Mount Tamalpais is a glorious little mountain. It contains so many trails, so many vistas, so many opportunities for losing yourself in the embrace of the natural world. One of my favorite nooks of this dramatic state park is the Deer Park access trail. Tucked into a tranquil Fairfax neighborhood, this access point takes the nature lover through a canopy of trees that resembles a wooden tunnel. When taking this trail on previous hikes in the rain, my friend and I barely felt any moisture. It was as if we were under a living, breathing cloak of branches, leafs and twisting trunks.
This time the hike would not be under winter rain, but a glorious fall day with a mixture of moisture-bearing clouds and bright sunshine. There were the scents and flavors of weather to come. Leaves were strewn about in haphazard fashion -- no doubt displaced by wind and sun. Dappled sunlight sunk through holes in the organic tunnel and illuminated the trail for my rhythmically stomping boots. Five Corners would be the goal today, an amazing outlook giving views of the freshwater drainage of Mt. Tamalpais. Living under her shadow my whole life, I was curious to know more about the origin of the State Park, and of course, the fate of the indigenous peoples who inhabited the area long before gold, long before Spanish mission psycho invasions.
The Miwok tribe had numerous tribes ranging from as far north as the Mt. Shasta, and all over the present day Bay Area. An estimated 19,500 tribes people existed in 1800 and the archeological records show that coastal Miwoks and their relatives lived here in peace for thousands of years prior to Spanish invasion. Small pox in the blankets, diphtheria in the porridge, and lots of guns and ropes quickly decimated this otherwise peaceful populace. The string of missions began with San Francisco in 1794, then San Jose 1811, followed shortly thereafter by San Rafael, Solano, Sonoma and Santa Rosa.
After the 1850 treaty between the United States and Mexico all of the Miwok lands were "legally" portioned off to Spanish royalty. This was despite the fact that many Miwok men gave their lives in battle with US forces in the war against Mexico. During this indignant advance of religious-based psychopaths who felt it was there duty in God's name to bring Christianity to the 'savages", the number of natives not living in captivity declined steadily to 1,800 in 1905. That number dropped even further to less than 800 Miwoks still living their traditional style of life in 1930.
It is so hard to be a progressive American with that kind of history attached to my country's history. I found it impossible to not ponder the fate of the Miwok as I reached my destination of Five Corners. Below me are Lagunitas and Phoenix lakes. Great receptors of the freshest drinking water any community on earth drinks. Damn! I must have had some good karma in past lives to be born and raised here in Marin County, under the shadow of the Sleeping Princess, Tamalpais. I am so grateful for this opportunity to walk among the Redwoods, but I also say a prayer for those that were driven from this land by the greedy founders of this "great" country.
Walking back to my truck, I hear a noise. Spattering of footfalls, some high-pitched laughing. I turn to look and it is the children of Deer Park school racing down the trail straight at me. Smiles on their faces, I am able to coerce high fives from most of them, one even has to turn around and give me a higher high five than the previous one. Ahhh, to be a child in Marin again, with no liberal education yet having sunk in, no knowledge of the great genocide that occurred in order for such a plentiful existence.
sources: Allogan Slagle, AAIA website
ER Harris
