Note: The term “Día de Muertos” is how the holiday is referred to in Mexico; “Día de los Muertos” is a back-translation, from the English “Day of the Dead.” I use Día de Muertos to honor the original designation.

In one of my favorite books, Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal Dreams, the main character returns to her tiny rural hometown of Grace, Arizona. In the course of the story she joins the local Día de Muertos celebration. Kingsolver’s description and the concept of this holiday has stayed with me for decades. In the book, Día de Muertos is a family holiday celebrated with an all-day outing at the local cemetery. The families set up camp on the gravesites of relatives with large amounts of delicious food and drink. The children run through the graves playing games, the adults visit with one another, and stories of those who passed are shared throughout the day and into the evening. This celebration of the dead - the honoring of ancestors alongside the present realities of food, drink, play, and conversational connection - is a refreshing and wholesome perspective on the cycle of life. 

In pre-Hispanic Central America and Mexico, Día de Muertos was a time to honor the dead. It was first celebrated over 3000 years ago by the Olmecs, and then by the Toltecs, Mixtecs, Zapotecs, Maya and Aztecs. The belief was that this life is a preparation for what comes after; the honoring of those who had passed into that realm was important for maintaining good relationships with the dead.

Día de Muertos is celebrated in Mexico from October 28 - November 2. Traditionally, certain days were designated for the specific ways in which people passed. For example, October 29 was for those who died from drowning, November 1 marks the day for the passing of children, and November 2 is for adults who’ve moved on. Interestingly, parades were not a part of the holiday until the James Bond movie Spectre inspired the first parade in Mexico City in 2016. Since then, parades are often a part of the celebrations in major cities.

Just as in Kingsolver’s novel, the traditional celebration is an honoring of the ancestors by their families. Gatherings at cemeteries are a part of the holiday, as well as altars, ofrendas, created in individual homes or even in the graveyards themselves. The altars consist of symbolic items which are intended to please the ancestral spirits and bring them home for this special time:

• Cempasuchil (Marigolds), represented death for the Aztecs. It was thought that the orange and gold petals held the heat of the sun. Flor de Muerto (flower of the dead, Mexican marigolds) with their bright color and distinctive scent, lead the spirits to the altar. 
• Copal or Inciense (copal tree resin or other incense) keeps the bad spirits away.
• Velas (candles), so that the spirits of the ancestors can find their way to the altar. Also represents the element of fire.
• Papel Picado (paper cut-outs), symbolize the connection between death and life. Also represents the element of air.
• Agua (water), in a clay or glass jug, for the spirits might be thirsty. Also represents the element of water.
• Pan de Muerto (Bread of the dead), a sweet bread made with anise and orange peel to nourish the spirits. Also represents the element of earth.
• Calaveras (sugar skulls), decorated colorfully and sometimes with the name of the deceased written on the forehead.
• Favorite foods of the departed, as well as photos, notes, and personal items may also be a part of the altar.

Have you ever been to the Día de Muertos altar set up at Bud Werner Library? The official lighting this year is Friday November 1 from 12:00-1:00pm, and the altar is open Wednesday October 30 through Sunday November 3 from 10am - 5pm. I have visited over the past couple of years, and try to go during a quiet time in the evening. There is a poignancy and a peacefulness in the bright yellow marigolds bordering the aisle to the ofrenda, the photos and drawings and notes written to loved ones, all lit by the tiny white flames of electric tealights.

Sources/Learn More
Mano a Mano: Mexican Culture Without Borders: Día de Muertos (Day of the Dead)
The Mexican Museum: Día de los Muertos
Smithsonian National Museum of the American Latino: Día de los Muertos Resources

​Hallowed: from the Old English halgian "to make holy, sanctify; to honor as holy, consecrate, ordain." (Etymology Online: Hallow)

October is spooky month, when ghosts, witches, skeletons and tombstones are a common front-yard sight. October 31 is Halloween, All Hallows Eve, the night where the separation between living and dead is said to be less defined, more ethereal. In the eerie dark hours, we might imagine the spirits rising from their graves to swirl about, misty figures performing their haunted dance.

