EcoHearth: Come Home to the Earth

Toss a mega loop of rope over the Four Corners where Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona meet. Now arrange the perimeter so it divides Utah diagonally northeast-southwest in half and encloses the western quarter-slice of Colorado. Pull the lower edge around the northwest corner of New Mexico and the northern half of Arizona. You’ve just cordoned off 130,000 square miles of “red rock country,” known as the Colorado Plateau. Within this province lie eight national parks, including the Grand Canyon and Canyonlands, and six national monuments.

In 1984, Canyonlands Field Institute (CFI) set up base camp in the heart of the Colorado Plateau in Moab, Utah. It is an outdoor education center that offers people the chance to experience wilderness directly, through hiking, camping, tours and river running. CFI’s field camps are in Professor Valley, 20 miles from Moab on the Colorado River, and in the nearby La Sal Mountains that tower over the sunglow and burnt sienna desert below. CFI’s founding director is naturalist Karla VanderZanden.

EcoHearth: CFI just celebrated its 25th anniversary. How did you get the idea to start your nature-based learning programs?

Karla VanderZanden: I grew up on a small farm in western Oregon as an only child of older parents. The nearby woods that fringed the fields my father leased for his wheat became my haven. The tall trees, lush understory plants and tree squirrels became my friends. It was a magical, safe place where I could escape a sometimes tense home life. I was 14 when the landowner proposed to log and level the woods to expand a housing development on the other side. I went to his living room and spoke for the trees—the importance of leaving a place where kids like me could run wild. The woods still stand today.

I went to church camp one week every summer and likewise learned to love the world “away at camp.” In high school, I had the chance to volunteer as a counselor/assistant instructor at the Portland-area Outdoor Schools for 6th graders. Between that experience and my first week at college, when I went on a river-rafting trip, I knew I had found my niche—somehow to combine nature study or retreats into wilderness, using rivers and classroom, and promoting active civic engagement.

EH: Please describe your programs and the range of environments into which you venture.

KV: CFI serves three broad audiences: school groups, both regional and those that travel from across the country; adults and families; and young adult outdoor professionals.

We organize land-based trips by vehicle and short hikes in Arches and Canyonlands National Parks and in many beautiful BLM [Bureau of Land Management] Wilderness Study Areas near Moab. We have an established primitive field camp on leased land in Professor Valley, up the river from Moab, in a stunning and private setting. Here we primarily host school groups in spring and fall. This year we are hosting several Family Explorer Weekends for parents who want to go to nature camp with their kids but have some time on their own to bike or hike during the weekend as well. There are tepees for sleeping and yurts that serve as the cookhouse and meeting room. In hot summer months, we set up a tent base camp in the National Forest in the La Sal Mountains.

We are full-fledged river-running outfitters with a strong science and cultural history emphasis on all of our trips. The school river trips employ a watershed theme that involves structured investigations and activities. Participants learn about camp life and how to read and run the river. We spend time “naturalizing”—simply observing, looking up things in field guides, finding out how a critter is adapted to this place and so on. We also sketch, write and take time to read from our trip library. We always have active games for the kids to learn an ecological concept, build team spirit or just burn off energy.

We are participatory in philosophy; that is, everyone takes a turn assisting in the kitchen, gathering firewood and helping to rig the boats. This is in contrast to most commercial river companies, which keep the guides separate from the guests to provide more luxurious service. We provide nicely for our adult trips, however, including gourmet meals. The main difference is that it is a shared journey. We have “participants” rather than customers.

I lead several special adult trips in various locations, including an annual women’s river trip—Women Wild by Nature. Some of the same gals have been going with me for 20 years! I also design several once-in-a-lifetime trips to remote areas of the Colorado Plateau with special experts. In April we’ll hike with pack-stock from Navajo Mountain to Rainbow Bridge, and one night we’ll camp at the home of a traditional Navajo family. Proceeds from these ventures help to support our youth programs. They keep my own juices flowing, as I love to do the research and enjoy learning and sharing new things about the Plateau.

