Department, Utah and its counties, and SUWA visited Tooele, Garfield, Beaver, Grand and San Juan counties to take testimony from 10 witnesses.

Pete Steele, a 76-year-old witness from San Juan, testified for three days on roughly 100 roads. Steele, a former cattle rancher, tour guide, BLM employee and San Juan employee, said he used R.S. 2477 roads south of Canyonlands for livestock operations, hunting, predator control, hiking, and other recreation and traveling, according to his affidavit.

"When you spend time with the people who live and work on these roads and have lived there all their lives, you realize they are important, and they're important for intangible reasons," Rampton said. "For instance, there are a lot of hunters who use these roads. They have places they've gone all their lives. They've gone with their fathers and grandfathers and families. Traditions have built up around the use of these roads."

'The whole thing is a travesty'

But critics of Utah's claims say the vast majority of the roads are so-called Class D routes that have never been maintained and aren't critical to the state's transportation needs.

Many were created by off-roaders, oil and gas prospectors or wanderers who left the trodden path decades ago. In the arid desert, where plants and shrubs take hundreds of years to regrow, an improvised two-track can take centuries to fully restore itself.

"People argue about the meaning of the word 'highway,' but it's hard to imagine it means a random oil and gas seismic line from the '60s that hasn't been driven except once every five years," said Kevin Walker, a SUWA volunteer who lives in Moab and works for Microsoft. "To me that seems like abusing the law."

On a searing hot July day, Walker hunted for R.S. 2477 claims along Browns Hole Road, a dirt route that heads east from U.S. 191 toward the La Sal Mountains.

"See that faint line over there?" he asked, pointing to a strip of younger, lighter sagebrush that vanished into a hillside.

It was an oil and gas seismic line, one of thousands that were carved in the 1950s and '60s by prospectors who used dynamite to locate mineral deposits. San Juan County is claiming it under R.S. 2477.

"They were never planning on coming back," Walker said of the prospectors, who are said to have been paid by the mile. "Someone else comes along and sees the tire tracks and tries the road, even though there's nothing there."

Wearing a blue bucket hat, running shorts and sandals, Walker said he takes pride in finding the faintest R.S. 2477 claims. He mapped many of these routes decades ago while taking an inventory of roadless lands for the Utah Wilderness Coalition, of which SUWA is a member.

He said many of the counties' R.S. 2477 routes were even fainter when he first walked them 15 years ago. Since the lawsuits were filed, counties have systematically driven all the routes, he said.

"When the counties claim they need these roads, it's disingenuous and demonstrably false," he said. "What they really want is to control the land."

Once an R.S. 2477 claim is granted, BLM has almost no way to close them down, even if it needs to preserve them for wildlife or quiet recreation. It effectively precludes future wilderness.

"These are federal lands, and the federal government should be able to manage them in a rational way and not encumbered by this loophole in a very ancient law," Walker said. "To me, the whole thing is a travesty."

A handful of other R.S. 2477 road claims spur haphazardly from the Browns Hole Road. One of them narrows into a rocky trough before petering out into the juniper and pinyon flats.

In the late 1990s, Grand County decided to increase the miles of Class B roads in its system to prevent a reduction in state subsidies for road maintenance, Walker said. It unilaterally bladed minor roads and unmaintained jeep trails, he said, but "BLM didn't have the guts to stand up to them."

Several miles south of here, the R.S. 2477 battle is playing out at Hatch Point, a sagebrush plateau coveted by oil and gas and potash developers as well as SUWA and the Sierra Club, which have proposed including the land in a 1.4-million-acre Greater Canyonlands National Monument.

A 22-mile paved road takes visitors to the Needles Overlook, which offers miles of stunning views over labyrinth red rock canyons underneath Canyonlands park.

Hatch Point has plenty of dirt roads, though the area's dense brush, rock buttes and spires make them hard to see. San Juan has staked dozens of R.S. 2477 claims here.

One of them leads to a dried-up stock pond and a field of invasive cheatgrass and Russian thistle. It fades a couple of hundred yards into the desert before disappearing.

"It just goes out here and dies," said Liz Thomas, an attorney for SUWA. "It doesn't circle back. It wasn't intended to go anywhere."

Court-awarded road claims would make the area an easier target for mineral development and potentially a weaker candidate for a national monument.

'A wasting kind of witness'

Roads support San Juan's mineral economy -- oil, gas and mining account for 60 percent of its tax base -- but they also preserve recreation, said John Fellmeth, who helps run the county's roads preservation project.

San Juan claimed roughly 1,800 roads in its R.S. 2477 lawsuit, even though some have never been driven by county officials.

