Caninus Lupus Surprizus
February 27, 2015

So, to cut right to the chase with no buildup whatsoever - we saw wolves in the wild!  In fact, we were so startled by the sighting that our brains took a while to comprehend the fact.  You may believe it or not; you may argue it all you want; you may say it is not possible, but the fact remains that we saw wolves while hiking the back country in the Agua Fria National Monument.

It happened thus: As we hiked along a wash bottom, I spotted what appeared to be a man-made rock wall far above on the canyon rim.  That conjecture led us to scramble and bushwhack our way up the steep and rocky cliffside to see what we could see.

Sure enough, it was a built-up rock lip, not prehistoric as we first thought, but something more recent, evidently a rancher’s catchment of sorts to keep cattle from escaping down into the drainage.  The climb was a bit strenuous and we had been hiking for a spell, so we opted to take a rest and enjoy the view from our newly-gained vantage point.

A rock wall sits high up from the sand wash below.

I shot some photos of the vastness of our higher surroundings whilst we tanked up on water.  After a bit of talking and resting, movement in the high grass back from the rim caught my eye.  When I turned in that direction, my brain immediately said “antelope”.  As I focused on one of the two creatures, I realized that it was what my brain then identified as “coyote after an antelope”.  Keep in mind here that these were instantaneous reactions, come and gone in a flash.

Focusing on the second animal, I then thought they were both coyotes.  They had risen up from their resting place in the tall dry grass and were looking directly at us.  They did not seem particularly spooked - we were more startled than they; however, they did turn and begin heading away from us, stopping to glance back now and then.

It was then that I decided to photograph them.  This is the result:

Can you spot the wolves in the photo?  No, of course not, because I was far too excited and flailing about to actually locate them in the viewfinder.

Excitement prevailed to the detriment of getting a shot of them.  Zooming the camera and then trying to find the subjects in the view finder while exhorting Chris to help me and flailing away with the camera one way and another, I managed to get a photo of landscape and totally missed the animals.

As we animatedly discussed the encounter, we began to realize that we had seen wolves, not coyotes at all.  We got to watch them for a quite a while as their exit from our proximity was nothing more than a relatively leisurely trot across the mesa top until they finally disappeared over a rocky ridge.

The animals were quite large, nearer to the size of a German shepherd if one could be said to judge such while in the throes of such agitation, lacked the narrow pointy snouts of a coyote, and had fur of a somewhat reddish hue.

So there you have it - the most excitement of our year so far!

The diversity of that vast area is immense.  This view shows the grassy mesa tops which are in turn ringed by ranges of mountains.

Much of the countryside is volcanic in origin which results in rugged canyons and gnarly footing through rough rockiness often obscured by grass.

Some of the Monument's canyons are wide-bottomed and sand-filled, the result of ravaging floods that occur periodically.

Humanity’s leavings, prehistoric and otherwise . . .

Interestingly, our wolf encounter led us to other discoveries, just as the rock wall led us to the wolves, which we would never have seen otherwise.  Prior to that, we had been heading downstream in the dry wash - sometimes it offered a wide flat surface that was deep enough with loose sand to make walking quite a chore.

 Other aspects of it manifested as rubbley river rock that was tough hiking as well.

At any rate, we were curious if there might be a den where we first encountered the wolves, so that determined our direction of travel.  No den in sight, but just beyond, we found the ruins of a prehistoric rock dwelling and a “pot drop”, a place where one ceramic pot had broken some millennia past, and other pottery scatters.

A scattering of potsherds near an ancient habitation.

Chris is standing in the midst of the rubble that once was a two-room prehistoric habitation.

Powerless to resist, our feet led us in the direction the wolves had taken.  We were incredulous to actually encounter a wolf once more, which I assume was one of the pair we spotted earlier.  Pretty sure I saw a thought bubble above his head that said something like “What in hades are they doing here; I thought I had gotten rid of them”.

Ira and George at the Cross Y . . .

It was interesting to find another even longer rock wall before we wandered off that mesa top.  That is country that my Dad rode in when he was coyboying at the Cross Y Ranch.  I couldn't help but wonder if he had used those catchments at the edge of the high country’s escarpments to gather cattle.

 When he used to talk about trying to round up wild cows in that country, he would talk about how crazed it was working in Lousy Canyon.  At the time, I thought that was merely his description of how rough it was there - turns out it really is the name of that particular canyon.

The Monument covers much of the Cross Y range that Dad and George Berryhill worked.  Ira and George were lifelong friends and were so happy to have that later-in-life opportunity to work together out there.  They shared many long days of hard, hard work and had a myriad of experiences that lent themselves to yarns for later spinning.

Many of us in their families were privileged to spend time there, also, with Dad showing us his trap lines, and enjoying his and George’s pit barbecues that drew huge crowds; one couple flew in their private plane from Germany for the event every year.  Dad and that gentleman were prone to imbibe in a bit of apricot brandy or peppermint schnapps together in celebration of life.

Birds . . .

