Picacho Peak - Done!

Sign at start - note the saddle - got as far as
left side of highest part of peak

Yesterday Dave and I hiked up to Picacho Peak, yes, the peak right by us at our RV park!  It is something I wanted to try to do, and have to say that I am not disappointed that we didn't make it all the way to the top - we made it to the saddle, which I will explain shortly.  The Hunter Trail that leads up to the top of the Peak is rated difficult, an elevation gain of 2400 feet from the base start, but I told Dave I wanted to go as far as I could just to see what it was all about.  Many folks here at the park have gone to the top and I wanted to know.  The trail is 2 miles long one-way, rated difficult, but what the heck - if some of these older folks have done it - I need to try.
We chose a day that wasn't hot and not cold.
Perfectly blue skies, starting out at 10am was 60 degrees.  By the time we got to the saddle it was 75.  I was concerned for Dave and his arthritic knee and he was concerned that I couldn't do it - the steps at places was a very deep climb - I have too short of legs he thought.  And I haven't been hiking for the last couple of weeks.  So obviously, was even more concerned.

Notice Hand rails?

View after climbing 800 feet of the 2400 feet - looking east

More Hand rails.  This one was tame!

Well, we got to the saddle - which from this point on is considered very difficult.  I could see why.  We started out on it and I got scared of the steepness and not knowing if I could get back to the saddle.  You see, you have to go almost straight down at that point - very steep, around the
peak at this point to the back side, using a cable hand-hold to keep you from falling, and then go almost straight up to the top from there.  Ah, no. Nope. Enough.  I was elated I made it to the saddle.  For those that have seen Picacho Peak, it's the area where it looks like a horse saddle - the flat part near the top.  The only mishap was me - of course - I fell a few feet coming down from the saddle and tore my pants and scraped my knee.  I slightly twisted my ankle also at the same time and it was uncomfortable for me on the way down.  Lots and lots of people hiking up and down.  Hindsight - we should have waited till during the week when we really could have taken our time.  Saw poppies just beginning to bloom - hope in another month this Peak will be in full bloom - they say the Peak turns a bright yellow from all the flowers.  Would be lovely to see!
 

Poppies beginning to bloom!

I have to say that coming down was much more difficult (forget about the ankle) because the gravel and small stones made it so unstable.  We weren't out of breath like we were going up and had to stop to rest - just very unsure of our footing.  Glad I did it!  I have now put two more things on the list to do before we head out in a couple of months. 1. A tortoise(s) is living on the slopes of the Peak, we need to find this area which means hiking around the Peak from the south side, and 2. we found a sunset trail which starts on the north side of the Peak and is for those that want to see a fabulous sunset from the western side of the Peak.  Will do!

We begin a couple of weeks of being with the 3 grandgirls, living at their house in Chandler helping take care of them while Jill travels for a week and the second week which is the start of their spring break.  We are beginning to think and plan for our departure to Washington (state) come May 1st.  Getting exciting!

Snow Day!

Amazing - we decided to make Arizona, specifically Picacho Peak, our winter home to escape the winter snows - and guess what?  We got a terrific storm yesterday and now the kids in Tucson which is about 25 miles from us, have a snow day today.  Very rare.  Here's a picture of what snow looks like on cacti.

We have been busy with the grandgirls in Chandler, driving to Jill's house to help with after-school activities and being with them.  Fun time.  This past Saturday they came to our place and the girls and Grandpa swam for hours.  Yes, it was that nice just a few days ago.  This morning we looked out and saw snow on Lowell Mountain just west of us, and Mount Lemmon in Tucson is totally snow covered. It is about 45 out now, supposed to get to the 50s by this afternoon.  We have a few more days of this cold snap and then warming back up into the 70s.

We are still planning on hitting the road to go to Washington state by the first of May, starting to think and plan our route from here.  Want to spend time on the north side of the Grand Canyon - campground doesn't open until May 1, but it will be pretty chilly still at that time - so we will go through Las Vegas first then round back east and probably get there to Jacobs Lake sometime around the 15th of May.

Dave has designed and planted a cactus garden around our place.  Looks great, hope the snow and cold don't kill the plants.  Only time will tell.

Visit to National Memorial Park

No wonder people carry guns here!

