Took a short weekend trip to the Vermillion Cliffs area this past weekend. Long haul from Phoenix for just a couple days, but wanted to take advantage of the nice weather before it gets too hot in a couple weeks. We headed in through Marble Canyon and worked up through House Rock Valley Road, before turning off towards Poverty Flats and on to White Pocket. The area was fantastic – smaller than Coyote Buttes South – but no less interesting. Lots of amazing formations and colors. Probably should have shot a little later in the afternoon than we did – but still very cool. Had a minor disaster when the howling winds broke one of the support braces in the tent – due to my failure to guy it out. Fortunately we were able to use the guy lines to support the tent so we didn’t have to scrap the camping. Grilled up some nice burgers for dinner, and went for a nice walk through the formations when the full moon rose.
On Sunday we broke camp, drove through Pawhole and moved up to the Wire Pass trailhead for a short day hike. We hiked through the Wirepass Narrows and into Buckskin Gulch. While we only walked a couple miles into the Buckskin it was simply stunning. Huge sandstone walls rising up on either side with only a few feet between them. With the sun high in the sky, we got great colors and shadows.
Wish we had more than a couple days to hike and explore – but definitely worth the drive.
Headed out with some folks to explore some of the area west of Phoenix, ran the Big Horn Mountains trail and then on up to Harquahala Mountain. We started in Tonopah, heading west on Indian School a few miles then heading off north on an unmarked track that took us under the I10. From there it follows power lines for a few miles before crossing into Humingbird Springs Wilderness Area. You’re restricted to the main road here (never mind the cattle tearing the land), but it’s a sceneic, mellow ride. We searched a bit for Black Rock mine which one of the group recommended but were unable to find it. After having lunch up near Big Horn mine, we worked our way up to Eagle Eye road.
We continued on up to the mountain – the staging area is about 4-5 miles down the road. It’s not a difficult trail at all, but very steep shelf road on the last 3rd and low-range is a definite must coming down. Had great views and dramatic weather up there with the wind whipping around and snow flurries coming down. We walked around the old Smithsonian solar observatory, disappointed to find all the placards removed though.
There are a bunch of microwave arrays up there and solar powering them – apparently the microwave gear is for controlling the various canals in the area.
Took a run out to Sheep Bridge with the Arizona Land Cruiser Association. Was a nice day for it – sunny, but not too hot. The road from Seven Springs up to Bloody Basin was in good shape – with little washboarding and we made good time. Pressed on to the bridge and enjoyed a nice lunch down the by the river. The river was flowing too fast to be fordable unfortunately – but we were expecting that.
Unfortunately one of the members of the group had a mishap on the way out and rolled his truck – fortunately despite the scene looking pretty bad, he walked away with only a few stitches. The club members made sure that he made it to the hospital, valuables were recovered from the truck and the truck itself recovered the following day.
Not exactly how things are supposed to go, but at least there weren’t any serious injuries.
Had a nice daytrip through the Bulldog Canyon area with the AZLCA. Wasn’t much in the way of a challenge, but was a beautiful day and the scenery was spectacular. Followed up the the trail, but a nice lunch at Tortilla Flat – which was crowded as always during high season.
Had a great long weekend in San Antonio. Primarily went to attend the ABS Expo. First knife show I’d managed to attend in a few years and picked a great show to go to. While not all the makers I was hoping to talk to were in attendance, was still a great show and I didn’t go home empty handed.
In between the show we spent some time on the Riverwalk enjoying the local restaurants and watering holes and also did the obligatory tour at the Alamo.
Nice city and absolutely great weather.
Spent New Years week wandering Death Valley National Park. Was surprised to realize just how large and diverse the park is. Ranging from -287 ft below sea level at Badwater to over 11,000 ft at Telescope Peak. We drove through Vegas, past the beautiful Red Rock Canyon area to Death Valley on a Saturday. We camped the first few nights at Furnace Creek – which in retrospect was a bit of a mistake, given the crowds. The location did allow us easy access to some of the more prominent attractions including Dante’s View, Badwater and Gold Canyon – where we enjoyed some great hiking.
After leaving Furnace Creek we worked north to Scotty’s Castle to do the tours and hear the entertaining stories about the history of the mansion. We then moved on to the Racetrack Playa – one of the most talked about features of the park, including the famous ‘moving’ rocks. The ride down the road wasn’t nearly as difficult as advertised, though very washboarded. The playa was stunning, the ‘grandstand’ (a huge island of basalt rock in the middle of the playa) is just amazing. We enjoyed some great company at the campsite just south of the playa that night. Being the middle of winter, the road up to Eureka Dunes was marked closed and we opted not challenge it, given we were on our own.
