I've been full of gratitude all week for my family coming down from Denver to visit and see some of my favorite plants and locations in southern Arizona. But first I have to issue a correction to my previous post wherein I claimed Aldo Leopold was instrumental in the creation of the first National Forest in the US, the Gila National Forest. Actually I don't know if the Gila National Forest was the first in the nation but the Gila Wilderness, within the Gila Nat'l Forest, was the first Wilderness area in the US, created in 1924, and Aldo Leopold was instrumental in that. That's what I'd misremembered. My apologies!
Anyway, I met the family in the Gila National Forest in western NM the afternoon of Saturday the 25th of April. We were originally going to go to this campground called Cosmic Campground which is one of two Dark Sky Sanctuaries in the US (as recognized by some international group) but due to the covid precautions all the national forest sites, be they visitor center, picnic area, campground, or certain trails, were closed (and the bathrooms were locked - D'oh!). So we improvised and went to a place I'd found on Sunflower Mesa, not too far from Cosmic Campground, and just due west of Alma, NM. This turned out to be better than Cosmic Campground in my estimation, because it was more private, and as it was a new moon that night we had a beautiful dark sky to enjoy.
The next day (Sunday) I'd been hoping we would make it all the way through several legs of a very scenic drive and end up northwest of Tucson at my Camp Kermit, but Owen had been in touch with a friend of his, Logan, who has been camping and climbing in southern AZ for a couple months now and he was interested in doing a climb with him so we decided to turn the first day into two days and detoured to the Cochise Mountains where we camped the second night.
Owen went for a climb the next morning and the rest of us wandered around admiring the heat and the rocks and the cacti and eventually we headed out and finally made it to Camp Kermit (Monday evening) after doing a lovely drive over Gates Pass Road just around sunset and coming down the west side to see fields and fields of blooming cholla. So beautiful, but unfortunately we were in vehicles and racing the sun to our campsite.
The next morning was Tuesday and we started off with an early walk to see the cacti and try to beat the day's heat. It was reaching the low 100s in Tucson at that point. After packing up camp we headed out to drive away the afternoon in air-conditioning and arrived in Margie's Cove in time for a beautiful sunset hike.
Wednesday morning Owen took his bike for a ride down a rocky ridge while Max filmed him with his drone. In the afternoon we drove south through Gila Bend and Ajo to my special place just north of the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. At one point on the BLM dirt roads during that drive my car thermometer was telling me it was 112 degress F outside! Nights were decent, though, always getting down at least into the upper 60s. So we cooled off at least 45 degrees that day from afternoon to early morning, with no change in the weather whatsoever (no cold front moving in, for instance).
Thursday morning Darcy and Eddie went a different way from myself and the boys because we all had different itineraries but we met up that night on the rimrock above Sedona for a final beautiful evening all together.
Friday morning Darcy and Eddie lit out directly for Denver to get back to work, but I decided to follow Max and Owen all the way through Navajo country and Monument Valley past Mexican Hat and up an incredible road onto the mesa south of Bear's Ears, Utah, where the three of us camped together for one final night.
That was last night and this morning we packed up, threw the disk around a bit, and the boys started their return run to Denver while I backtracked and took pictures of all the amazing scenery we'd been in too much of a hurry to stop for yesterday (stay tuned for those in the next blog) and now I'm in Page, Arizona, at the foot of Lake Powell, where I've come to access some services (grocery stores and auto parts for a minor electrical problem I've been having) and the internet. Groceries and phone signals are few and far between in northern Arizona and southern Utah and I expect I may be offline more often than not on the next phase of my explorations. But for now I'm chillaxin' in the Walmart parking lot and trying to decompress from having just completed such a fantastic dream come true adventure which I've been anticipating for many months.
Hoping you're all well and will stay that way!
Chris