"It looks like there might be a nice overlook," Fellmeth said, pointing to a narrow rust-colored dirt path at Hatch Point.

He was joined by Nick Sandberg, the county's public lands coordinator who previously worked more than 30 years at BLM's Monticello field office, which oversees Hatch Point.

Neither was sure where the road went or what it was used for.

It likely provided access for livestock growers, Sandberg said, pointing to a salt block on the side of the road that may have nourished cows or sheep.

The road ended at the plateau's edge, where a dirt clearing offered sweeping views of Heart Canyon nearly a thousand feet below and the "six shooter" pinnacle -- a sandstone spire named by early cowboys for its resemblance to pistols. The jagged rocks of Canyonlands could be seen in the distance.

The road certainly led somewhere, though whether it is a "highway" is a matter of dispute that will be decided by a federal judge.

Fellmeth said there are about 80 "at-risk" witnesses in San Juan. Some testify on as many as 60 roads in a day, he said.

"Most of them are fairly old, and even those who are still with us, their mental faculties are deteriorating quite dramatically," he said. "It's a wasting kind of witness."

Critics have questioned whether witnesses in their 70s or 80s could accurately identify the roads they used when Lyndon Johnson was president.

Before they testify, witnesses are driven on the roads by the state's attorneys to "refresh their recollection," said Bloch, the attorney from SUWA.

Courts will have to wrestle with issues of credibility, as they do with all trials.

From the Needles Overlook at Hatch Point, Fellmeth pointed to an airstrip about a thousand feet below that may have been used to transport oil and gas equipment to the Lockhart Basin.

Visual clues like that can help orient R.S. 2477 witnesses, Fellmeth said.

However, they can also be deceiving. Less than a mile away is a similar airstrip with similar red rock surroundings.

'We have a high card'

County officials in Utah see R.S. 2477 as a potent defense against the president's use of the Antiquities Act to designate national monuments.

The 1906 law is controversial in Utah, where President Clinton designated the 1.9-million-acre Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in 1996 over the objections of local officials. Monuments bar future mineral claims.

R.S. 2477 adds another twist to Utah's political mine field.

"It just gives the counties an extra card to play that they haven't had in the past," said Lynn Jackson, a councilman for Grand County, whose economy depends heavily on mountain bikers, off-highway vehicle riders and national park visitors.

"We know we have a high card," Jackson said. "For now, we're just going to tuck it up our sleeve, and if we need it, we'll play it."

Utah counties were politically emboldened by Kane County's R.S. 2477 victory, Jackson said. Grand and five other counties are currently negotiating with conservationists and other stakeholders on a major public lands bill.

"SUWA is concerned," Jackson said. "If we take all these 12,000 segments, they're saying 'Holy crap, we're likely to lose all that ... maybe we should negotiate.'"

Jackson, who formerly worked for BLM for 32 years, opposes the proposed Canyonlands National Monument, which he argued would hamper oil and gas and potash development in Grand, stifling economic diversification.

On a recent drive through the butte-marked desert lands northwest of Moab, Jackson pointed to a sandy, riparian wash passable only by motorcycles that descends to an overlook above the Green River.

The path, an R.S. 2477 claim, was kept open in BLM's travel management plan, even though conservationists wanted it closed, Jackson said. The county believes it should have the final say over who uses the road.

"That's a huge draw to the motorized recreation economy," he said. "They're the ones who spend the most money around here."

A spreading fight?

Litigating all of Utah's R.S. 2477 roads to the 10th Circuit could take well over a decade and cost billions of dollars.

"Obviously it's kind of insane to try to litigate 12,000 roads," said one top Interior official who asked not to be named. The first Kane County case, which involved 15 roads, took nine days of trial and field trips, the official said.

The hope is that as cases are decided at the appellate court level, parties will have a better foundation for settlement talks.

Since March, a handful of cases in Garfield, Kane, Emery and San Juan counties have been active. Meanwhile, the state is continuing to depose its old and infirm witnesses in case the rest of the roughly 20 cases become active.

While conservationists have criticized the state's lawsuits as a waste of taxpayer money, the R.S. 2477 campaign is widely supported in the Utah Legislature, where lawmakers earlier this year passed a special appropriation to compensate counties for legal services from outside firms including Holland & Hart. The firm is estimated to have provided at least $1.8 million in services to Kane County alone, The Salt Lake Tribune reported in March, citing former BLM Director and Utah public lands official Kathleen Clarke.

Under the plan, the state would pay for half of the first $700,000 in legal bills a county incurs and would pay the majority of bills beyond that.

Conservationists are skeptical whether the federal government will adequately represent their interests.