We visited the country's only National Memorial Park yesterday - Coronado.  Located south of us, on the Mexican/US border, chosen to be located here with the understanding that this park would be an international park with Mexico and the US - that hasn't happened yet - they hope some day in the future.  The park commemorates Francisco Vasquez de Coronado's expedition from Mexico up through to Kansas and return in the 1540s, a 'probable' route that he used through this area.  Spain sent out Coronado to find the seven cities of gold that previous explorers Cortes, Pizarro, de Vaca, and Father Marcos de Niza told about and exaggerated.  Coronado never found the cities nor the gold but did meet many native Indians and introduced the Spanish culture to them and to this day Spanish culture has integrated into our life with food, customs, words and phrases used, Catholicism, farming.

Trail to top of Coronado Peak

After leaving the visitors center we started out on a paved road but quickly it turned into a dirt, narrow, windy dusty road and started up the  switchbacks up to the top of Coronado Peak to get to the hiking trails at the top of the mountain. As Dave was driving up all I could think about was he had lots of practice with narrow twisty roads from our time spent in Glacier and Going-To-The-Sun Road.  Met a car coming down and we just made it by - by inches - to continue to the top. Not quite as pretty as Glacier with snow capped mountains - in fact this view was desert, dry, but still quite impressive.  This park borders Mexico and from the top you could see the border clearly defined with a wall. We encountered a National Park Trail Crew rehabbing the beginning of the trailhead moving huge boulders up farther onto the mountain - phew!  After reading the warning sign right at the beginning of the trailhead, we now understand why many people carry guns.  When we visited Amerind last Sunday a group of motorcycles came in - all weaving gun holsters and guns - even the women (theirs were in pink)!

Lovely day there - the vista views were amazing.  Looking north we were on the back side of the Huachuca Mountains and at  the other side of the mountain is Fort Huachuca Army Base and Sierra Vista.  Lots of history in this area.  What we didn't see during this visit is Border Patrol cars/vans.  Where we are camping - this is a common sight, seeing them sitting off the road, watching everything and everyone.  Have to go through check points each time we go to Tucson, common thing for us now. At night we can see the Border Patrol checkpoint out of Tombstone from our camper and Dave says he can see spot lights moving around.  Some times we see their helicopters flying around, low, looking for someone.  Doesn't scare us, just a fact of life here.

On our way back we decided to go out to eat - something we don't do alot of.  We were told of a great pizzeria not far from the National Memorial called Mimosa.  Wow!  Great pizza!  But a nice way to celebrate both our birthdays together.  We will begin today to pack the final things up and tomorrow we will move up to Picacho and leave the RV here and come back Tuesday morning to move off anything left or forgot and make sure all liquids are emptied, then move it to the dealer in Huachuca City - not far from here.  Picacho here we come!

A Walk in the Riparian

Dry San Pedro River - cattle under trees

We went back to San Pedro Riparian which is run by the BLM Tuesday afternoon.  We hiked this area last December and wanted to come back to go further on the trail, to see the ruins of a stamping plant and what else remained of the ghost town Fairbanks.  What surprised us the most was the dry conditions of the Riparian.  What is a riparian? It is the area along a river which serves many purposes: helps the stream get rid of energy with less erosion and flooding, has diverse habitat of animals and foliage, usually has a huge animal dependency to the water. Anyhow, we have visited many riparians on our travels but this one is quite unique.  At the turn of the century the town of Fairbanks was a thriving community with schools, banks, hotels, liveries, stores, etc.  Had a railroad here that was a major stop between Tombstone and Tucson.  As late as 1975 the town had a resident but now the it is just buildings and a ghost town.  Down the road from Fairbanks stood 9 stamping mills along the San Pedro River.  We wanted to hike to one of the last remaining structures of the Grand Central Mill, about 2 miles from Fairbanks.

Remains of Grand Central Mill

We knew that this was probably a free range area for cattle and horses and heard the rustlings in the brush and heard moo-ing.  Wasn't until our return walk back along the San Pedro where we saw the cattle standing in the dry river bed.  Found the stamping mill - was amazed at how big it was.  Must have been quite noisy - 24/7 workings and the pounding going on must have heard for miles. Saw what was left of the mill and also some foundations of buildings - probably in support of the mill.  Dave discovered an open mine shaft and he got pretty close - said he couldn't see the bottom.

