Page 39 - Humanism 2019

Adventures in Nature

Photos and text by Mitzi McKay,
Assistant Dean of Student Affairs
College of Graduate Nursing

What better way to stay human than to immerse
yourself in nature? Nature has a way of
reminding you that you are not always in charge,
and keeps you very aware of how human you
really are.
On a perfect Saturday morning three employees
and a friend from the CGN headed out on an
adventure to the Southern California Cadiz
Dunes. By all accounts, blogs and GPS maps, the
getting there was doable by Jeep or other four-
wheel-drive vehicle. The Cadiz Dunes are a set of
protected dunes and part of the larger Mojave
Desert landscape. Being protected from vehicles
of any kind means they are not likely to be
visited by your typical weekend adventurers. The
fact that there are no regularly maintained roads
to get there may also be a factor in why they are
not widely known or visited (a fact we
discovered personally). Without much visitation
of the human kind, the dunes would be pristine
and the wind patterns in the sand would be
incredible. It was going to be well worth the trip.
Our intentions were to arrive midday, enjoy the
full view and explore the dunes, and stay into the evening to
capture tube light painting photography, a process of capturing
patterns of light behind your model while still highlighting the
incredible scenery in the background.
The thing to remember is that forging your own roads out to a
location and exploring sand dunes during the day is one thing,
but finding your way back to the car and then out of the
wilderness area in the dark is a completely different adventure.
Let’s just say that it took us four hours to get there and five to
get back, (there was an added hour of “Twilight Zone”
adventure in there as we worked to find our way out). The GPS
had an idea of where it wanted us to go, but not wanting to end
up in any of the salt evaporation ponds that are scattered across
the desert landscape in that area made us a bit more reluctant to
blindly follow. After all, these were dirt paths, not paved roads,
we were trekking. We were four adventurous women who were
not afraid of the dark, but if aliens existed, this would have been
where our abduction would have taken place and the making of
the movie telling our story would have begun.
We ended up on a slightly more maintained dirt road, obviously
created for the salt evaporation pond crew, and everyone
breathed a sigh of relief. After all, the workers would have gone
out this way at the end of the day, so we would too. Of course,
in “the movie,” this would be where you would drive up to a
gate and it would be locked. Yup, that’s exactly what happened.
Of course, there were no aliens and no abductions. We did find
our way out, I did manage to capture some pretty terrific
photos, and believe it or not, I still have friends willing to
adventure with me. I hope you enjoy the photos as much as I
enjoyed the journey in taking them. I am feeling very human. n

HUMANISM IN THE HEALTH SCIENCES 2019 • VOL. 22 36