According to SUWA's Bloch, conservation groups have twice as many attorneys working on R.S. 2477 cases than the Justice Department. Pro bono work is being provided by law firms Kirkland & Ellis LLP, Cooley LLP and Jenner & Block LLP, he said. There are also two local Salt Lake City firms, former Earthjustice attorney Robert Wiygul, and SUWA and Wilderness Society attorneys working on the cases.

The federal government's appeal of the Kane County case to the 10th Circuit was heartening, Bloch said.

Utah counties have lost some notable R.S. 2477 cases too.

For example, a federal district judge in 2011 rejected San Juan County's claim that several miles of Salt Creek Canyon in Canyonlands National Park was an R.S. 2477 route. "A jeep trail on a creek bed, with its shifting sand and intermittent floods is a by-way, but not a highway," wrote U.S. District Judge Bruce Jenkins (Land Letter, June 2, 2011).

San Juan and Utah appealed the case to the 10th Circuit, which could issue a decision any day.

Utah's R.S. 2477 claims are being closely watched by environmental attorneys as well as other Western states looking to loosen Washington, D.C.'s reins over public lands.

The Vermont Law School included Utah's road claims in its "Top 10 Environmental Watch List 2013," warning that if federal courts affirm even a fraction of the state's claims, it could set off a cascade of threats to national parks, wilderness study areas, monuments and other protected lands across the West.

"Other western states are likely watching Utah's land grab, waiting to see what the federal courts will do with these 26 claims," wrote Hillary Hoffmann, a professor at the law school, and student Sara Imperiale.

Alaska has already earmarked money to study potential R.S. 2477 claims, and Nevada, the birthplace of the Sagebrush Rebellion, would jump on the R.S. 2477 "bandwagon" if Utah prevails in its lawsuits, Hoffmann and Imperiale said.

Attempts to settle

The ongoing litigation has created a great deal of uncertainty on all sides, including BLM, said Robert Keiter, a professor of public lands for the University of Utah who serves on the board of the National Parks Conservation Association, which has criticized the state's road claims.

"That impacts the BLM's ability to make long-term land and resource management decisions wherever these claims are being pressed," he said.

The road claims also complicate a broader effort by Utah GOP Rep. Rob Bishop to pass a comprehensive public lands bill for six eastern Utah counties -- Uintah, Emery, Carbon, Grand, Wayne and San Juan -- that would consolidate lands for oil and gas, potash and mining development while designating others for off-highway vehicles, mountain bikes and wilderness.

Bishop said conservation groups he is working with -- which include SUWA, the Wilderness Society, the Pew Charitable Trusts, the Sierra Club and the Nature Conservancy -- have "legitimate concerns" that future road claims could tarnish wilderness designations, which, by definition, aim to keep the lands "untrammeled by man."

Scott Groene, executive director of SUWA, said Washington County in 2009 agreed to have wilderness designations under legislation passed by former Sen. Bob Bennett (R-Utah) but has since filed R.S. 2477 claims in those areas.

"Utah's 20-plus lawsuits against the United States over R.S. 2477 may be the biggest hurdle to overcome in trying to reach agreement here," Groene said. "Fortunately, Congressman Bishop has said he believes the R.S. 2477 issue should be resolved as part of this legislation. We are in agreement with him on this point."

Last month, the various sides reached a rare accord to amicably resolve a handful of the disputed road claims in remote mountains west of Salt Lake City.

BLM, Utah, Juab County and environmental groups announced a settlement designed to balance the protection of primitive lands in the Deep Creek Mountains wilderness study area with access for motorized vehicle users (Greenwire, Aug. 20).

It marked the first negotiated settlement in Utah's larger bid over the R.S. 2477 claims.

Congress has tried unsuccessfully a handful of times to address the conflict.

Bills by then-Rep. Mark Udall (D-Colo.) nearly a decade ago sought to narrow the definition of R.S. 2477 rights of ways. Bills by Rep. Steve Pearce (R-N.M.) in 2006 and 2007 would have given states and counties more influence in the process. But lawmakers have done little since then.

Some observers are hopeful Bishop can resolve some claims in eastern Utah.

"There's an opportunity for some, if not all, of those roads to be addressed as a result of this legislative process," said Cody Stewart, an energy adviser for Herbert and former Bishop aide. "It may be one of the negotiated pieces that helps bring this across the finish line."

Off-roaders and Marines in contention for rugged desert

The Corps wants to expand its Twentynine Palms base for major combat exercises, but civilians fear the loss of a popular recreational area.

Off-road vehicles stir up dust in Johnson Valley, where the Marine Corps wants to extend its Twentynine Palms base to accommodate major combat exercises. (John Herrick/CRAWL Magazine)

By Tony Perry
Los Angeles Times

Reporting from Twentynine Palms — Rough and rocky, Johnson Valley is considered the perfect place to test the mettle of men and their machines.