Ranger Robert

Along the way ran into a woman weeding and discovered that she was with the BLM doing trail maintenance.  She said that we would find another person a little farther.  Talked with him for some time about what his work is - a Ranger with BLM - and his history, was a National Park service employee doing fire fighting (we can certainly relate to this from this past summer) and also as a ranger.  When he started as a ranger here at San Pedro there were 2 other rangers with him and with the cut backs - he's the last man standing.  We also talked in length about buying American made only - which we strongly follow - not patronizing stores that bring in products from out of the country and we also buy from the mom-and-pops' businesses when ever we can before going to the chain stores - helping keep the small business going.

The trail was flat and packed dirt going out to the Mill but on our swing around along the River it became sandy and hard to walk.  We both ended up limping by the time we got back to the car - me for my foot problem and Dave from twisting his knee.

Amerind and Whitewater Draw

Gopher snake at museum

Snake by our car

Sunday we decided to head out to visit a museum called Amerind located in Dragoon about 20 miles east of here.  But first, when we were getting into the car, Dave said - we have a visitor - a snake.  What????  Okay, we are in the desert and I have not been paying attention to where I walk - I sure do now!  We didn't know when we got to the museum is that they were celebrating 75 year anniversary - that day.   Great.  Lots of people, lots.  They had a wildlife - snake - exhibit there and we questioned one of the handlers about the snake we saw by the RV and they said more than likely it was a baby gopher.  We really didn't spend time in the museum, which is one man's interest in American Indian artifacts and then the development of the museum to share with the world, due to the amount of people there - had to wait in line to look at a display.  We will come back another day to spend time and look at the many displays.  This museum is nestled in the Dragoon mountains, can't see it at all from the road, looks very Spanish in design, and was very impressive inside.  It kept going and going and going.

Hopi Dancers 

The museum had invited various Native Indian dancers/performers and artists to spend the day, we saw the Hopi while Navajo and Tohono O'odham were scheduled for later in the day.  We happened to get there in time to see Hopi Indians sing songs and perform dances.  Listening to some other folks around us, they were wondering if they could take pictures since many Indian functions and pow-wows they had attended in the past did not allow picture taking.  The elder who presided over this session said of course - take as many pictures as you like, and there will be a question and answer period after that hopefully will answer anything you see or hear.  It was a family affair - grandfather was the moderator/drummer/singer, 3 girls were sisters - his granddaughters, the male dancer was his son, and the young man singing with him was his grandson.  The woman in black by the elder helped with everything was the girls' mother, the elder's daughter. The program started with a 10 year old girl singing a song about harvest time.  Took alot of courage to stand in front of about 400 people and sing in your native tongue.  Then the dancers came out with the grandfather singing and playing the drum with his grandson chanting with him and keeping time with a rattle.  I was most impressed with the stamina of these people, they danced continually for 25 minutes, stopping for about 2 minutes between each song.  The costumes were hand made by the grandfather's son, the head pieces again were handmade by the mother of the girls.

Sandhill Cranes - big birds!

After this performance we moved to the museum and art gallery but it was too crowded.  We opted to get some fry bread, if you get a chance to eat one of these, do it.  Very yummy.  We got our fry bread with honey and powder sugar.  I think the best we ever had was in Taos Pueblo in New Mexico.

I see you!

We left by 1pm to head over to Whitewater Draw, an area that is the resting place for the sandhill cranes as they migrate further south for the winter, they come from as far north as Siberia.  We had been to Whitewater last December and there were over 30,000 cranes here, close,  just awesome.  We are about 6 weeks ahead of the full thrust of the birds, saw maybe 5,000 but much further out feeding.  We will come back here late December to see them again.  You can hear them way before seeing them.  Stay tuned - we will visit this again and I'll report then. And our last sighting on our way out of the Draw was this pretty hawk - keeping us in his sight.  I see you!

