Pipe Spring

Yesterday we drove back to Arizona (only 25 miles south of us) to the Kaibab Paiute Reservation and the Pipe Spring National Monument of the US Park System - equally shared in duties between the two entities. The history of this place is amazing - who could survive in this harsh climate? The natural spring is located between the Vermilion Cliffs to the east and the Grand Canyon to the south and Zion National Park to the west, flowing cold water from the sandstones pours out from a crevice and nourishes this ranch.  Enough water to support this ranch but not an entire town.  The Mormon Church established this tithing ranch back in 1879, Brigham Young - the leader of the Mormons - wanted the members to spread out and spread the Mormon word.  The spring is located along the Arizona strip - a term we learned yesterday that is the narrow land that skirts the north of the Grand Canyon and runs along a plateau making it easy for folks moving from the east to the west and not get caught in all the canyons and red sandstone valleys.  Interesting to learn about how the Mormons tried to convert the Paiute Indians to their religion, how the Navajos often raided the Paiutes and the settlers and how the Paiutes were misidentified as Navajos, how the US government clamped down on the polygamy that the Mormons were known for, how the 3 cultures interacted.  The Winsore Castle as this Mormon outpost was called, provided rest and comfort for those pioneers traveling the road. The fort (castle) was built directly over the spring which didn't make the Paiutes too happy, and also each direction in the fort had gun ports where they could watch for anyone coming and not get shot at.   It also provided food such as butter, milk, cheese and live cattle to support the men who were constructing of the Mormon Temple in St. George - a mere 4 day ride by horse - and 2 hour dive by car today. And with the growth of the ranch, the herds desiccated the land and could not support the ranch and eventually the whole ranch was sold.  Many couples stopped at the Pipe Spring on their way to the Church to get married and thus this route was called the Honeymoon Trail.  Life on the ranch looked harsh, but somehow inviting. And with the tour of the Castle I fell in love with every room - had a reproduction quilts displayed.  Yeah! I hope our pictures come out - just not enough words to say without seeing the pic.

Narrows Walk in Zion

Checkerboard Mesa (petrified sand dune)

We drove to Zion National Park yesterday - this is a park I wanted to visit 26 years ago when Dave and I and Dennis and Jill drove across country visiting as many places as possible.  Just couldn't get to them all. Zion is a name chosen by the first Euro-American settlers - the Mormons - who thus named it after the Biblical Hebrew word - Zion - meaning place of refuge or sanctuary.  Lots of sights are Biblical named - the alter and pulpit, the three patriarchs (Isaac, Abraham, and Jacob), Angels landing, etc. We entered the park from the East Entrance - glad we did - east side versus the west entrance - totally different.  And, we had to go through a 1.1 mile long tunnel to get to the main part of the park.  What spectacular views we saw!  And - this is all sandstone.  The first 'wow' came even before getting through the tunnel into the main canyon.  We stopped and viewed Checkerboard Mesa which is a sand dune only solidified.  Then the tunnel drive thru, then big WOW on the other side.  Switch back road to get down into the canyon, very scary - how do buses and RV's do this? then the drive to the visitors center to decide what to do.  We viewed a movie on how the canyon was formed and the early inhabitants, then got on the shuttle bus (no cars allowed into the main park unless you are staying at the lodge).  We opted to ride the 40 minutes to the end of the canyon and hike to the Narrows.  This hike was a mile long, easy and paved, along the Virgin River, to the point where the canyon narrows down and to continue - you have to walk through the river to the end.  Dave and I weren't into getting wet, so we stopped there, took lots of pictures, ate snacks, rested, and started back. Many people continue on this river wet trail, and you have to be aware of flash floods - the narrow canyon can fill in seconds! There were so many trails to choose from - one sounded appealing - the weeping rock trail which shows ivy and plants and ferns growing out of the sandstone monoliths and water seeping out with waterfalls.  It was just too warm of a day to do 2 hikes - so we had chosen the cooler. Very warm day - when we got back to the car at 3pm, was 111.  Good thing we are used to very warm weather - this day would have been really unbearable. But we are glad we went to Zion National Park it is just as majestic as they write about and our pictures won't do it justice, was on our list of things to do, but we realize that if we went to Bryce Canyon NP, then to Arches and Canyonlands NPs and also to Capitol Reef NP - we will be red-rocked sandstone out.  So on our return trip from Montana this early fall we will visit Arches, Canyonlands an Capitol Reef.  All these parks with the addition of the Grand Canyon are part of the Colorado Plateau - which now makes sense why all the red rock and formations.  Today we are headed to Pipe Spring National Monument - more of a historical park about the early settlers around the Grand Canyon and Zion/Bryce National Parks.