We moved down to Stovepipe Wells (a terrible campsite – more of a parking lot) to enjoy some hiking on the Dunes and up through Mosaic Canyon. Really pretty attractions – just a bummer the campsite was so boring.
Also took a quick trip up to the Charcoal Ovens just below Telescope Peak and then worked over to Darwin Falls. Was pretty weird seeing a running waterfall surrounded by desolate desert.
A nice trip though if we go again it will be to spend time in the more remote areas of the park we weren’t able to get to this trip.
Had a great 12 day trip through the Moab area. We started leaving Phoenix early on a Saturday headed up to Valley of the Gods. Just past Mexican hat we turned off onto Valley of the Gods road, drove in a few miles and found a great campsite with an amazing view. The following day we headed up the Moki Dugway on our way to Natural Bridges National Monument for some hiking among the stunning natural bridges.
After some hiking we headed up to Moab for a nice bed before heading onto the White Rim Road in Canyonlands National Park. Unfortunately we knew the weather was starting to shift but the rangers thought we’d be find so we picked up our permits and headed down the Shafer Switchbacks onto the rim. Had a beautiful day, even seeing some desert big horn sheep – a ewe and a kid. We camped at the Airport campsite – which wasn’t the most stunning site but still very nice. The wind starting picking up really good late in the afternoon blowing the impending storm into the area. The following day we headed on to our campsite at Murphy Hogback. By the time we got there the weather had really started to turn and the rain started shortly after. Heck of a storm that blew through that night – thought it would take the tent down several times – but the OzTent stood tough and kept up dry and sheltered all night.
After exiting Canyonlands we headed over to Arches National Park for a few nights. We really enjoyed all the day hikes to the typical sites – Landscape Arch, Delicate Arch & the Windows. The highlight though was the taking the road over to Tower Arch and down past the Whales Eye.
We regrouped in Moab for a night, before heading down to the Needles area. Sadly we found out that the Horse Canyon area was closed due to rain, which put a crimp in our plans. We drove the road out to the Colorado Overlook which was very cool. After that we tried to head over Elephant Hill to the Devil’s Kitchen campground. The trail is a little rougher than Kim wanted to do though, so we turned back and headed to Durango for the night.
Had a great dinner in Durango, and visited Mesa Verde the following day. Part of the park was closed for the season, but did get to enjoy some of the more visited ruins without much of a crowd at all.
From Mesa Verde we worked down to Chaco Canyon National Historic Park to spend night and day learning about the site, the ruins and the various theories about what it was all for.
Aside from the storm and generally colder than expected temperatures, it was a great trip and we’re looking forward to getting back to Canyonlands to conquer Elephant Hill and visit the remote Maze district.
Managed to get up to Wyoming again this year for deer hunting. Sandwiched the trip between two weeks of IT training, which made for a nice break.
Saw a bunch of whitetail and mulies as usual – but nothing particularly special. Did end up taking a nice 4×4, though if I’d had a little more time to think about it I might not have pulled the trigger – not quite as big as I initially thought. At any rate had a fabulous time and we managed to managed to get my grandfather a deer, which at his age was quite an accomplishment.
Spent Labor Day week in on the Big Island of Hawaii. As we’d just been a couple years ago, we didn’t plan to do much. Mostly we just wanted to hang out and enjoy the beach. Took a couple of snorkel trips which were enjoyable though we didn’t see quite the variety of fish that we did on the previous trip. Did get to see some big eels though snorkeling off the beach at Mauna Loa resort.
One of the highlights was a trip up Mauna Kea to see the telescopes and do some stargazing. We’d tried to do this on the last trip but had got clouded out – glad we were able to do it this trip.
Great weather, great food and an overall wonderful trip!
Had the first workshop class on Tuesday night – very cool. Mesa Arts Center has a pretty cool setup for the welding/blacksmithing lab – with a workshop and a balcony area for the forges, etc. Had a couple forges setup and pretty much got right to it. Used the black sand, some borax glass and graphite crucibles – loaded them up in the forge and gave them about an hour.
Interesting to see how the different forge designs affect the crucibles differently. One of the forges had the burner aimed right at the top of the crucible and just ate through the tops in short order. The other one had the burner toward the back of the forge and seemed to be a lot easier on the crucibles, as well as generating more heat.
Each of the six students in the class managed to get through one button. We’ll have a 3rd forge next week and hope to get through a couple per student so that we can start building a paddle during the following class.
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