this land is your land.

In the squares of the city, in the shadow of the steeple
near the relief office, I’ve seen my people.
And some are grumblin’ and some are wonderin’
if this land’s still made for you and me.

– Woody Guthrie

It’s been raining in the desert.

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It started with clouds far off over the desert expanse, and then we had a midnight dash to cover our tents when the rain started coming down. The next morning, we watched the storms roll over the desert from a distance. The direction of the wind kept changing, and the powerful storms swirled and shifted around us.

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It rained for four days. It rained hard for two. We barely used our rain gear for 2,300 miles, but we needed it in the desert. We were walking and watching, counting seconds between distant bolts of lightening and the rolling thunder that followed.

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the old Thompson Springs hotel.

We paused over a small underpass to watch a storm the was crossing our path about 12 miles ahead. Suddenly, we saw a wall of dust rising across the desert, racing between small mounds of dirt toward us. The wind picked up and we took shelter. It came down from clouds unknown, driving in heavy sheets whipped hard and fast by the wind. The turbulent skies threw down pea-sized hail to pound us on the back as we walked.

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hail in the desert.

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After the storms passed, the muddy drainage paths overflowed with the tiny bits of ice and the sun lit up the towering rocks in the distance, reminding us of where we were in the world.

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we camped here.

As the sandy soil turned into an endless field of mud and rock, I could see the real driving force in how this landscape was formed. The rock faces and shapes of the eroded hills and rolling landscape tells the story of a lot of water once past. The rock is carved and worn down, and with the right kind of eyes it is easy to see the flow of water and sun and wind and time playing out right before your eyes. The fledgling canyons carving slowly through the landscape eroded noticeably from the few days of heavy rain. Without more vegetation to hold the soil in place, the entire state turns into one big drainage and the rain washes the earth down, down toward the ocean.

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Green River

We reached Green River on my birthday, and we restocked our food and water supplies before moving on. We met a fellow pilgrim at the local KOA campground – Rae is running across America, raising donations for Souls for Soles. She is running mostly barefoot, and we think that is insanely cool. We have been leapfrogging with Rae since Iowa, and it was a treat to finally meet her. Check her out, she’s doing a really amazing thing.

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Grace found some bones!

We now face 50-60 mile stretches between services, and we have a pretty good rhythm down for how to manage our resources. Rob is helping us every day with food prep and management, making sure we are getting quality nutrition during the most desolate stretches of this entire walk.

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Rob

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Every day, our surroundings change dramatically. Across the empty desert, mountains and plateaus and strange forms of rock stand monolithic in the distance. Although we move slowly, there is a great deal of magic to the experience of walking toward a massive something for days and days, and then looking over your shoulder and realizing that it’s fading away into the distance. Kait and I keep pointing and saying to each other, “Remember when we were walking toward that?”

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Down highway 24, we passed through Hanksville where we restocked once again. The road was quiet and the moon was full, and we decided to spend the afternoon catching up on laundry and showers, before heading out at sunset for a moonlight hike. Of course, the reflected light made an already surreal environment turn into a shadowy dreamworld, unimaginable and silent. We made camp late and hung out atop the tallest thing we could find, watching the moonlight play across the sand and sage and rocky sentinels that lined the road.

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meet me on top of that thing out there

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Grace watches everything.

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camping on the moon

In some desolate canyon, we stumbled across a well-maintained farm with fields of cut alfalfa, greenhouses, and a little storefront advertising cheese, bread, veggies, and other farm-fresh goods. We caught the owner, Randy, as he was pulling fresh-baked artisan breads and cinnamon rolls out of his wood-fired brick oven.

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Randy

Randy has been running the Mesa Farm for 18 years. He fed the barren soil, rotating goats and chickens on the rough pastures to nurse them back to health. Always, his goal is sustainability. Over coffee and goat’s milk yogurt smoothies, we dove right into a discussion of sustainability, conscious living, Hopi prophecies of the earth shaking, and all manner of existential dilemma facing the modern man. We love meeting people like Randy. He definitely inspired us, and I think we gave each other hope for the future.

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the view from Randy's kitchen.

This state is treating us very well. There aren’t a lot of opportunities for us to do our volunteer work (we have some coming up soon, though) but there is an infinite amount of time and space for deep, personal reflection. This is the part of the trip where we don’t have anything left to think about except the things we’ve been avoiding – the parts of ourselves that we don’t like. This is the time when we face our demons and decide how to work and learn and grow from this experience. It isn’t very fun, but it is important. It is probably the deepest, truest reason that we are out here anyway. If we want to make the world a better place, we have to start with ourselves.

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see also: Capitol Reef State Park.

And every night, we walk right off the side of the road and make camp in the most amazing places imaginable. Much of the land out here is owned by the Bureau of Land Management. Most BLM land is open for public use, without the “stay on the trails” restrictions of many state and national parks. It is an astounding realization that all of this land – millions of acres across the country – is open and waiting for people to use. There is a real energy to such a place, where you can climb on rocks and explore the bounty of this land to your heart’s desire. Sure, you need to bring your own water and give up your flushing toilet – but there is no substitute for the feeling of absolute freedom that nature can bring us.

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Castle Rock

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This is all waiting for you! It’s easy to find, and right in your backyard. Just get in your car and start driving – or walk out your front door – out to where the sky is endless and the rocks all melt their ancient, endless melt.

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