And what of those places where we find graves? Graveyards, cemeteries, memorial parks, burial grounds - what distinguishes one from another? 






Burial ground is a more general term referring to an area for the burying of dead bodies, an area set apart from the living and a means to honor the dead. It has been thought that Neanderthals and Homo sapiens, with their larger brain case, were the first to have the cognitive ability to see the dead as in a different state, engaging in what is known as “funerary behavior,” where rites and burials are performed. Earlier hominin were thought to exhibit  “mortuary behavior,” also displayed by elephants and chimps, where the living try to interact with the dead, as if the dead are not separate. Relatively recent finds in the Rising Star cave system in South Africa have led paleoanthropologists to believe that Homo naledi, with their much smaller brain case, did indeed exhibit funerary behavior by dropping the dead through a narrow opening called “The Chute.” The bones found are dated to 335,000 to 241,000 years ago, pre-dating by more than 100,000 years the prior earliest known burial.  National Geographic: Earliest Human Burial

The word graveyard is from the Proto-Germanic words “graban” (to dig) and “gardan” (an enclosed area of land). In the Middle Ages, graveyards, or churchyards, were the areas adjacent to churches for the more common folk to be interred, while the wealthy and influential were often buried in crypts under the church itself. As populations increased, these graveyards became crowded - sometimes layers of burials deep. When many died from disease, graveyards were a centralizing place for the disease, making these places problematic, and actually horrific when floods caused coffins to surface and bodies to spill out. 

Enter the concept of a cemetery, from the Greek word “koimeterion” meaning “resting place.” Cemeteries developed in the U.S. in the 1830’s, and were on neutral ground rather than affiliated with specific churches. They were often located away from city centers, addressing the problem of available space. They tended to have large entrance gates or arches, signifying the separation between the living and the dead. Cemeteries were similar to parks at one point, as public gardens and parks were not yet mainstream. People would visit, picnic and enjoy the day amongst the beautiful grounds and ornate sculpture. Years ago, a couple of my dear clients, a loving husband and wife, told me that their first date was a picnic dinner at a cemetery. It definitely worked for them!

Memorial parks take the concept of distance a step further, often with grave markers flush to the ground for ease of maintenance. Rather than a place to stay awhile, they can be impersonal places with their immaculate lawns devoid of unique headstone decoration.

Personally I’ve always been a fan of graveyards and cemeteries. The more moss on the headstones and the older they were, the better. When I’d visit my grandparents over the summer in Maryland, they indulged my fascination and took me to many a graveyard. The little churchyards, stones marked with just names and dates, told simply and starkly of the deaths of young children or entire families. Some graves were adorned with elaborate sculpture, others with humble headstones, broken and crumbling. There was an occasional (and strange) upheaval of the ground from beneath a marker. 

What drew me to these places most of all was a certain feeling. A stalwart oak, with massive trunk and forest-green canopy looming above, offering shade and solace. The permeating silence despite a soft breeze. Below my feet the body of someone who’d once lived, perhaps walked in this same place, a very long time ago. The rough surface of the stone on my fingertips as I’d trace the markings, wondering about their life. The feeling of a distant past touching the present moment, territory both mysterious and sacred. Hallowed ground. 


Sources

• YouTube Video: The Fascinating History of Cemeteries
• Huff Post: Here’s The Difference Between a Cemetery And A Graveyard
• National Geographic: Earliest Human Burial
• The Atlantic: Our First Public Parks: The Forgotten History of Cemeteries

​Blue sky, orange and golden aspen shimmering in the breeze, trail underfoot carpeted with fallen leaves. It is easy and a delight to be very caught up in the beauty of our current autumn days. Once in a while, though, whether I’m on the mountain, near Fish Creek, or somewhere else, my eyes are magnetically pulled to the gargantuan boulders along the way. Some charcoal grey, some covered in lime lichen, some with patches of coral pink. They are strewn about randomly - how did they get there? 