On our drive into the Monument, we were not too surprised to spot ravens and a red-tailed hawk looking for its morning meal.  Not nearly as common was a beautiful kestrel that insisted on keeping just ahead of us while landing on successive road-side vegetation.  I wondered why it didn't simply move away from the road if our approach disturbed it.  Others, reminiscent of our back-yard birds, were western scrub jay, white-crowned sparrow and northern flicker.  Another that we identified on that mostly dry hike was a curve-billed thrasher.

Gila woodpeckers were creating a racket around a very large half-dead sycamore tree in a drainage bottom.

Not surprisingly, a black phoebe was hunting as we stopped for a short hike along Silver Creek and down to the Agua Fria River.

For the times when the river is at flood stage, the Horseshoe Ranch has installed a suspension foot bridge; it allows folks to leave their vehicles behind and walk to the headquarters when the low-water crossing is not passable.

It appears that the Horseshoe is operating in partnership with private foundations and the Game & Fish Department.

This was our peaceful perch for lunch - shaded, just up from the wash bottom - while admiring the rocky outcroppings across the way and awesome clouds blown into odd formations by high winds.

A dried seed pod of a devil's claw plant.  The root of a plant by that name is used as an anti-inflammatory especially for relief from arthritis pain, although I am not positive if it is this plant or another by the same name.

And home . . .

Meanwhile, back home, we enjoy the beauty of our surroundings at Watson Lake . . .

. . . and Willow Lake.

Gaining years
February 18, 2016

In the category of “life is good”, I ensconced myself in the back yard by the fountain to write a few things about a recent boondock, the only jaunt we have taken for what feels like millennia.  With the advent of spring (at least in my mind), we come to the end of a self-imposed exile from the wonders of the natural world. 

Okay, so it’s a little melodramatic, but it’s been a long cold wettish winter and I don’t at all care for being out in cold wettish weather, so I have been mostly indoors, and indoors is not where I thrive.

I fully understand that winter is far from over here in the mountains of Yavapai County; it’s just that it seems so much easier to endure on the downhill side than when one is facing the entire dark season.

Longer days, more sunlight, incredibly balmy, even warm days rouse me to restlessness and remembrance of where my wellness resides - outside.

A birthday . . .

Yea, long ago in the first week of January, I opined that it would be lovely to celebrate Chris’ birthday with a drive down to lower elevations, followed perhaps by an evening repast at the T-Bird Cafe.  Six weeks later, we found ourselves at long last with better weather but still bogged chin-deep (the melodramatic mood lingers still) in The Great Photo Project.

The primary reason for huddling indoors throughout the winter – The Great Photo Project – is one of those things that has been hanging over my head for years and demanded to be taken care of at this juncture.  It involves organizing, identifying as best we can, and scanning thousands of old, old and not-so-old family pictures so that they can be shared. 

In addition, the time is ripe for digitizing the entirety of our family history source material, so that overwhelming project is also happening apace.  Yes, it will be heady indeed when this work is behind us; getting there is feeling ever more torturous as I ping off the walls yearning for that “out there” experience.

Gratitude . . .

Attempting to put my little pity party aside, I am grateful for my day in the sun and for all the others that will surely follow.  As that particular jaunt was ostensibly to commemorate the señor’s special day, I generously allowed him to choose our direction of travel.  Well, to be completely truthful, I did veto his first choice but only because it wasn’t a very good one.  Clearly, he needs my guidance, as I continue to point out to him at every opportunity.

On the way . . .

As we drove away from responsibilities, my heart lightened with the anticipation of discovering what is to be found.  Always, new surroundings bring new perspectives; there’s just something about rolling down the road without a plan that engenders excitement and eagerness.

Heading away down south, we took Iron Springs Road through Skull Valley.  As we crossed the railroad tracks, Chris made his usual remark about how sad it is that the Skull Valley general store closed up shop and I responded with my usual agreement - some things never change, unlike the Skull Valley general store.

We took the turnoff to Hillside which set me to thinking about Mom, only because I recall a photo of her and an early boyfriend by the name of Dub Whatley who lived in Hillside.  Most likely he was either a cowboy or a miner - not much else happening in that region; of course that was before her cowboy, Ira Kelley, captured her heart.

Decrying development . . .

In my younger years, it was almost always possible to set off on bumpy dirt ranch roads that criss-crossed the landscape.  Now, however, that has become the exception.  More and more back roads are gated and posted: surely the result of city yahoos who lack respect for the land and the people who ranch it.  They cut fences, leave gates open and destroy property, leaving landowners no choice but to restrict access to us all.

All of which is a prelude to saying it took us quite a while to find a suitable route off the small highway we were following.  In this case, our route was a recently widened and graded ranch road, winding this way and that as it maintained its ridgetop vantage point. 

The decision about when to stop was made for us when we arrived at a locked gate.  The surprise, though, was after we crawled through the gate to begin our hike.  Inexplicably, signs on the opposite side of the gate warned us not to trespass whence we had just come, giving as the reason that locked gates were ahead.  The reality was that there were not only no locked gates in the direction we had come, there were no gates at all, not even a fence to put one on.

