Stinking Pants Spring

It was the last water hole of the day, and I wanted to get closer for a second picture.  This spring wasn’t on my topographical atlas, so I counted myself lucky to have found it.  Judging by the cattle use, though, it might have been a manmade, earth-walled tank.  It was hard to tell.  Water overflowed from the pool and spilled over into cattle tracks and cattle patties, then ran dirtily down the road that had led me to it.  I was standing a few yards from the edge of the pool, and already there was an inch of excrement-enriched water around my boots.  The place smelled of methane and decomposition.  I chose my next step carefully.  I aimed for a crumpled shrub, figuring that my boot wouldn’t sink in too much.

The last spring of the day.  Silver Island Range in the background.

I was right on what I believe to be the Walker Expedition’s probable path.  When the expedition passed near the Great Salt Lake, Walker was scouting for the Buenaventura River.  The Buenaventura ran, according to the best beliefs of eastern cartographers, from the Great Salt Lake to the Pacific Ocean.  In Walker’s day, it was a theoretical river, and of course that’s all it ever was.  But to scout for it, and ultimately disprove its existence, Walker had to cover a big swath of ground west of the Salt Lake.

The country west of the Salt Lake is famously dry.  Due west of the lake lies the Great Salt Lake Desert; south and west of the lake lie the Bonneville Salt Flats.  In places, therefore, the expedition would have passed through country covered only with rock, dust, and sagebrush.  In other places, there was only rock, dust, and salt.  Since neither horses nor men can survive on rock, dust, sagebrush, or salt, it was a hard place for horsemen.

Consequently, the expedition would have had to do what all subsequent explorers or wagon trains did – hop from spring to spring.  Zenas Leonard indicates that Indian trails connected the springs, and that the expedition followed the trails across the arid landscape.

So I spent today much of today springhunting.  Driving on well-maintained dirt roads, turning off of them to rutted, rocky dirt roads, stopping the truck to explore on foot, hiking along creekbeds, breaking through willows and other brush in search of flowing water.  I eventually learned to look for willows and a certain reddish shrub as indicators of water, but still, I wouldn’t have found most of the springs without my GPS.  Carrying it with me, however, I visited Rabbit Springs (no flowing water, but water stood in the deep road ruts), Governor’s Spring (barely a seepage out of the ground), Tunnel Spring No. 2 (dry), South Patterson Spring (cow trampled mudhole), Donner Spring (nice pool; too bad the Donner Party didn’t make it in time), and the final spring where I was taking a step closer to take a picture.

Duke in the only standing water we could find at Rabbit Springs.

I had only taken the road toward this last spring because it led to the salt flats, and I wanted to get up close to see what the flats looked like.  I thought maybe I could drive across them.  Only as I drove toward the salt flats did I happen to pass this waterhole, which was clearly a favorite with the local bovine population.  The place reeked of their dung, and as I drew near it, I was glad I hadn’t let Duke out of the truck.  He’d have splashed around in it and made a mess of himself.

I was determined to walk more carefully.  I chose my next footrest atop the crumpled shrub.  It gave way.  The whole plant sank.  I fought for my next foothold so I could get out of the cow-dung quagmire, but my next foothold sank too.  It was like stepping into a peat bog.  Or maybe a giant cow patty.  Liquefied cow shit poured into my left boot, cool against my ankle.  I tried to go forward again, but the ground sank under my right foot.  The right boot filled with the fertile mixture.  The whole area was unstable.    I floundered back toward my truck, spattering myself with the squishy material as I struggled.  After a few steps I reached the hard dirt of the road.  I collapsed on my butt in the dust.  My butt felt cool pressed against the earth.  And wet.  Apparently I’d splattered the liquefied shit on the backside of my pants.  So I sat in the road in the sun, covered in mud and dung, redolent of a giant bovine fart, and giving all appearances from the backside of having lost personal rectal control.

It’s the kind of thing that you might as well laugh at.

I checked my topo atlas again.  No name for this water hole.  Henceforth, it shall be known – at least for me – as Stinking Pants Spring.  I changed my Carhartts, flored my truck through the salt flats just to show ‘em, and went on into town.

Across the Salt Flats.