About 1.8 million years ago, ice formed and began to sculpt the Rocky Mountain landscape.  Glaciers moved from mountain summits to valley floors. Along the way, these rivers of ice exerted immense pressure on the rock walls of the canyons. As water froze and thawed in cracks in the rock, this effectively allowed pressure from the moving glaciers to pull immense chunks away from the canyon wall in a process called plucking. The massive boulders moved with the flow of the ice and when the glaciers receded, the boulders were left behind, scattered through the landscape like a giant’s marble toss. In another process called abrasion, rocks embedded in the glacier ice scraped against canyon walls, leaving striations as evidence of the direction the glacier moved in.

Hiking alongside Fish Creek is one of my favorite things to do. The pioneers called it Fish Creek back in the day because, as you might guess, there were plenty of fish: whitefish and brook trout. Lower Fish Creek Falls, about 283 feet in height, was the result of two glaciers coming together, creating both a hanging valley and the spectacular falls. 

A few miles further on Fish Creek Trail, well beyond the second falls and getting towards Long Lake, the creek meanders through banks thick with brush. Down lower, close to the Sanctuary Trailhead, the honey-moss colored water gurgles its way over and around rocks, even through the frozen days of winter. The sound of the creek is hopeful: new life in the spring, the continued flow through the hot summer and sometimes dry autumn, and its resilient babble under thick snow even in the frozen days of winter. It seems incredible that almost 2 million years ago the powerful forces of alpine glacier, rock, and erosion forged this valley, now thick in conifer and aspen, a place of peace and flowing water.  

Sources

• Ave, Raymond, Backcountry Adventure Guide to the Mount Zirkel Wilderness, pgs 26-27. Mountain Jay Media LLC, 2003.
• White-Crane, Diane, Hiking the ‘Boat II, pgs 41, 46-47. Aspen Tree Press, 2003.

It’s early morning on the Saturday of Labor Day weekend, and Charlotte and I are navigating the washboard and potholes of Seedhouse Road, about an hour north of Steamboat. She’s home from college for a couple of days, and we’re taking advantage of the perfect weather to do a little backpacking on the Zirkel Circle. 

Seedhouse Road got its name from a 1910 U.S. Forest Service seed-processing building. Workers roasted cones from Engelmann spruce and lodgepole pine over fires in the seedhouse in order to release the seeds, which they then sold. The operation lasted only a year, but the name stuck. 

We pull into the Slavonia trailhead at the end of Seedhouse Road. The moniker Slavonia has always struck me as unusual; the area is named for the Slavonia Mine, established by four Slavics in 1904. What was mined there? Gold, silver, and copper were most commonly mined according to the records for Routt County, and you can see a more complete list of the various minerals recorded for the Slavonia region here.

Many prefer to do the Circle counter-clockwise; we opt for clockwise and head down the trail. The Zirkel Circle is an 11-mile loop in the Zirkel Wilderness. Although the loop doesn’t include summiting the 12,185’ Mt. Zirkel, (highest peak in Routt County, and named for German geologist Ferdinand Zirkel), it does offer water crossings, stellar vistas, and both Gilpin and Gold Creek Lakes. 
​
It is a beautiful blue-sky day, and the sun feels warm enough to start shedding layers early on. It's been over two decades since I last backpacked, evidenced by my pack’s lifeless bungee cord and my needing a YouTube refresher for how to even load the thing. 

Being out here with my pack feels familiar soon enough, and the time with Charlotte feels like a lark, and an adventure with the bonus of learning from some of her well-earned wilderness skills. Throughout high school she’d taken advantage of dual-enrollment with the local Colorado Mountain College for math and science, but in her senior year she took part in several field classes, including Desert Orientation, Snow Orientation, and Canyon Orientation. Being out there for days and nights at a time, and learning from the best, has resulted in some serious experience and know-how for Charlotte.  

We reach the turquoise-hued Gilpin Lake, plunked down between sharply angled peaks, and then hoof it up and over the 11,000+-foot saddle to make camp on the other side. Finding a sheltered little spot in the trees, overlooking a huge meadow with Gold Creek merrily gurgling through it, we pitch camp and eat lunch. Then we use our math and shot-put skills to rig the food bag on a high branch. It takes a while but, satisfied with our bear-proofing, we head out for a couple hours of exploration.

