Last week I took part in a photography workshop at the Ghost Ranch near Abiquiu, New Mexico. Led by our hardy pro, Richard Choe, three of us hiked along the riverbed to Box Canyon. It’s the rainy season, with thunderstorms each night, so the trail was muddy. In fact, I had to go digging for one of my shoes. It was as if an evil spirit lived in the mud. Once it took hold of my shoe, it refused to let go.
The idea of an evil spirit isn’t so far-fetched. The first settlers were brothers by the name of Archuleta, cattle rustlers who led stolen herds along the riverbed to conceal the hoof prints, then hid them at the end of the canyon where there was a larger space. The story goes that brother #1 made a transaction without the knowledge of brother #2 and buried the proceeds. Brother #2 got wind of the deal and murdered brother #1. Then he kidnapped brother #1’s wife and daughter, hoping he could persuade them to reveal the location of the buried money. But wife and daughter escaped and pretty soon a posse came looking for brother #2. When they found him, they hanged him from a cottonwood tree. Even today, if you listen closely, you can hear a man and woman fighting.
I don’t know about ghosts, but if you look closely at the image below, you’ll see the wisp of something just above the falling water. I had set my tripod in the river and was using a neutral density filter to illustrate how you get a long exposure to give water a silky appearance. While the shutter was still open, I asked Jim, one of my hiking companions, to walk in front of the camera just to see what would happen. He’s there in the picture, or at least a wisp of him. His ghost?
When we got to the box part of the box canyon, we relaxed on a broad flat rock and looked up at the rim of the canyon looming maybe 50 or 60 feet overhead. There was a brilliant echo–perfect for an outdoor choir–but I don’t know how you could hide cattle there without muzzling them. The parabolic shape of the space creates a natural amplifier.