Buffalo Soldier Museum

Displays inside museum

One of the places we wanted to visit while here in Tombstone is the Buffalo Soldier Museum located inside Fort Huachuca, an active US Army base, located in Sierra Vista at the base of the Huachuca Mountains, about a 15 minute drive south of where we are camping.  We had no idea what to expect or see so the day was an oh-my! day.  After going through the gate and getting directions as to where the museum was, we started driving on the HUGE base - and I do mean HUGE! - passed 2 elementary schools, a Burger King, gas station, hospital, grocery stores, housing, etc.  Got lost, but eventually found the museum.  There are 2 museums to visit housed in 3 buildings.  The museums tell the story of how the fort was established in 1877 as a temporary camp and eventual permanent base and of the military intelligence that is intricate to the armed forces.  Fort Huachuca (Who-ah-chew-cah and means 'thunder' in Apache, they believed weather originated in the mountains) has played a role in national defense since then.  As a matter of fact, this base is the center for all military intelligence development and training for all armed forces in the country.

The Buffalo Soldier Museum is located within the 2 Fort's museums and pays tribute to the African-American men who were trained and fought in the Spanish-American Punitive War of Mexico in 1917 and also in World War I and II.  The term 'buffalo soldier' was coined by the Apache Indians because their curly hair and dark skin resembled the buffalo.  Two regiments were established here and were trained and deployed to various conflicts around the world.

Military Intelligence Museum

The oh-my came from learning about the role the Fort plays today.  The military intelligence that is developed and products developed and tested is mind boggling.  Of course we were not allowed to see any of this, but we did know it was housed in various buildings around the base by watching a movie inside the museum.  One note:  we have noticed high in the sky over the base - we can see it from our campground - a balloon type thing just floating up there.  I asked the guard as we came into the base what it was - he said it monitors the border for activity, a security camera.  The base is located right near the border of Mexico.  And I am sure that this blog will be scanned by their intelligence since I mentioned Fort Huachuca.

And one more thing....the city of Sierra Vista is deceiving.  It boasts a population of 44,000 and the base has approximate population of 135,000! but it doesn't have the big department stores that you would expect for a large city.  Biggest store is a Wally World and JC Penney.  Two main grocery stores, big 3 car dealers, lots of small businesses.  You can drive one hour north and be in Tucson which is where I think they most go for shopping.

Donkeys, Coyotes, and Sunsets

We have been very busy while here in Tombstone, can't believe we have been here two weeks already!  We spent last Thursday, Friday, Monday, and Tuesday up in Chandler doing grandgirl watching while Mom and Dad were at work. Was great to see them again after almost 5 months of us being on the road - how they have grown and matured! Now we will get to see them alot while here for the winter - Yay!

Donkeys being led home

Each night we are here we are serenaded with the coyotes - typically coming awake about 6:45pm and running all night, back and forth, howling, then quiet, then running by again.  At first we were elated to hear them, but now - it has become ho-hum, but I find I am woken up all the time as they pass - I still love it!  And no rhyme or reason as to when they first run by or when they stop for the night.  We find their scat (poop) markings at the fence line not far from us so they are close.  Yesterday we went on a hike on one of the trails here at the RV park, taking the fence line west, traveling about a mile total.  Saw lots of animal prints, some big marks - looked like horse tracks, and lots of people feet where some may also be hiking.  As we rounded the fence line along the road, still in desert sagebrush and various foliage that I should have learned by now, we came across 2 donkeys in a high fenced area, right near the front entrance to the RV park.  There was a woman inside the fence with them, hugging one of them while brushing the other.  One man was getting water and filling a bin inside while a third was walking along the fence for security for the donkeys.  Started up a conversation with the woman - are these your babies?  Yes, they ran away yesterday and found themselves in this RV park (it's fenced all around except at the  entrance way). She said the coyotes spooked them and they took off, they tracked them yesterday for awhile but lost the trail.  She said they will come back in the morning and walk them back to their place - not sure where but I think it's a far piece to walk them (maybe 3 miles?), said they are really spooked and won't stand a ride in the trailer - will have to walk them home.  Sure enough, about an hour ago Dave took their picture as they were being walked out.

Beautiful Sunsets - looking towards California

Sunsets?  Well, just about every night we are given the most spectacular show, almost as good as Santa Fe skies, almost.  And many mornings are just as colorful.  The mornings scare us - being tuned into the weather during our time as sailors on Lake Erie - we remember the saying, "Red sky at night - sailors delight. Red sky in morning - sailors take warning."  Within two hours of sunrise the skies clear to crystal blue and no warning is sounded.  Absolutely beautiful day. Every day.

We pack up the RV, or should I say unload, and take it into the RV dealer on the 29th.  From then on we will be in Picacho.  This is a lovely place - we will miss it when we leave.