There is an often used, traditional Navajo prayer that begins, “In beauty, I walk.”
And on this early-September morning, I found myself surrounded by beauty as I roamed the verdant and sandy floor of Canyon de Chelly — a web of deep sandstone gorges that encompasses trails, wildlife, ancient ruins, rock arka and miles of sacred land in the heart of the Navajo Nation.
Red and brown cliffs, varnished by thousands of years of high desert weather, towered on either side of me. The crisp, dry air carried the scent of warming earth, a recently emptied riverbed and sun-baked grass. Desert shrubs, cottonwood trees, and yellow and purple wildflowers added splashes of color against the rocky backdrops, nourished by the water that brings life to the canyon floor.
I was on a tour of the canyon with Harold Bia, our Navajo guide, and four other visitors, riding in the back of an open truck. We bumped over dry riverbeds, veered close to the sandstone walls, and glided left and right over sandy dunes like a surfer carving a wave.
We stopped at a set of ancient pictures on a red rock wall. Mr. Bia used a flashlight to illuminate handprints, hunters on horseback and Kokopelli, a flute-playing deity of fertility, nestled in a shady area, as he explained the history of the people who had lived in this sacred place for centuries: the Ancestral Puebloans, Hopi and Navajo.