An estimated 200,000 people a year flock to the desert valley for recreational pursuits: hiking, camping, rock-hounding, star-gazing and a new sport called "geocaching," a treasure hunt using GPS technology. Moviemakers use the desert floor for chase scenes.

But the valley has gained its greatest acclaim in recent years as an untamed, unregulated venue for off-road vehicles. Off-roaders take their Jeeps, motorcycles, dune buggies, ATVs, "rock crawlers" and other souped-up vehicles over, around and through the rills and hills and rocks.

The annual King of the Hammers race, billed as the toughest desert race in the nation, draws more than 20,000 participants and spectators.

"There's not another place in the country where we could hold our race," said Dave Cole, one of the race organizers. "This is our Daytona 500."

The Marine Corps, whose Twentynine Palms base is directly adjacent to Johnson Valley, also likes the valley's challenging terrain — for similar yet different reasons.

The Marine Corps would like to include the land inside the boundaries of its Air-Ground Combat Center as a training area for large-scale, live-fire exercises where three battalions could simultaneously practice assaulting a fixed location. The land is controlled by the federal Bureau of Land Management.

Johnson Valley would give the Marine Corps a large-scale training capability it lacks at any of its bases, according to Marine brass. Even in a budget-tightening season when other projects are being dropped or trimmed, the Marine Corps has allocated $60 million for the expansion project.

Gen. James Amos, the commandant, considers the expansion "absolutely essential to providing the requisite training area for preparing Marines to meet the challenges of the future security environment."

The off-roaders look at the valley and see an exciting, irreplaceable place for their sport. Amos looks at the valley and sees a place to provide training that will enhance the "survivability" of Marines in combat.

The off-roaders and the merchants who depend on all the recreationalists are not going down without a fight. When the Marines opened up their expansion proposal for public review in May, more than 25,000 responses were received.

The Marines have offered a compromise: the heart of the Johnson Valley racing area would be available 10 months a year and closed for two months when a major exercise is planned.

But expansion skeptics feel that the dual-use idea would be withdrawn as soon as the first civilian wanders innocently or defiantly into the midst of Marine training or is hurt by ordnance left when the training is over.

The dispute features two sides that, philosophically, are aligned. Both believe in living life on the edge, facing down danger in the desert.

The Marine Corps sent a color guard to this year's King of the Hammers. Off-duty Marines have their own desert racing team. And expansion opponents, many of them military veterans, feel a twinge at opposing the Marines during a time of war.

"It's going to have a devastating effect on recreation," said Ray Pessa, a Yucca Valley activist. "National defense comes first, and if they say they need it, so be it. But I'm not sure they've looked at all the alternatives."

The Marines agree there are other expansion alternatives on the eastern and southern edges of the base but insist that none is as good as Johnson Valley on the west.

The final environmental impact statement is set for completion in early January. The Department of Navy's decision on which, if any, alternative to select is scheduled for April, in time for the issue to be sent to Congress for inclusion in the defense appropriations bill.

Beyond the effect on off-roaders and business owners, Betty Munson, with the Johnson Valley Improvement Assn., sees a loss of the freedom that lures people to the austere and often blisteringly hot desert.

"Johnson Valley is all that is left of the California desert where you can travel without any restrictions, go camping without a fee, go anywhere, any time," Munson said. "There's a lot of freedom out there that people won't have anymore."

Ninety percent of Marines deploying to Afghanistan come to the Twentynine Palms base for live-fire and other training called Mojave Viper. A re-created Afghan village has 1,500 buildings and is populated by up to 1,000 Afghan "role players." Marines are also taught to detect and dodge roadside bombs, the Taliban weapon of choice. Training is continuously tweaked to include lessons learned from the battlefield.

But what the base lacks is space to have three battalions converging on an "enemy" location.

Although the Twentynine Palms base is sprawling — 600,000 acres, compared to 125,000 acres at Camp Pendleton — there are various impediments to having a simultaneous live-fire exercise involving three battalions on the move. Among those impediments are federally protected tortoises.

The tortoise issue annoys the off-roaders. If there were more tortoises in Johnson Valley, that would probably kill the idea of annexing it to the base, said Cole, who loves Johnson Valley so much that he was married on one of its promontories.

"If I was having a tortoise race, that would be seen as valuable," said Cole. "But I'm having a people race, and that's not seen as valuable."

The Marine Corps has been studying expansion of Twentynine Palms for nearly a decade, with each study coming to much the same conclusion: Johnson Valley is the best alternative.

