The Muse of the Blue River

​​By Tamra Testerman

Photo Credit: Elyssa Clement

Inspired by Georgia O’Keeffe and her painting ‘Blue River,’ late last spring, I joined Far Flung Adventures, a local rafting company for nearly half a century, on a three-day adventure down the Rio Chama. The trip begins in high alpine woodlands and flows 32 miles in the heart of Georgia O’Keeffe country ending at the head of Abiquiu reservoir, a stone’s throw from her home. 
 
We met at Bode’s Mercantile and General Store, the Abiquiu landmark known for providing “service to travellers, hunters, pilgrims, stray artists and bandits since 1893.” After stocking up on nibbles and libations, we boarded a van for the launch point at Cooper’s El Vato Ranch on the rural outskirts of Tierra Amarilla. There was not much conversation on the way – The land tends to dominate with its scruffy beauty.
 
After a flawless launch, we made our way down river serenaded by Canada geese to a muddy bank lined with red willows, and Ponderosa Camp our overnight bivouac site. We pitched tents in a meadow nestled in a grove of sappy vanilla scented Ponderosa, intermingled with the pungent camphor of juniper and sage and occasional pile of musky bear, rabbit and elk scat.   

Photo Credit: with permission Tarynce J Hise

There was no cell phone service, no way out except by a river flowing at a brisk 3500 cubic feet per second. Too fast for this swimmer, though I managed to wade to the edge of the surf one morning, tethered to a red willow branch for a very ‘cold plunge.’ On the first night we slept in the eerie light of a penumbral lunar eclipse. And you could feel wildlife nearby, coyotes howling, echoing in the canyon. ​

There is a rich legacy of artists interpreting the remote landscape surrounding O’Keeffe’s homes overlooking the Chama River Valley. The winding 135-mile Rio Chama is a tributary of the Rio Grande begins from high alpine headwaters of the glaciated San Juan Mountains in southern Colorado. The dramatic beauty crescendos with the Rio Chama’s bone bleached sandstone, siltstone, and gypsum cliffs carved by wind and time, now homes for nesting birds and wildlife. ​

Our river guide, Elyssa Clement, confirmed the elevation and presence of water make for a mixed desert fauna — “Cottonwood for large specimens, a few firs and spruce here and there too. Juniper, red willows, box elder, hackberry and willows. It’s a mixed desert overall. Geologically, it’s a part of the Colorado Plateau. The most prominent layers we were seeing in the wilderness section of the Rio Chama include Dakota Sandstone, which occurs during the end of the Cretaceous period. Beyond that, starting from the Monastery of Christ in the Desert, we move deeper in geologic time with the exposed Mancos Shale at the beginning of the Triassic.”
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Photo Credit: Tamra Testerman

Moving from one geological time zone to the next, stratocumulus clouds slung low overhead, bathed in a mercurial light, we were immersed in O’Keeffe’s color palette; cerulean and cobalt blues, raw umber, silver white, alizarin crimson and viridian green. The banks were lined with stalwart cottonwoods, and willow, and pine trees veering off in angles. There were beavers coasting along. And we spotted herons, kingfishers, swallows, and warblers. 
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Image Credit: Tarynce J Hise with Permission

Image Credit: Tamra Testerman

And geese racing overhead, skidding into the river and taking off. If there was a soundtrack for this adventure, it would be geese honks in the morning, crackle of campfire, and sound of the night wind in the trees. And our guide’s river navigation lesson. – (have a listen below.)​

Video Credit Tamra Testerman
 
After three days on an explorative journey through a painting, I gained a profound understanding of the muse in O’Keeffe’s ‘Blue River’ and what moved her to harness the power and beauty of the Rio Chama with the potency of her brush and oil paints.