The 1937 edition of The Desert Magazine

Remember the old Desert magazine?  It’s publication ran from 1937 all the way to 1985, when its management decided to close up shop.

The original Desert Magazine was published from 1937 to 1985 by a man named Randall Henderson.  In 1958 he passed the torch, and other editors kept the magazine afloat until 1985.  Since then, efforts have been made to resurrect Desert magazine in print and as an online magazine.  The latest, and most promising, effort is www.dezertmagazine.com.

This online magazine is founded by John Grassom.  Grassom said Dezert Magazine is “a quarterly online publication dedicated to all things southwest. This includes archeology, anthropology, history, 4×4ing, travel, wildlife, botany, rock hounding and treasure hunting.”

Grassom added, “We are simply moving forward with the same commitment and passion as the first.”

The first Desert Magazine focused on archaeology, wildlife, human interest stories, history, geology, and anything desert-related.  And that’s what Dezert Magazine is going to be about.

Grassom invited the Desert Dogs to participate in providing content to their magazine, with the first issue coming up on October 1. We hope that this will be the beginning of a long and enduring friendship.

I’ll finish with this last bit, written by Mr. Henderson himself, in the very first edition of Desert Magazine, waaaaay back in 1937.  He wrote that there’s the desert that poets and authors dredge up – a purely imagined world, and then there’s the real desert. 

“The other Desert—the real Desert-—is not for the eyes of the superficial observer, or the fearful soul or the cynic. It is a land, the character of which is hidden except to those who come with friendliness and understanding. To these the Desert offers rare gifts: health-giving sunshine—a sky that is studded with diamonds—a breeze that bears no poison—a landscape of pastel colors such as no artist can duplicate—thorn-covered plants which during countless ages have clung tenaciously to life through heat and drought and wind and the depredations of thirsty animals, and yet each season send forth blossoms of exquisite coloring as a symbol of courage that has triumphed over terrifying obstacles. To those who come to the Desert with friendliness, it gives friendship; to those who come with courage, it gives new strength of character. Those seeking relaxation find release from the world of man-made troubles. For those seeking beauty, the Desert offers nature’s rarest artistry. This is the Desert that men and women learn to love.”

Let the new Dezert Magazine forge its own trail, but we let it also keep alive the tradition of giving the desert its due respect and homage.

Photo from Edwards Air Force Base website

Global Hawk conducts test flight in Palmdale – On July 15, a modified version of an unmanned reconnaissance vehicle called the Global Hawk was tested at Northrup-Grumman’s manufacturing facility.

It sort of looks like a bulky version of the Predator – that other unmanned vehicle that regularly wreaks havoc on Taliban forces in Afghanistan.  The modifications to the Global Hawk were on its communications module, which is that bulge on the head of the aircraft.

The Global Hawk isn’t new.  It actually flew a number of combat missions in Iraq.  While it only flew 3 percent of recon missions during Operation Iraqi freedom, it returned an astounding 55 percent of the data!  Now that’s impressive.  One Global Hawk detected 13 surface-to-air missiles, 50 SAM launchers, 300 canisters, and 70 missile transporters.  It also imaged 300 Iraqi tanks – which consisted at that time of 38 percent of Iraq’s armored forces. (Information from spyflight.co.uk)

If it did so well during Operation Iraqi Freedom, I wonder what sort of capabilities it will have now, with its new enhanced communications system.   The earlier versions of the aircraft looked a lot sleeker and skinnier.  That big brain in the head houses a satellite system that can process images from beyond line-of-sight to satellite systems, thus putting the battlefield into real time for the men and women in uniform.

The advantage of something like this for our troops vs. a Third World country’s troops are ridiculous, of course.

Golden Valley Wilderness, photo by Andrew Perry

Our trip to the Golden Valley Wilderness – On Father’s Day weekend 2010, I spent some quality time with my dad Joe Perry exploring the Golden Valley Wilderness.  It wasn’t the most successful of trips, it was marred with problems, and we didn’t find anything too extravagant – but it was still awesome in its own right as an adventure.

We hit the road at about 8 p.m., and got into the area around 11 p.m., entering via a road behind Red Mountain (near Randsburg/Johannesburg).  We took this road out to a dry lake behind the Lava Mountains called Cuddeback Lake.   We were trying to find a faint road that would take us north around Almond Mountain into the Golden Valley.  We got lost numerous times in that northern section of Cuddeback Lake.

Finally, at around 3 a.m. we think we find the road.   A very faint road.  After following it for a while, it disappears.  At this time, we were convinced we were still on the right direction, so we continued forward, dodging rocks and bushes and thinking we were following the remnants of a road.  Suddenly, a clear road appears and we take it.   We were excited because there were a lot of landmarks that kept popping up – ravines, certain turns, etc.

But it was all an illusion.

At 4 a.m. we realize that we made a huge circle in the desert, and we were in fact back where we started at the northern end of Cuddeback Lake.  We decided right there and then to get some sleep.

The next morning, I get up first and hike up a nearby hill to get a better view at the valley below.  Through the bushes, I detect a very faint jeep trail meandering through the bushes.

Later, when Joe wakes up, we take the trail again and find the faint little jeep trail that would eventually take us to the main road into the Golden Valley.

I drive a Toyota Highlander, which is a good vehicle, but it wasn’t equipped for this road.  Or rather, it would be a lot safer to take two vehicles.  The road looked as if it hadn’t been traveled upon for many months.  A few times I got out of the vehicle to move large rocks, and a few smaller, jutting rocks just to calm myself down.  We went about 4 miles down the road and explored a small hill of lava rocks, taking in the view.

The valley is beautiful, but we didn’t find anything.  We hypothesize, however, that our search was a bad sample, and that there are much more things to find throughout this valley.  We also think that the road may in fact have been parallel to (or actually be) an old Indian trail (actually, the equivalent of an Indian highway) that connected Cuddeback Lake to water sources near the Panamint Range.  That’s pure conjecture at this point, though.