Under the Marine Corps' preferred alternative plan, 108,530 acres of Johnson Valley would be permanently closed to the public. An additional 38,137 acres would be open 10 months a year.

Although the issue involves federally managed land, members of California's Off-Highway Motor Vehicle Recreation Commission toured Johnson Valley in late May and, after hearing testimony from all sides, sent a letter to the Marine Corps saying it could not support the expansion plan.

Commission members suggested that the Marines look at sharing one of the spacious bases in California or Nevada belonging to other branches of the military, possibly the Army's Ft. Irwin, the Navy's China Lake, or Edwards Air Force Base. The Marines say that such an agreement would be overly expensive and impractical for a variety of reasons.

Daphne Greene, deputy director of California State Parks, said the Marines are to be complimented for seeking off-roaders' opinions and looking for a compromise. But the inclusion of Johnson Valley in the expansion plan would be too great a loss of a natural asset that Californians have long enjoyed, she said.

"We wouldn't let the Marines take over Yosemite," Greene said.

Rain too late for wildflowers

BY JOHN VAUGHN, BAJO EL SOL EDITOR
Yuma Sun

You may have been hoping that this week's forecasted rains would produce a bounty of colorful wildflowers in the Yuma area this spring.

But, alas, you'll have to wait until at least a year from now.

The rain will no doubt benefit the area's native trees and cactuses, say U.S. Bureau of Land Management officials. But it comes too late for the wildflowers that, in wetter years, blanket the desert and even pockets of Yuma in hues of purple, pink, yellow and white.

"We have to have rain in the fall and early winter to germinate the (wildflower) seeds, and it's been drought conditions," said Lori Cook, spokeswoman for the BLM's Yuma Field Office.

Rain is forecast in the area Wednesday and Thursday as a Pacific storm moves from California into Arizona.

Wildflower seeds stored in the soil begin germinating in the fall and need periodic rain from then through winter to blossom early in the new year, said Karen Reichhardt, a BLM botanist in Yuma.

"It's just like if you plant a garden. You have to water pretty regularly for the plants to grow."

In wet years, commonly seen wildflowers in the desert and in Yuma include the desert sand verbena, a low-growing plant with small lavender flowers; the desert sunflower, sporting large white flowers; and dune primrose, a tall purplish grass that grows in bunches at roadside and in disturbed soil.

In early 2009, the Yuma area had a good season for wildflowers on the heels of a wet winter that included heavy rains over the previous Thanksgiving holiday.

But this week's rain is not all wasted. Cook said it will benefit the area's native mesquite, cottonwood, willow and ironwood trees as well cactuses.

"They'll take it anytime they can get it."

And in the short term, she added, the rain will forestall dry conditions that can lead to wildland fires, which are not uncommon in Yuma County even in January and February.

Reichhardt said hikers and other outdoor enthusiasts who venture into the desert in the weeks and months ahead will still be able to see color. In bloom will be the area's hummingbird bushes, also know as chuparorsas; brittle bushes, palo verde and ironwood trees and cactuses.

"We just won't have the carpets of wildflowers."

Remains May Be Tourists Missing 13 Years

Bones Found in Death Valley May Be From German Party Whose Abandoned Van Was Found in 1996

Egbert Rimkus, Georg Weber and Cornelia Meyer, three members of a party of German tourists who disappeared in Death Valley 13 years ago, their van found with three flat tires on a remote road with most of their possessions gone. Two hikers discovered bones that may belong to the missing party on Thursday Nov. 12, 2009, police said. (AP/Inyo County Sheriff/NPS)

Associated Press

DEATH VALLEY NATIONAL PARK, Calif. Skeletal remains found in Death Valley may belong to one or more of the four German tourists who vanished in searing summer heat 13 years ago, authorities said Friday.

Two hikers discovered the bones Thursday in a remote area of the famous Mojave Desert park. The hikers were search-and-rescue workers from Riverside County but they were off duty at the time, Inyo County sheriff's spokeswoman Carma Roper said.

Identification for one of the missing tourists was found near the bones, she said.

"We're fairly certain" that the remains are those of one or more of the long-missing visitors, Roper said. However, formally identifying the remains will be a long process, she said. The cause of death also must be determined.

"At this point, it's being handled like a criminal investigation ... but there is no evidence of foul play at this point," Roper said.

The remains were found southeast of Goler Wash, a rugged area accessible only by 4-wheel-drive vehicles. The area is several miles south of the spot where an abandoned minivan the tourists had rented was found months after they were reported missing.

Roper said it would be a relief to solve a mystery that stretches back to 1996.

"I know a lot of people have invested a lot of their time and energy and emotions into concluding the case," she said.

