April 3rd 2011

Sitting on the shore of Lake Mojave, I am surrounded by the sand and rock of a campsite beach. This completely artificial oasis is made possible by the large concrete dam built on the Colorado River about a quarter mile south of us. The beach is courtesy of the National Park Service. My party is joined by nearly a dozen other groups of RV’ers, mallards, wood duck, common grackle and a pair of geese. The mallards seem to have paired for the season, one male with his shimmering emerald cap, white collar, brown vest and slate belly; the female in brown. One pair has staken claim to the same small patch of beach on which I will be residing. They defend it fervently, the male going so far as to pursue other pairs in flight, banking and turning like a top gun dogfight. The grackles, small black and brown birds with yellow eyes and cumbersome folded tails privilege us with their enthusiastic, if not strange song. The wood duck, a solitary male has taken up following a pair of mallards like a third wheel on a first date. His unusual behavior does not overshadow his exquisite beauty however. He wears a great crest on his head and bright shades of green on his face, accented by streaks of piercing white. More noteworthy may even be his blood red eyes. The geese it would seem are locals well accustomed to humans. They go so far as to walk right up to the humans and murmur a low noise as if to beckon a hand out.

This beach lies on a small bay on the lake so we can see short outcropping of sandstone and white limestone speckled with flowering creosote. Up until now the creosote has been a scraggly bush with faint traces of green as it has pushed small leaves in bunches out the ends of its thin branches. However, the whole landscape is now full of bright yellow as each plant produces hundreds of tiny flowers.

Across the river lies Arizona, A gentle slope rises from the river up to a sudden and drastic change to a ridgeline dotted with mesas and precipices. The rock that hasn’t eroded away towers above the slope below creating a dragon’s tail like scene. The desert looks desolate from this distance.

As the sun sets behind me I watch my shadow grow longer, reaching farther out into the gently rippling water. The breeze is blowing down the river from the north bringing with it the pollen from a spring thrust to life and a calming sound as it rustles the leaves of the cottonwood tree I sit under.

In a setting such as this I can’t help but think of my home in the Appalachians. I yearn to be back in the rolling hills, covered by a fine mist, masked by a dense cover of oak and pine. I ache to hear the song birds as they travel through this time of year and smell the honeysuckle.

The sun is setting down behind the granite spires of Bridge Canyon Wilderness. The Sandstone of Arizona remains lit up, but the temperature begins to drop and the wind is picking up on my beach oasis. The smell of charcoal and the need to layer up reawakens me from my Smokies daydream. It would seem that setting up camp will take precedence over writing for the time being.