We follow Gold Creek trail east and then north, which is the trail to take if you plan to climb Mt. Zirkel by way of Red Dirt Pass. We see no other people on this part of the trail, and enjoy the solitude as the loop trail is so popular. The wind blows down the valley through the long grasses. Red Dirt Pass glows scarlet in the afternoon sun. Then we step over something odd on the trail - a long rusted pipe that disappears up into the ridge of trees to the west. A little further we catch sight of some log cabin ruins, with a metal bed frame and the remains of box springs sticking up above the decomposing cabin walls.

I am mystified. We are at 10,000 feet, out in the middle of nowhere - Mt. Zirkel to the north, Red Dirt Pass to the northeast, and here is this cabin with its decorative, heavy, bed frame. What self-respecting miner would bother hauling a bed frame up here? It is hard to imagine a miner returning after a long day of hard work to enjoy the decorative bed - more likely they preferred a plain old bottle. 

It turns out this is the site of the Slavonia Mining Camp. Just west of where we stand gawking at the bed frame is a ridge that lies to the east of Gilpin Lake. The Slavonia Mine is located at the base of this ridge. The old pipe we’d stepped over on the trail runs all the way up to the mine, most likely used to drain off excess water when the mine was in operation. I notice another cabin a few hundred yards away, more intact, and with a nice fire ring near it. This area is often used by backpackers as their campsite before summiting Mt. Zirkel. Standing in the quiet, the breeze blowing through the evergreens bordering the cabin remains, the place feels lonely, and a bit…spooky. You couldn’t pay me to stay the night here.

I notice Charlotte smiling and she points out the two pine martens playing peekaboo with her. Their endearing heart-shaped faces watch her inquisitively before they run off. The sun is getting low, and it is time for us to head back to our own camp for a warm dinner and maybe a game of Crazy 8s in the tent before snuggling into our sleeping bags, content with a day well-spent.

Resources/Learn More

• The Diggings: USGS Historic Mining Records
• Steamboat Pilot article: The Mighty Zirkel: Take a Hike to the Tallest Point in Routt County
• Steamboat Pilot article: Wilderness Wanderings: Mining Clues Remain in Zirkel Wilderness

Books:

• Ave, Raymond, Backcountry Adventure Guide to the Mount Zirkel Wilderness. Mountain Jay Media LLC, 2003.
• Thompson, Jay and Therese, Hiker’s Guide to the Mount Zirkel Wilderness Area. Pruett Publishing Company,1992.
• White-Crane, Diane, Hiking the ‘Boat II. Aspen Tree Press, 2003.

​Autumn. I both dread that it means the end of summer, and marvel at the rich and varied shades that seemingly deepen by the minute. Bright gold trees, mahogany shrubs, orange berries, amongst deep green conifer and bluest of blue skies. Each day feels like a staving off winter for another 24 hours.

There are some who refer to taking in this glory as “leaf peeping.” I detest that term, actually. Whether you are strolling along the Yampa Core Trail, out for a mountain hike, a long bike ride or a paddle, there is an engagement with the beauty all around that “peeping” doesn’t even come close to describing. The term “leaf-peeper” first showed up in print in 1965 in Vermont. Some folks seem to do just fine with the term, others consider it insulting and worse, as “peeping” conjures voyeuristic tendencies. See Mental Floss: A Brief History of Leaf-Peeping. 

The one thing most are in agreement with though, is that this time of year has its own magnificence, perhaps because, at least in the mountains, it is almost as fleeting as the summer. A clump of aspen becomes more incandescently golden by the day, and then a few strong gusts toss that gold to the ground. Or a shrub, foliage ripening to a rich cabernet, is halted by a snow-storm, and the whole thing shrivels and turns black. So every day with fall’s palette feels like a gift. 

So I propose that the term leaf-peeping be struck from use. Suggested phrases: full-fledged fall gawking, awe-struck ambling, or simply reveling in the incomparable Mother Nature. Especially in the last few days in Steamboat, I see people looking around in wonder, and hear people talking about their experience of the unparalleled color. It is truly an incredible season.

As for how and why leaves change color, check out my post the Fluctuating Foliage of Fall to learn.