The park near the Nevada border is considered the hottest and driest location in North America.

The four who vanished in the 3-million-acre wilderness on July 22, 1996, were Dresden residents Cornelia Meyer, 27; her 4-year-old son, Max; her boyfriend, architect Egbert Rimkus, 34, and his 10-year-old son, Georg Weber.

They had arrived in the United States earlier in the month and were touring in a Plymouth Voyager minivan rented in Los Angeles.

They checked out of a Las Vegas hotel room on July 22 and arrived in Death Valley the same day, records indicated.

Temperatures in the park that week had topped 120 degrees.

The visitors bought an information booklet at the visitor center and then apparently stayed overnight in the park and the next day took a dirt road into a remote area.

An entry in German and dated July 23, 1996, was left in a guest book kept in a box on a metal pole in an abandoned mining camp. It indicated the visitors were going through "the pass" - possibly a reference to Mengel Pass, a dirt trail that crosses the barren Panamint Range, a barren mountain range on the park's southwestern border.

The entry was signed "Conny, Egbert, Georg, Max."

They weren't heard from again.

On Oct. 23, the locked van was found mired in sand in a ravine off roadless Anvil Spring Canyon, amid rolling hills at an elevation of 3,000 feet and far from usual tourist routes. Three tires were shredded and one had come loose from the rim.

Searchers found a beer bottle a quarter-mile away that appeared to have come from a package found in the van.

Inside the van were rolls of exposed photo film, sleeping bags, empty gallon water containers, the Death Valley information booklet and an American flag apparently taken from a stone cabin in Butte Valley, five miles away.

No tracks that could have been made by the missing tourists were found. No passports or personal effects such as keys, a purse or wallet were found.

A team of 45 searchers, eight horses and four helicopters from California and Nevada law enforcement agencies combed the area but found nothing more.

Bones may solve mystery of missing Death Valley tourists

Rental van was found with four flat tires, but searchers never located four German visitors who disappeared in 1996.

By Teresa Watanabe
Los Angeles Times

A 13-year-old mystery involving the disappearance of four German tourists in the sweltering desert of Death Valley may have ended Friday, when authorities announced that bones that may be their skeletal remains had been found.

In a statement, Inyo County Undersheriff Jim Jones said that personal identification belonging to one of the tourists was found near the skeletal remains, which were discovered by two hikers Thursday in a remote area of Death Valley National Park.

The four tourists -- Cornelia Meyer, 28; her 4-year-old son, Max; Egbert Rimkus, 33; and his son, Georg Weber, 10 vanished in July 1996, when temperatures at the park reached 115 degrees. The Dresden residents had been touring the Southwest and had not been seen since signing a visitor register at the Warm Springs area at the southwestern end of the park.

Three months after disappearing, their dark green minivan, which was rented at Los Angeles International Airport, was found in Anvil Spring Canyon. All four tires were flat and tire tracks indicated that the group had driven on shredded tires and bent wheels for about two miles, authorities said then.

Only a beer can and other debris were found near the van.

Although no foul play is suspected, Inyo County sheriff's spokeswoman Carma Roper told the Associated Press that the discovery was being handled as a criminal investigation.

She added that it would take a long time to formally identify the remains and determine the cause of death.

Authorities have searched throughout the years but failed to undercover any further evidence until this week.

Hikers keep standing date with Coachella Valley's desert

The Santa Rosa & San Jacinto Mountains National Monument features scenic views such as this one. The scenic national-monument area can become the backdrop for exploring the desert. Ramon Mena Owens / The Press-Enterprise

Slideshow

By STEVE MOORE
The Press-Enterprise

PALM DESERT - At 6 a.m., a half-dozen people gather at the Santa Rosa & San Jacinto Mountains National Monument before heading into the craggy mountains overlooking the Coachella Valley.

The Thursday Morning Hikes program attracts the adventurous and the fitness-minded.

They rise early for three- or four-mile hikes -- even in the dead of summer.

The program runs year-round so those who can't stand the heat can take the many winter hikes.

The scenic national-monument area becomes the backdrop for exploring the desert. The federally designated lands cover 272,000 acres, from the floor of the Coachella Valley to the surrounding mountains, including forests at more than 10,500 feet.

On a recent Thursday, two groups set out.

One explored the Randall Henderson Loop Trail, an almost three-mile hike with a fairly gradual 200- to 300-foot gain in elevation.

Other hikers, led by volunteer Drew Leander, covered the Art Smith Trail. It includes some strenuous uphill sections and a rise of about 500 feet in elevation over a four-mile trek.

