Sewemup Mesa Canyon, Gateway CO
Boondocked below Sewemup Mesa, Gateway CO, April 28, 2011
Point of Interest
From the roadside POI sign along Rt-141 10 miles south of Gateway CO:
Sewemup Mesa is one of the ecologically pristine areas in western Colorado, having been isolated from development by its almost impassible belt of encircling sandstone cliffs. A striking band of thousand-foot-high cliffs of Wingate Sandstone encircles more than 75% of Sewemup Mesa. Many huge ponderosa pines line the canyons of the mesa top and grow directly from sandstone terraces along the mesa's western cliffs. The cliffs provide nesting sites for the endangered peregrine falcon, as well as for the golden eagles. Bald eagles winter along the Dolores River at the area's edge. Mountain lions rule the mesa, and the lower slopes are important big-game winter range for deer and elk.
The legend of Sewemup Mesa began in the late 1800's as a real true cattle-rustling operation. A local rancher "rustler" would drive stolen cattle, from both Utah and Colorado up into the well concealed "pockets" of the mesa. There he would rope them, tie them down and with a sharp knife, cut out the piece of the hide containing the brand. He would then sew them back up with bailing [sic] wire and rawhide. After the wounds healed, the cows would be branded with the rustler's own brand. Then they would be put back on the range with the other cattle and no one was any wiser.
Sewemup Mesa Canyon is a limited, rough, but picturesque boondocking site along the BLM primitive road into the canyon below Sewemup Mesa, a half mile off CO Rt 141 about 10 miles south of Gateway CO.
Sewemup Mesa Canyon, Gateway CO
- Verizon cell phone and EVDO service - no signal
- Locate Sewemup Mesa Canyon on my Night Camps map
- Check the weather here
Nights I've camped here
Beware of Hypnotic Media
To live sanely in Los Angeles (or, I suppose, in any other large American city) you have to cultivate the art of staying awake. You must learn to resist (firmly but not tensely) the unceasing hypnotic suggestions of the radio, the billboards, the movies and the newspapers; those demon voices which are forever whispering in your ear what you should desire, what you should fear, what you should wear and eat and drink and enjoy, what you should think and do and be. They have planned a life for you — from the cradle to the grave and beyond — which it would be easy, fatally easy!, to accept. The least wandering of the attention, the least relaxation of your awareness, and already the eyelids begin to droop, the eyes grow vacant, the body starts to move in obedience to the hypnotist’s command. Wake up, wake up — before you sign that seven-year contract, buy that house you don’t really want, marry that girl you secretly despise. Don’t reach for the whiskey, that won’t help you. You’ve got to think, to discriminate, to exercise your own free will and judgment. And you must do this, I repeat, without tension, quite rationally and calmly. For if you give way to fury against the hypnotists, if you smash the radio and tear the newspapers to shreds, you will only rush to the other extreme and fossilize into defiant eccentricity.