EH: What are some ethics you share with people when they visit the desert ecosystem for the first time?

KV: They include:

• Basic ecological awareness, i.e. everything is connected to everything else.
• Understanding and appreciation of life in the arid west with regard to water limitations on life in all its forms.
• Simple joys of living outdoors, unplugged and without gadgets.
• Appreciation for wide-open spaces and such “resources” as dark night skies and silence, as well as the other natural and cultural resources of our region.
• Awareness of leave-no-trace principles and specific low-impact practices for river trips in this desert west.
• Awareness of where our food and water come from, the importance of healthy food choices and buying locally as much as possible…
• Understanding of public lands. These parks, BLM and forest lands belong to all Americans. We explain the mandates of various agencies and current issues facing these lands and the human communities nearby.
• Importance of civic involvement in issues and respectful dialogue with those who hold different points of view.
• Importance of giving something back to a place or to a cause—in thanks for a positive experience in nature. We incorporate service work and a work ethic when appropriate.

EH: I recently hiked up to Fisher Towers near Professor Valley and the pristine silence that enveloped me was so unusual. Though I knew there was life all around me, the place felt lifeless. Why should we visit stark and silent places?

KV: I recall a quote from Terry Tempest Williams that “beauty is not found in the excessive but in what is lean and spare and subtle.”

This Canyonlands desert is not as harsh or barren as other deserts. We are high desert, meaning the Colorado Plateau sits about a mile above sea level and thus we have a great diversity in our climate (cold, freezing winters and hot dry summers). We also have diversity in elevation with our island mountain ranges scattered among the canyons so that our plant communities range from 3,700 feet to 12,500 feet.

Learning about the great diversity in what might appear lifeless is indeed an eye-opener, particularly learning about the special adaptations for life that have evolved. These grand vistas are also heart and mind openers. Many people respond positively to the open spaces, in awe of the grandeur. They learn to appreciate a different kind of beauty stemming from strange rock formations, colors and the contrast of red rock against white-capped mountains against blue sky.

EH: How have people survived these thirsty environments over millennia?

People have survived like the animals and plants have done—conserving water, taking advantage of natural runoff and storage potential, holing up in the heat of the day, protecting skin from sun and water loss, traveling to a variety of elevations throughout the seasons to get food and water, selecting or creating shelters that take advantage of solar aspect or earth insulation, among other techniques. Populations were affected by limited food and water sources, cycles of drought, disease and natural disasters.

EH: Why did you choose to live in the desert?

KV: Like so many people who first come to canyon country, I drove in the middle of the night, threw my sleeping bag out on the desert and woke up at dawn to this incredible view of red rocks in Arches National Park, set against the snow-capped La Sals. And I was hooked. I saw that the Moab community was “open” in contrast to otherwise conservative Utah, accepting of my values and interests, though I had to be willing to show interest in local history and community, and listen and learn. Moab was just going into a severe recession with uranium mining halting and a sawmill closing. The town had emptied out for the most part, leaving a number of homes and office spaces available, and making it affordable for young folks to get established.

I love the river and river-running culture. I value living where the air is a “Class I Airshed,” the best possible and adjacent to National Parks, and where the sun shines most of the time.

Also, I am here for the small-town atmosphere. Since I moved here in 1980, Moab has only grown from about 5,000 to 7,000 inhabitants. That isn’t much! There have been changes on Main Street and certain seasons it’s crowded in town. But if you know when and where to go, you can go hiking anytime of year and still be alone. Life in a small town has its lessons regardless of location—tolerance and forgiveness among them. You can’t be aggressive or sneaky or negative and disappear in this town. You will run into the person you have difficulty with the next day at the post office!

Additional resources:
Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey
Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert by Terry Tempest Williams
Read about other Eco Heroes

[If you know someone who is deserving of an Eco Hero profile on EcoHearth.com, please contact us. – Ed.]

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