Utah!

We left Williams AZ this morning at 8am, driving east until we got to Flagstaff and then turned north on US route 89.  This is a really nice road, not a highway, but very scenic.  Talk about red earth and towering cliffs!  The neat thing - we will be on this road all the way into Montana and up to Glacier National Park on the border of Canada.  Our route took us through Navajo territory, very barren, but how do the people (Dine') live like this?  We traveled along the eastern edge of the Grand Canyon up past it to Page to make the turn heading west and north.  No water, no trees, but still small communities in the middle of nowhere land.  We had planned to stop in Page, AZ to tank up the truck, which is where Glen Canyon Recreational Area, Glen Canyon Dam, and Lake Powell is.  Talk about amazing!  This is where the Colorado River gets dammed up and the government monitors the release of water - this is the river that eventually flows through the Grand Canyon. Lots of million dollar homes advertised - have a breath taking view of Lake Powell right from your living room! Lots of jet skis, boats, and RV parks are in Page - a big mecca for outdoor types.  Hot, but there's water!

Got into some trouble before we stopped in Page - only we didn't know it until Dave did a walk around while filling up the tank. Dave said we had a 'problem' in the far back of the RV - I hadn't a clue what he was talking about until I walked to the back and saw insulation  hanging from the frame of the RV and the pan that covers the fresh water tank under the RV belly just hanging.  What the heck?  Fortunately the support for the back jacks was holding 1/2 of it up - enough not to drag on the ground.  We did drive over some rough road along the way, and when he pulled the RV to the side and we got under the RV to look - poor design.  The pan broke away from the bolts holding it up.  Dave got rope out and strung up the pan and weaved the rope back and forth and tied it off, hoping we'd make it to our campground in Glendale, UT which is a very very small town on Route 89, and 89 is paralleling Interstate 15 - so if we have to get to a big town - just drive about 30 miles west.  And, where we are in Glendale - we are in the middle of Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park, and about 30 miles north of the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.  Lots to see and do and Dave already contacted someone to come to the campground to fix our problem - this weekend.  We will sit here now until July 5th then move more north towards Salt Lake City.

Wupatki and Sunset Crater Volcano and MNA

Yesterday we drove back into Flagstaff and then north to two National Monuments - Wupatki and Sunset Crater Volcano.  Wupatki Pueblo was started about 1090 Ce and at the height if it's life, over 2000 people lived there.  There were over 100 rooms, ball courts, kivas, that were excavated and now preserved under the National Park System.  What is truly amazing is how did they live in the harsh environment and survive under the dry desert heat and winds?  By 1400 all the inhabitants have left and the pueblo fell into ruins from the forces of nature.  From a distance standing at this pueblo, you can see two other ruins, not open to the public.  This pueblo is located on the Little Colorado River and between this river and the small caches of water pockets, these Hopi Indians eked out a life.  We had to drive through Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument to get to Wupatki, see the mountains that define this Flagstaff area and also from a distance you could see the Painted Dessert.

After walking around the ruins and learning about Wupatki, we drove back into Sunset Crater and stopped and hiked along the lava fields.  Scientists believe that this Volcano erupted about 1000 years ago, a middle-of-the-road in terms of explosiveness and eruption.  Based on dating of downed trees, they believe Sunset erupted numerous times over a period of 150 years - from about 1050 to 1200 Ce.  The lava fields are amazing to see, and with the eruptions also came earth quakes, which had to affect Wupatki and neighboring pueblos.  To see how life has began again, and wild Apache plume - a beautiful pink flowering bush living in the middle of the cinder flow and pine trees growing in the middle of the lava field - amazing.

We drove back into Flagstaff and went to the Museum of Northern Arizona which explained how the ancient peoples lived, who they were (Zuni, Hopi, Navajo) and their life history was quite informative. This museum is a privately funded establishment and I was thinking when I got into their gift shop - to maybe get a piece of turquoise jewelry - well, not.  Cheapest piece was $1200. Pretty, but don't need it.

Tuesday we pack up and head north, driving around the eastern side of the Grand Canyon to a town called Glendale, Utah.  We will be centrally located to Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park, the north rim of the Grand Canyon, and also be near Cedar Breaks National Monument.

