Only the wind
and cruching sand beneath your feet break the silence while walking
among the creosote bushes and cacti of the desert. It is a different world, a world of
dryness and wind and of solitude.
A world where creatures wait until nightfall to venture from
their hiding places among the rocks and under the ground. A world of the coyote and bobcat and
of the rattlesnake, a world of sudden death for rabbits, mice
and lizards just trying to survive until the next day.
Yet there is
beauty in the desert, of wind swept sand dunes that ripple across
your path, and rocks that have been painted by desert varnish
for millennia. The desert is not barren,
it holds many mysteries lurking just beyond the next hill or
behind the next rock. In the spring, flowers
dot the gray and tan landscape with red and orange and white
blossoms which flow from the cacti like Jules springing from
the sand.
The rattling
sound of a thrasher as it calls for a mate in the still morning
air is the sound of the Southwest.
And lest we forget the wonderful yelping of the coyote at evening
when hunger brings them out to gather for the hunt. These are the true dwellers of the
barren places, and we search only for a few moments of their
life when we step into the timeless, mysterious world of the
great American deserts.
