SISKIYOU WILDERNESS: Magical Encounters and Mystical Evocations at Clear Creek


The area is home to the Karuk Indians, who hold these lands sacred since time immemorial—Katamin, they call it, the center of the world. They continue to practice their rites, holding their annual World Renewal ceremony near the mouth of Clear Creek to ensure their survival and the return of salmon and acorns. Known as Pic-Ya-Wish, the Karuk request the cooperation of rafting companies and river adventurers to avoid certain areas of the river each summer. Although the Ka

Clear Creek is blessed with primo camp sites (gotta know where to find ‘em), thick and healthy forests on upper slopes, including home to the rare Port Orford

Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on your perspective, the Forest Service has opened up this sector of the Klamath National Forest—leading into the Siskiyou Wilderness—to vehicle traffic. Otherwise, it would be a grueling hike in. From ultra-scenic Highway 96, you take an eight mile gravel road (passenger cars can do it easily) to the trailhead. It used to n

All you really have to do is pay attention to topography—simply follow Clear Creek’s canyon ridges. Veer away from it, and you’re off course. Well, after years of traversing that eight mile stretch, you eventually learn this. On arr


The great thing about this special spot is you can get to it without the rigmarole and rigor of a hot and dusty trail hike. You can have your cooler with ice and beer and whatnot. You can set up chairs and bring excess reading matter. You can have a box of prettily wrapped presents for your lovely wife to open with childlike glee. Sure, it’s the dreaded and lazy car camping syndrome. . .and yet, paradoxically, once you’re down this little nothing of a fifty foot trail, you might as well be miles and miles in, that’s how remote-feeling this spot is. Without doubt, it is the prettiest, wildest, ruggedest stre

But alas! As we pulled into the mile seven pull off, to our chagrin a Subaru Outback with Oregon plates was already there. (Go back to Oregon!—a reversal, for those not in the know, of Oregonians’ admonishment to us to “go back to California”!)
So, what to do? Simply REJOICE IN THE WAY THINGS ARE was my lovely wife’s advice. Just like last year, when we were discouraged from hiking into our original

The next day I approached the campers—an herbalist d

A typical day at Clear Creek? Think of sloooooowing waaaaaaay doooooown. Imagine walking in meditative mini-steps. Certainly the 108 degree temperature helps, but the exercise is to deliberately gear it down s

Over the past five years we have sought out our animal totem(s) in these nature immersions—nothing like a vision quest, mind you, but still, a thorough immersion in the other world of plant, tree, sky, water, earth, rock, animal. Only the occasion plane overhead or redneck or Christian-group incursion reminds us otherwise. And each year, without fail, a certain animal is attracted to us, or we to the animal, and then back home we pick that animal from the animal “Tarot” deck my sisters g


My psychic-spiritual connection with the animals this season of Mary’s 44th birthday surpassed previous experiences only in quantity. This year, I had several amazing experiences involving Clear Creek residents. I’m only reporting what happened; you draw your own conclusions.
“WE’RE going to see an animal we’ve never seen before at Cle


FIRST day down on the river, we immediately noticed the paucity of our flittering and favorite friend, Dragonfly. Where were they? What was going on? Being major patrollers of the canyon waterways, their absence for nearly two days was striking. We literally did not see a single one. Very odd. Something was going on. Not being an entomologist, I hadn’t a clue. So, instead I perched on a boulder in the creek, opened my heart to the universe and beseeched Dragonfly to please pay a visit, come out come out wherever yo

BEFORE Mary’s birthday on the 17th of July, I had said to her, “Honey, you will have a special visitor on your birthday.” Now, why would I make such an utterance? How did I know? Was I just playing some mental game with myself, trying to think things into existence? So, imagine

ON her birthday, we drew the Animal Cards. Mary picked two or three, and twice upside down Beaver came up. (She later picked upside Beaver again at home.) I drew a card and held up Bat. Hmmmmmmm.

SO far, it’s been praying, predicting, prescient, and psychic. We have had the pleasure of visiting with ant, beetle, bee, bat, butterfly, bumblebee, bird, caterpillar, cicada, cricket, dragonfly, deer, fly, frog, fish, grasshopper, horsefly, hummingbird, kingfisher, lizard, moth, mosquito, midge, mantis, pheasa

SUCH is life at Clear Creek. We’re always sad to leave. . .and yet it is amazing to count up the days and nights spent under the stars at Clear Creek—we’ve passed close to 75 starry nights and hot sunny days there. You get to know a place intimately after that much time. Maybe that’s why—and when—the animals and you are able to connect.
For your contemplation, some journal jottings, snapshots of time, place, memory, visions and impressions, of eternally lazy, magical, sacred summe

- Leaves twirling to the ground, to the creek, swept up in the rush of water like tiny rafts headed on their unknown epic journeys
- Insects flitting merrily about, a profusion of butterflies and moths, more birds than usual, clumsy bees, elegant wasps, unseen, hidden, infinite
- Fish popping up to catch them; fish attracted to our presence
- Emerald jade lime Kool-Aid green pools, so cold but so inviting on hot days
- Single gossamer filament of spider thread cast across the gorge, up the slope, over to the log, connecting to the boulder, a luminous strand of silk swaying back and forth in the breeze

- White rock, gray rock, gnarled rock of ages
- Lingering memories of past seasons here doing same—nothing and nothing more
- Evening sunlight splaying over limpid water—dazzling, mesmerizing, kaleidoscopic
- Jays squawkin’ up a storm, a branch falling, wind rustling treetops
- Endless rush-roar of water white and pure
- Moss-crusted boulders, tiniest of flowering coming

- Intense dry heat, contrasted with night coolness (kinda like the desert)
- Big Mama Madrone peeling off her sensuous layers of bark revealing smooth kissable trunks and branches, not surprisingly with breasts and belly-buttons
- Sun rising over ridges, spilling its first radiant bouquet of day’s light over the creek and hills
- Reading aloud to Mary from Leaves of Grass, Walden, John Muir’s Wilderness Essays, and Tom Brown Jr.’s The Vision and his story of Grandfather, the Lipan Apache medicine man whose spirit could be felt, somehow, along with Muir’s, Whitman’s and Thoreau’s
- World of rock world of tree world of water world of sky—home to all of our animal friends. . .see you next year same time same place!
2 Comments:
As someone who has chosen the death-defying creek side expedition for a better look at that emerald-green peek and promise of a swimming hole... you nailed it. Your writing is crisp and clear and witty and your observations of the locals are spot on. Good job.
Grew up in nearby Happy Camp (1981-1997). Clear Creek is one of the most special places on earth for me. Thank you for taking me back.
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