"This is the most dangerous part of the journey," Leander joked, waving his group across blacktopped Highway 74, just below two blind curves.

Before the outing ended, the hikers saw a rattlesnake snuggling up for warmth against some rocks. They spied blooming spiny, green ocotillos arching skyward after summer rains. One guide spotted a rare desert tortoise. Trudging through the humidity, the hikers flicked at gnats buzzing around their eyes and ears.

During the winter, Thursday Morning Hikes attract 40 to 75 people and require the help of four to six guides.

"Many living in the desert are exercise-oriented," Leander said. "They are very outdoorsy.

"That's why they're here. They're curious, but many wouldn't do this on their own," he said.

"We try to instill a little confidence that they can -- with proper safety precautions," Leander added. "The trails are wide open, free to the public, and we have maps."

As the hikers made their way along the winding Art Smith Trail heading toward its junction with the Hopalong Cassidy Trail, sweat glistened on the back of their necks.

Year-round hiker Diane Kahan, 61, of Indian Wells, had come prepared.

She donned an Australian mosquito net that covered her entire face and drank a few quarts of water before setting out.

She'd brought sunscreen, a whistle -- three short blasts if you're in trouble -- and cold water tucked away in a fanny pack that has a long tube to suck on for a drink.

"My family thinks I'm crazy," she said, when asked about hiking during summer. "But it's a good workout, and the guides are very knowledgeable."

Leander stopped at the junction of the Art Smith and Randall Henderson trails so hikers could rest.

Along the way, he pointed out yellow flowers on brittlebush, barrel cactus, agave, cholla cactus, mesquite and the Little San Bernardino Mountains and Indio Hills. From a rocky perch, hikers peered into the ultraprivate Big Horn development and golf course, where multi-million homes and fairways spread across what was once virgin desert.

Spotting a rattlesnake, the guide said, "He's sleeping and not warm enough yet. That's the trouble with being cold-blooded. He knows we're here and doesn't like it."

The rattler's black tongue slowly flicked out.

"We'll leave him alone to wake up," the guide said.

When many have fled the desert, some summer tourists settle into their hotels and go for a hike.

Dave Heatherington, 61, of Vancouver, British Columbia, flipped through a visitor's guide and saw the nature getaway: "Thursday Morning Hikes."

Heatherington, who has hiked the Grand Canyon, carried water, macadamia-nut cookies, a sandwich and first-aid supplies in his backpack.

"It's all good," he said, a hat shading his face slightly. "I like getting out and meeting new people."

Getting Connected

Hikes and presentations are scheduled through the rest of the year and in 2009.

"The Top Ten Scary Desert Creatures," "Happy Tails Doggie Adventure Hike," "Desert Survivors Nature Walk," "History of Conservation in the Coachella Valley," "Ready, Set, Find!: Geocaching in the National Monument," Cactus Spring Hike and "Are You Smarter Than a Raven?" are just a few.

Information: 760-862-9984 (9 a.m. to 4 p.m. seven days a week); Web site: www.desertmountains.org

Scott Segal is director of programs for Friends of the Desert Mountains at the National Monument Visitor Center.

Year-round, he watches hikers return from encountering a desert many only see in brochures.

"In essence, they feel a sense of connection with their national treasures," he said.

"They become connected with the geology and geography, the plants and the animals, and they learn about the culture of the native Cahuilla people."

Hikers missing in Grand Canyon flooding found

By CHRIS KAHN
Associated Press




A stranded rafter is lowered to shore after being short hauled across the Colorado River Sunday Aug. 17, 2008 in the Grand Canyon. An earthen dam broke near the Grand Canyon early Sunday after heavy rains that forced officials to pluck hundreds of residents and campers from the gorge by helicopter. (AP Photo/National Park Service)


PHOENIX — Rescue crews have located a handful of hikers who were missing after flooding struck a remote part of the Grand Canyon, authorities said today.

The 11 people from two families were tracked down in the canyon on Monday, Coconino County Sheriff's Department spokesman Gerry Blair said. They were the last to be accounted for after creeks overflowing with runoff from severe thunderstorms washed away trails during the weekend, stranding dozens of tourists.

"We have met them, and they're OK," Blair said.

Authorities were receiving more calls from people who believe their loved ones may still be in the canyon, Blair said. But everyone who followed the rules and signed in at the bottom of the trail into the remote area had been evacuated.

Rescue crews checked the hiking trails and surrounding gorges by helicopter and foot again today, and crews will do a more comprehensive ground search when the flood waters recede in a few days, Blair said.

Helicopters ferried about 255 people out of the canyon Sunday and Monday from the Havasupai Tribe's village of Supai, a remote community near the bottom of the canyon in an area west of Grand Canyon National Park headquarters. Many of the stranded tourists made their way to Supai before catching a helicopter ride to the rim.

