In 1908, most of southeastern Utah was inaccessible to travel except on foot or horseback. That didn’t keep National Geographic from publishing an article about the massive bridges of rock in a canyon southwest of the Abajo Mountains.
It was enough to get the attention of the man most responsible for America’s system of National Parks and Monuments. Teddy Roosevelt set aside what we call Natural Bridges National Monument. It gives the site pride of place as the oldest monument or park in Utah and the only one created by Roosevelt.
Even so, it wasn’t until the uranium rush after World War Two that roads existed to get there. Most of those roads are still dirt or gravel, though one became State Route 95.
SR-95 is a treasure of a road. It cuts south from Hanksville between the Henry Mountains and the canyons of the Dirty Devil before weaving its way through deep canyons and circling east through what is now Bears Ears National Monument. Along the way, engineers designed bridges that arch over the Dirty Devil and Colorado Rivers, with steel spans braced against red rock carrying cars and trucks hundreds of feet above ground.
It terminates at a junction just south of Blanding. It’s just 120 miles long, but those miles offer more exploration than you could make in a lifetime.
For this "Max Tracks" trip, I reserved a campsite at Natural Bridges. It’s a wonderful campground — no running water, no electricity, no cell service, but the sites themselves are well-cared for and private.
Of course, privacy wasn’t an issue on the first weekend of January. My dog Chaco and I were alone in the campground!
Our first order of business: Find the place my colleague Dan Evans pointed to when I had the FOX 13 morning team do a series of random tasks to choose my destination. Dan sent us on a search for Zeke’s Hole.
Strange name? Yes. But common in the American West, where the favored home ground for Trappers was commonly called their “hole.” Jackson Hole most famous among them was originally “Jackson’s Hole,” trapper David Jackson’s favorite spot. It’s called their “Hole” because it’s usually a sheltered spot, chosen as a good place to set up camp.
The namesake of Zeke’s Hole turned out to be Ezekiel Johnson, the first custodian of Natural Bridges National Monument.
Zeke was a guide when guides were essential for any travel into the treacherous terrain. He ran horse teams from Blanding to the Bridges and other features of the area.
Unfortunately, I found Zeke’s Hole Road, which is actually a series of very fun dirt and gravel tracks up and down ridges and ravines, but the Hole itself seemed to elude me, though my complete reconnoiter of all of the roads may mean I accidentally saw it without knowing. A guy can hope!
If you’re wondering, this area is cold in the winter. Natural Bridges sits at about 6500 feet elevation. On our two nights in the campground, the outside temperature sank below 20 degrees, but Chaco and I were cozy in our trailer.
Still, a hot meal in a nice town was on the agenda after our exhaustive search for Zeke’s elusive Hole. Usually reclusive, my reporting requirements led me to actually talk to people in a local hot spot, the Patio Diner.
Lori Metzger delivered my bleu bacon burger, fries and Diet Pepsi, and I sensed she might be the manager, because the other employees were very nice high-school-aged folks.
Metzger confirmed my suspicion. She is one of the restaurant managers. Her sister owns the place.
Metzger moved to Blanding from Winslow, Arizona in 2014, perhaps to avoid the joke I predictably asked.
“Do you have a flatbed Ford?”
“Oh, I’ve never heard that one!” she laughed in response to my Eagles reference. (Ask your parents if you don’t get it. And listen to some Eagles. It’ll make your life a little better!)
Really, she was ready for a big change after her youngest daughter finished high school, and she wanted to find a friendly small town.
"Even though my sister lived here when I moved here, and even though she moved away and my mom moved away, I’m staying. I love Blanding,” Lori told me.
Even at mid-afternoon on a January Saturday, the diner was doing brisk business. The San Juan High School Broncos boys basketball game played on the radio as I entered, and the customers included a mix of young and old.
"This is the longest I’ve lived anywhere at one time. So, yeah, I’ve stuck," she said before introducing me to one of her granddaughters, Alyssa, who works with the woman she calls “Granny.”
Among the Diner’s diners was Karen Mariano. She was in town with her husband Dan and her sister-in-law and Niece.
"I like living on the reservation," she told me of her home between Mexican Hat and Monument Valley.
Karen and her companions all speak Navajo and I asked her if Navajo names for local landmarks have special significance.
“Monument Valley is ‘Tsé Biiʼ Ndzisgaii’,” she said.
After sharing the name, everyone at the table chimed in on the meaning of the unfamiliar words. The direct translation is something like the “valley of rocks,” but around the table they talked about nuances of light hitting the rocks and the variegated colors along the cliffs. Then they texted me a bunch of photographs of the enviable views from their home.
Karen told me she loved living with sheep, goats and horses in a simple home surrounded by natural beauty.
"I wasn’t raised with the sheep and goats and horses. I lived in a one-room house. I didn’t have my own room,” she said.
Her home now has electricity, an upgrade made about 10 years back, she told me, but there are still limitations on much of the reservation.
"We don’t have any water, and then we have to go to the nearest community that takes showers. But we’re used to the routine, and I think I’d rather stay where I’m at.”
