Greetings from Vern Whitaker Horse Camp



 
 

Warning!  The flowers are coming!  So says prognosticator Paul Johnson,
who is calling the peak for the third week of February.  The Desert Sand Verbena are already
starting to bloom along the horse camp road.  The Dune Evening Primrose are not far behind.                                                   ...............

That full ¨perigee¨ moon over Anza Borrego last month was bright enough to ride Coyote Canyon
blindfolded at midnight.  If they still ran wild cattle in the canyon,
those old cowboys could have roped unbranded steers at 3 a.m.   In the past they did exactly that... under
a ¨wolf¨ moon, as the Indians called it.   Those vacas are long gone, however,
just like those old vaqueros, such as Lester Reed and Carlos Moreno, who gave Monkey Hill its name.
 
Speaking of Lester Reed, his little book, Old Time Cattlemen and other Pioneers of the Anza-Borrego Area,
should be required reading for anyone who is new to the Borrego
Springs area, or anyone who rides in Coyote Canyon.
Lester was grubstaked by Ann Wissler, and due to severe arthritis, wrote his book grasping
a pencil and pecking out his pages, one key at a time, on an Underwood typewriter.
 
Reed´s book reminds me of another little book entitled Bob Fudge - Texas Trail Driver - Montana-Wyoming Cowboy,
By Jim Russell. ¨  Ian Tyson wrote a great song about Fudge, after reading about Fudge´s amazing life.
Both Fudge and Reed sure lived in a different world back then.  No telephones,
planes or automobiles. Everything was done on the back of a horse or mule. 
It wasn't that many decades ago rangers patrolled this park the same way. 
 
I was reading Lester´s book for the third time in front of the ranger office the other day when 
a couple drove into Vern´s camp from San Diego in a red Jeep. 
They circled the campground a couple of times, slowly.  Then started
to leave, backed up and came over to me.  Asked me how they get a ¨permit¨ to camp here. 
I said (with a smile) the permit is called a horse.  The couple said they had no interest in horses and drove off.  
I stood there thinking...¨Well... that´s their loss.¨
 
There´s a pueblito in Sonora, Mexico called Hediondilla. This is an interesting little
town, along with the word Hediondilla. 
Here in Anza Borrego Desert State Park we have hediondilla everywhere
you look.  You´ll find it in all North American deserts.   It surrounds Bailey´s cabin in Coyote Canyon. 
And it´s down here around the horse camp.  Father Font mentions it in his diary in 1775 enroute San Francisco Bay.
Hediondilla is the Spanish name for the Creosote Bush.  If you want to impress your botanist friends, 
call it Larrea Tridentata.  The Cahuilla call it Atukul.   It´s known as Epsil in Kumeyaay circles. Both tribes
used this plant for centuries as their ¨drugstore in the desert.¨ 
 
Senior park aide Abby Barker gives an interpretive talk on this maligned plant,
and says Indians used hediondilla in as many ways as modern medical practitioners use antibiotics today. 
An Indian lady in Abby´s audience one day told her that she never took prescription drugs until she married. 
Her Indian grandmother took care of her when she was sick using the Creosote Bush, including a tea from the leaves.
 
When Colonization Expedition leader Lt. Col. Juan Bautista de Anza and Friar Pedro Font exited the top of Coyote Canyon
on horseback, Font wrote ¨...we left behind the hediondilla  - vile smelling shrub of evil augury.¨  Too bad the ¨Danzantes¨...as they were referred to by Anza...didn´t give this priest a little Creosote tea...it might have improved his ¨flux.¨

 
Juan Bautista de Anza used a ¨super¨courier to take his journal back to the Viceroy in Mexico City,
after successfully ¨linking¨ the land route to Alta California, Nueva España in 1774.
That courier´s name was Juan Bautista Valdez.  This correo extraordinario, or extraordinary courier as Anza referred
to him, was the courier on both the Portolá Expedition of 1769 and the Anza Exploritory Expedition of 1774. 
 

 

¨Anza-Borrego SP, over the past few years has had several facilities replaced to meet Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requirements, one being the new restroom located at  the Horse Camp. As we continue to move forward with our compliance and departmental goals to provide equal experience to all, California State Parks (DPR) has contracted the  California Conservation Corp to build a new accessible trail that will extend from the Culp Valley Campground to the overlook of Hell Hole Canyon on the California Riding and

 Hiking Trail (CRHT). This new trail will allow persons with limited mobility to enjoy the breath taking landscape of the Anza-Borrego Desert from a location that has been accessible only to those who have the ability to hike on foot or ride on horseback or bikes. The new section of trail from Culp Valley to the CRHT is extremely labor intensive whereas these young men and women of the CCC are hauling, breaking and stacking rock for several thousand linier feet. Once this section is complete they will start the interface with the CRHT meaning there will be two separate trails running parallel to the overlook. This will allow the horsemen to continue their ride without impeding the people in mechanical devices and vise versa. State Parks and CCC expect to complete the project sometime in April provided everything goes well.

During the time of construction the CCC crew will be staying at the Vern Whitaker Horse Camp, which was a compromise by the management team of the Colorado Desert District, to include the Anza-Borrego Sector management team as a minor provision, on our part, for this project due to the expected cost of nearly $500k. Historically California has employed the CCC to construct many of the features that we look at, as part of our cultural heritage. I have high hopes that this trail will become a segue for future projects throughout the desert on mountain regions of the Borrego Desert.¨

The CCC crew is in San Diego right now, but will return on 11 February

to continue their work on the new ADA trail to Vista Point.  In addition to working on trails, the CCC works on other projects such as tree planting, erosion control and fence construction, and responds to natural disasters such as wildland fires, floods, earthquakes and oil spills.   

For more information on the CCC visit  www.ccc.ca.gov

You can access the CR&HT from the Culp Valley parking area, by riding your horse up the dirt road that splits toward Pena Spring.  There´s also great riding on the other side of Montezuma Grade (S-22), using The Jasper Trail and the Old Culp Valley Road for loop-rides with the CR&HT.  Confused?  

Stop at the Ranchita Country Store and talk to the owner...who rides the trails.

Or talk to Ranger Jennifer Rodriguez, who has Culp Valley in her sector (760) 767 4238.   

                                             .......................   

By this time next year, Madeleine Pickens, the wife of oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens,  hopes to have the world’s largest wild horse sanctuary open for customers — some 33,000 mustangs, that the federal government (the BLM) considered for euthanasia or selling to slaughterhouses overseas.

(This is due to a big drop in adoptions by the general public).

Madeleine hopes to acquire more than a million acres for her sanctuary, and adopt ALL wild horses currently occupying BLM corrals, across 10 western states. 

Madeleine has received calls from veterinarians from all over the country, offering vet care, and thousands of volunteers have offered to help her as well.

If you want to learn more, Madeleine´s website is www.madeleinepickens.com

Did you know that you can access the park´s monthly interpretive activities schedule on-line?  Just go to Www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=638