That openness and upgraded roadway pretty well convinced me the area is slated for residential development like so much of the West's open rangeland.

As we surveyed from our stopping place, tell-tale cottonwoods over that-a-way beckoned with the promise of a spring or at least a canyon with sub-surface water, and off we went.

The region was marked by wonderful rocky outcroppings, some reminiscent of Prescott's granite dells and others were clumps and rows of gigantic stone spires.

Gaining the bottom-land as we entered a canyon, the terrain leveled out and the vegetation varied to reflect the change.

Our approach through the rough and brushy country alerted a herd of javelina to our presence.  As we descended one side of the canyon, they scrambled away up the opposite slope. 

Despite the arid landscape all around, a spring was flowing in the canyon bottom, only to disappear back below the surface after a half mile or so. 

The water's flow in this section was slowed, creating a wide boggy area where we crossed.

"Don't worry about getting older", they say; "You'll still do stupid things, only slower."  Yup, that boggy place proved the observation.  Note to self: If companion crosses mucky place successfully, follow in those footsteps. 

We followed the watercourse upstream to its origin and then farther on until the canyon boxed us off.  At some past time, it might have been possible to go up and out, but the way is now blocked by huge fallen boulders.  Just below them, a tiny pool of water has surfaced.  Judging from the large sand deposit, an impressive waterfall must flow over those boulders at times.

The one thing we expected to find in that riparian area was birds - nary a one the entire time we were there - none calling, none singing, not flitting.

I was astonished to find this bee tree!  It appeared that the hive had been hidden in the hollow interior, but became exposed as the tree began to split open.  The bees were continuing about their business.  I was very happy that they had no interest in us.  Dad used to tell stories of raiding trees such as this for the honey in his Texas days.

Life in that canyon bottom must be tough, to judge by the convolutions of some of the trees.

A large stand of piñons was off in one direction and a large stand of crucifixion thorns in the opposite direction.  For some reason, these two specimens were growing together in complete isolation from any of their kind.

 Climbing back out of the lowlands afforded a better perspective of what was above our box canyon.  From up top, with the binoculars, I was surprised to spot a small enclave of piñon trees higher on the slope.  The area calls to me still: I'd like to return and bypass the canyon, climbing up to the treed area and the saddle beyond.

Date Creek . . .

Chris was interested in checking out Date Creek, and because it was his birthday trip, I concurred.  Okay, so I would have anyway, but this sounds more gift-like.  Those slightly lower elevations exhibited spring in a way we haven't seen at home yet.  Startling stands of lush green grass beautifully punctuated the mesquite thickets.

 At least one of us appears to be having a good time.  Can you guess which one?

Whooo?

With the exception of a few stagnant pools, Date Creek was dry, inexplicable given the winter moisture we've had.

As we trooped along the sandy, sometimes rocky stream bed, I was thrilled to spy a great horned owl overhead, evidently awoken by our stumblings and mumblings.  He did not budge from his roost despite eyeing us and surveying the surrounding countryside.

We hiked on for a goodly distance before retracing our steps downstream.  As we approached the owl's tree again, we thought the bird had moved when we saw it on the other side of the tree.  Despite searching fairly thoroughly when we saw the first owl, we were astounded to discover that there was a second one.  It was better hidden by branches but more obvious from the other direction.  It was bigger than the first, likely the female of the pair.  What a fun find that was!

The great horned variety were not the only owls there.  As we bushwhacked through a particularly overgrown section, we spooked out a pair of barn owls.  Their behavior was entirely different from the other duo; as we got too near, they would swoop low through the brush to a roost farther away from us, then repeat the process every time we got closer.

As we stopped in the streambed for a snack, the quiet was broken by another pair of birds - two Gila woodpeckers had quite a lot to say about something and they chattered loudly throughout much of our hike.   A flock of Gambel's quail flushed out ahead of us; other than those, our hikes were not very birdy.  Along the way, we also identified common raven, red-tailed hawk, red-shafted northern flicker, dark-eyed junco, white-crowned sparrow, horned lark, western kingbird, canyon towhee and chipping sparrow.

Further down the road, we spotted another much larger example of avian life, this one unidentified even when viewed with binoculars.

The señor, who knows about these things, said this was the largest hackberry tree he had ever seen.

The T-Bird Cafe . . .

Perhaps our favorite eatery in the area is in an unassuming old rock building in Peeples Valley.  An accidental discovery, the T-Bird Cafe is a true gem.  Their hand-tossed wood-fired pizza is more than worth the drive, and I highly recommend beginning the meal with bread sticks the like of which I have never encountered elsewhere.

If you go, be sure to tell them where you heard about it; who knows, I may get a free pizza out of the deal.

Katie, hard at work at the wood-fired pizza oven.

A takeout box was not necessary; it was far too scrumptious not to finish it on the spot.