Valentine's Day by the Dolores River

We had not been out in such a long time that when we finally got one day to get out, we took up the opportunity. So even though my beautiful wife may have usually preferred a traditional Valentine's date, we decided this would be our best chance to get out. Wanting to avoid snow and get out in the sunshine a bit, we headed down in elevation to Bedrock and back to the Dolores River. This time we drove all the way to the big parking area and walked from there. Instead of a pregnant wife, we had a nine month old baby. We were trying out the baby backpack given to us by John and Mindy. We appreciate it and so did Zyla as she looked pretty comfy in there. Jacqueline got the fun of seeing the cute baby the whole time and I got the job of mule. Zyla's new favorite thing she learned on this hike was that there are many different trees out there with lots of different textures. She wanted to grab every branch we went passed after I showed her some for the first time. We had a fairly warm day as it felt good to be in just a fleece. The trail was nothing new as we followed the same route as last time heading down by the river at first, then getting away from it, and eventually coming back. My main goal was just to make it farther than we did the previous time we hiked the trail and we did. Once the wind started to pick up, Jacqueline was a bit worried about how Zyla would handle it. Zyla seemed as unconcerned as normal, but we did finally stop and let her get out of the backpack for a while. We did not make it once again to the dino tracks or to the confluence of La Sal Creek, but this time we made it up onto the higher point to get a view. On the way back Zyla checked out some trees until it was all too much for her. She fell asleep and suddenly one side of my backpack was a lot heavier than the other. We let her sleep and consider ourselves lucky to have such an easy baby who tends to live in the now with her environment and just deal with what is in front of her. We look forward to many more jaunts with little Z and the family.

Wilson Mountain

Having the entire week off for Thanksgiving, Jacqueline, Zyla and I went down to Sedona to have Thanksgiving with Jacqueline's aunt Kris. It is a close enough drive so as not to put the baby in the car for too long. We arrived on Tuesday and on Wednesday we went for our first hike. We took the Boynton Canyon trail that left from the end of the Dry Creek Road. The weather was not looking too hot, in fact it was looking cold. We bundled up the baby and ventured out. It followed a resort community for a while and then we got away from it. Along the way we talked to a couple on the trail. There were a lot of people out on the trail for such a chilly day. It began to hail or snow or sleet, we couldn't tell, so we high tailed it out of there to make sure the baby didn't get too cold. The big hike of the trip, though, was Wilson Mountain. I looked through the guidebooks for the most strenuous hike and found that one, which also happened to be the highest mountain in Sedona. I got up super early on Saturday to make the 30 minute drive from Jacqueline's aunt's house in Cornville to the trailhead, just across the bridge going up Oak Creek Canyon. There was one other car at the trailhead as I started up the trail. The weather was chilly. The trail climbed steadily above Wilson Canyon named after a man who was killed by a grizzly bear there in the late 1800s. The views were great and while I was going uphill, it was nowhere near difficult. This was definitely one that could be called a mountain hike instead of a mountain climb. I could see where the trail was going but sometimes in Arizona it seems there are too many options for where to put a trail. Eventually though I got to where the trail came up to a plateau. From there I could choose which way to go and I continued to climb up. The trail was in its worst condition here, a little muddy and grown over with a few trees down, but eventually I came up to where I was close to the top of the mountain. I saw some white tail deer running away to one summit, but the other one said Sedona view, so I took that one. As I was heading there, I saw another hiker, first of the day, coming back from the summit. He was running and looked a little younger than me. Good for him as I continued to the summit and got a few pictures before I started back down the way I came. I was hustling because we still had to drive all the way home to Norwood, because we were trying to beat a storm. It is a little funny to hike so far and still be able to see where you started as the bridge was always in my view on the hike. The hike was somewhere around eleven miles, but I was able to get to the top before ten and back to the car before noon. When I was leaving the trailhead, there was major competition for a parking spot. It made me glad that I did rise and shine so early, so we could get back and avoid the long drive through winter weather. I really enjoyed the hike as Sedona has puzzled me in the past for a spot for recreation, but this was a great choice for a Saturday in late November.

Cashin Mine

My wife and baby were in Michigan going to Jacqueline's high school reunion. They left me all alone in Norwood, so I talked to the music teacher at the school and he was down for a weekend hike. We both had Friday off of school, so I called him up early in the morning to see if he was game. He said he was and there was an area I had been wanting to check out. On the drive to Moab from Norwood, there is a canyon that cuts through the scenery and winds its way down to the Dolores River. This seemed like an excellent trip. After doing some research online, I learned that there were some old mines in that area. Seemed interesting, so we went for that. It was about an hour's drive from Norwood to where we parked the car at a big pulloff. We could see a road below us and the terrain did not look too crazy so I asked him if he wanted to just start from here. Jeff looked a little apprehensive, but we slowly picked our way down running into very few obstacles until we hit the road. You have heard the expression "Alpine Start" well this was a desert start. From that point we just followed the road. Almost immediately we ran into a waterfall. We never got a good picture of it though, as it was obscured by vegetation and we did not want to cross the little creek we were following. Jeff was very impressed by the canyon country and all the rock. It was not long before we began running into mines. We saw the first one up the hill, so we climbed up to it. I was amazed that it was actually big enough for us to stand up in. We were not able to go very far back because neither of us had a flashlight, but we went as far back using what we could muster for light. I did not have a camera either, so I relied on Jeff to take some pictures. We did not have to go far to run into our next prospect and we could start to see why this area was hit so hard. With all the multi-colored rocks, we knew there were copper like material coming out of it along with probably much more stuff that you would have to be a mineralogist to know about. We were just appreciating the history that was in this area knowing that it must have been a much more thriving area when the mines were active here. Continuing down the road we ran into the first of the big mines which was the Cliff Dweller Mine. But the big one was at the end of the road and that was the Cashin Mine. There were dozens of buildings to house miners, many prospects, and a large mill that was still standing. We walked through the middle of it which was a little creepy. I figured if it could stand up in a Norwood windstorm, it would make it through a beautiful sunny October day. We climbed up on the cliff side to explore another prospect and you could tell that this one was the mother lode. It still had tracks running through it and we walked over to where there was a big vertical shaft. We were only able to go so far, but were glad we made it that far. As we came out, we walked over to the mill. I was not going to walk the tracks over to it, though, as that would have been foolish. I climbed up a steeper slope to where there was another prospect. Jeff had started calling me Bear from that guy Bear Grills on the Discovery Channel. This last one was not very exciting, so we went back down to explore some of the old falling down buildings. From there we headed back enjoying the stream and the beautiful fall colors. I thought about taking Jacqueline and Zyla back to this area. It would be a good off season hike. The hike back proved to be a lot quicker without all of the stops along the way. The climb out was not too bad either and we were left with much time to enjoy the rest of a much needed day off from teaching.