Grand Canyon NP

Yesterday morning we drove to the south rim of the Grand Canyon National Park, about 51 miles north of Williams.  After viewing two different movies about the history and formation at the visitor's center, we started our 'look see' at Mather Point.  Then decided to continue walking the rim westbound towards Grand Canyon Village which is about a 2 mile walk from Mather.  We had been to this park in 1986 for the first time, then again in 1991 - and now it was 21 years since being here.  Has it changed?  No, the look and views are the same which is breath taking and awesome and beautiful.  What has changed is what we knew as Babbitt's General Store is now called the Market Plaza and there is a lot more interactive things along the trail. There were so many people there but we did not feel overwhelmed - the trail is nice and leaves you with the feeling you are along. The bottom picture shows the Bright Angel Trail which switches back and forth to the bottom of the canyon which drops over a mile in depth.  The rangers say you need a gallon of water to take on this hike and it's only for those who are experienced hikers.  Needless to say, we will not be going down this trail.  However the third picture down shows the nice paved trail that encompasses the south rim for a length of 17 miles.  We only did 2 miles of this, and today we are pooped!  The second picture down shows a tagged California condor - endangered - and it was sunning itself while we were at El Tovar lodge - tag # 22.
The top picture - if you zoom in - you can see the Colorado River and if we stood long enough and stared, could see white water rafters going by.  Pretty cool.  A good day, our next move north will be near the North Rim which we have not visited.  And we will be near Zion National Park and Bryce Canyon National Park.

And We Are Off!

Yesterday was go!  We had half packed the RV Sunday night, then a little more on Monday, and yesterday we spent 2 more hours packing in food and the remainder of our clothes and toiletries and left Picacho at 8:45am.  We have totally changed our plans - we were going up the eastern side of Arizona, into New Mexico and then the lower portion of Colorado with the thought that we would then move westerly into Utah.  The wildfires had changed all that.  We were going to be into the main path of the fires, so we opted to go through Phoenix and head north on I17 through the Black Canyon and past Sedona.  We drove into Flagstaff and then headed west on I40 towards Las Vegas.  We are 30 miles west of Flagstaff, but 30 degrees cooler - daytime high of 81, nights down to 50!  How nice.  We were suffering from the heat at Picacho - during the day it was 105 to 107 and the nights at 75.  Stuck inside - too hot to do anything.

The town we are in is called Williams and it's the gateway to the Grand Canyon.  We will stay here for a week, planning on visiting the Grand Canyon. We need to get used to the RV again which is why we are staying put for a week. From here we will back track into Flagstaff then head north around the Grand Canyon and then into Utah.  Our goal this summer is to spend a lot of time in Montana.  With luck we will be back to Picacho sometime the beginning of November.  This will give us a good 4 1/2 months to see the world.

Waiting

We brought the RV out of storage and parked beside the park model, and cleaned the inside really good.  We had the outside washed as well as the truck by a company that specializes in washing RVs.  We had planned to head out on the 1st of June to Pinetop-Lakeside in the White Mountains which is north and east of Phoenix.  Temps there are also about 30 degrees cooler.  Our plans were to chill out, getting used to the RV living again, then head north - with our next stop at Navajo Valley National Monument.  And now we wait. There are wild fires in the mountains that we are watching and obviously we don't want to get caught in that.  There has been no rain since January - everything is in a severe drought and extreme conditions regarding fire hazards.  What I am surprised about is that trees are still green, the cactus are blooming, life is lush - in terms of dessert conditions.

Last week Dave started to feel pretty punky and ended up Thursday at our doctor's urgent care and he was diagnosed with sinus infection and bronchitis.  Medicine abounded.  Sunday he was not getting better, he was worse with pains in his leg, and, I was beginning to feel punky.  Yesterday morning we trekked back to the urgent care and now I have the sinus infection with bronchitis and he has an added diagnose of shingles.  Are we a mess or what?  So we sit tight, resting, drinking and eating our shlop for medicines.  And comfortable in the park model.  We still have about 2 days of packing the RV up, getting the fridge going so we can put food in it and then we can go.  Maybe, if we are well enough, we will be out by this Sunday.  The full-time residents here are sad we are sick but glad we are here.  They are all saying - why not stay all summer?  They don't want us to go.The doctor said she wasn't surprised that we have bronchial problems - too much smoke and dirt in the air.

Yesterday morning we captured and killed a diamond back rattlesnake, just looping across the roadway down two spots from us.  So, that makes 3 killed that we know of since May.  Great.  We need to get out of here!