Thunderstorms dumped 3 to 6 inches of rain on the entire region Friday and Saturday and about 2 inches more on Sunday. The storms sent a rush of water through parts of the canyon, uprooting trees and washing out trails and footbridges.

Mimi Mills, 42, of Nevada City, Calif., was stranded with 15 other river runners Saturday afternoon after a flash flood washed away their rafts. Mills said the group took shelter overnight under an overhang, but had to scramble up a cliff when another flash flood occurred in the middle of the night.

The Havasupai tribe is one of the smaller Indian communities in Arizona with some 679 members, according to Bureau of Indian Affairs estimates from 2003, the latest statistics available.

The tribe's Supai village sits in a region that's popular for hikers and river runners, with towering blue-green waterfalls. About 400 people live there year-round.

Search For Missing MNP Hiker Suspended

Mojave National Preserve
National Park News

On the evening of Sunday, June 8th, the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department received a 911 call reporting an overdue 67-year-old hiker from the Philippines who had last been seen by her hiking companion at Fort Piute on the evening of June 7th.

Rangers and deputies interviewed the reporting party, then conducted a hasty search of Piute Canyon with ground teams and an infrared-vision-equipped helicopter. She was not found.

An interagency search was conducted through Friday, June 13th, with up to 50 searchers employed each day. Also employed in the effort were helicopters and as many as six search dogs. The canyon is steep and narrow, with ledges and rugged terrain, and daytime temperatures were over 100 degrees, although there is water in the canyon.

The search has been suspended, but the investigation continues.

New trail map shows the way in wilderness

By STEVE MOORE
The Press-Enterprise



PALM DESERT - It's the wilderness at your fingertips.

A big, new foldout map pinpointing more than 75 trails in the Santa Rosa and San Jacinto Mountains National Monument spotlights desert hikes and alpine forest treks.

It's all part of the national monument's Celebration of Trails campaign.

The $8.95 map is now available exclusively at the visitor center, 51-500 Highway 74, about four miles south of downtown Palm Desert. Information: 760-862-9984.

"It's a giant undertaking, involving hundreds of miles of trails," said Buford Crites, vice president of The Friends of the Desert Mountains, one of several groups and agencies involved. "This map will encourage hiking and make it more likely that people will come back safely."

The 36-inch by nearly 39-inch map -- unveiled about a week and a half ago -- brings it all together.

In all, 10,000 maps were produced at a cost of about $40,000 -- plus a lot of donated time and labor, Crites said.

In the past, hikers often stopped into the national monument's visitor center and thumbed through a raft of maps -- U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, Automobile Club of Southern California, Desert Riders, Palm Desert's foldout trail map, hiking guides such as "140 Great Hikes in and Near Palm Springs" by Philip Ferranti and Pacific Crest Trail books.

At times, visitor center staff would even walk hikers out to a nearby trailhead or draw a diagram, volunteer Deborah Stone said.

But things are much easier now.

At the visitor center, people just reach for the Santa Rosa & San Jacinto Mountains National Monument Trail Map.

Three years in the making, the new map became a collaborative effort by the Friends, Coachella Valley Mountains Conservancy, The Wilderness Society, Tahquitz Group of the Sierra Club, Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians, Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Forest Service, California State Parks, Southern California Edison Co., city of Palm Desert and Palm Springs Life.

It wasn't all high-tech and GPS.

Crites said the desert and mountain trails were also hiked as a way of ensuring exact locations. Then, people got in a room and pored over GPS data and their own observations.

"The next time that I look at a map, I'm going to have a significantly broader appreciation of the process that goes into it," Crites said.

The new map is water-resistant -- something that will come in handy in the wilderness.

It includes a key listing trails by geographic area and gives their length, change in elevation and relative difficulty -- "easy, moderate, strenuous."

For Palm Desert/Rancho Mirage -- where several trails converge -- there's a blow-up box breaking out popular trails such as Bump & Grind, Hopalong Cassidy, Herb Jeffries and Gabby Hayes.

"A lot of people can find their way down El Paseo (a shopping street) much more quickly than the Art Smith or Hopalong Cassidy trail," Crites said. "But there's enormous interest by both residents and tourists in getting off the landscaped portion of our valley and out into the country and looking at our desert."

The national monument covers 272,000 acres, stretching from the desert floor of the Coachella Valley to the surrounding mountains, including forests at more than 10,500 feet.

In 2000, local conservationists and community leaders worked with Rep. Mary Bono Mack, R-Palm Springs, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., in passing legislation recognizing the vast wilderness area.