Secret Knowledge of Water
The moon was just rising as we selected a campsite on the floor of the Chihuahuan desert near Cooke's Peak, on the horizon at right. We were 50 miles north of the border with Mexico. We started a campfire immediately as the temperature started to plummet into the low teens on one of the last evenings of December. The next morning we took a stroll in the hills above our campsite. We headed into this draw to see if there were any signs of water. We found bleached bones, and plenty of thorny mesquite and ocotillo shrubs. Then we dropped into a crease in the land, not yet warmed by the morning sun, and found isolated pools where running water had stripped off the topsoil, exposing bedrock. The miracle of water in the desert. Encouraged, the next day we decided to go looking for a cold water spring that was supposed to be in a drainage above Faywood Hot Springs. Running water appeared to be a rare event here. But the tops of tall cottonwood and willow trees, visible to us in the ...