22 x 2

As our 44th anniversary trip winds down, we put the icing on the cake with a few more activities.  The Gila River remains a big draw for us, and it did not disappoint, despite relatively low water levels after the summer "nonsoon" season brought only minimal moisture to the area.  

The road into the Gila Box Conservation Area has been blacktopped, but remains mostly a single lane with long straight dropoffs - slightly offputting but then not as terrifying as some we've driven, and the views are stupendous.

I'm always happy when I'm near water, even more when it's a running stream. 

The weather was clement, would have been perfect for swimming; however, we were all about fishing that day, so fish we did.  I thought we might catch smallmouth bass out of that pool, but it was a successful catfish day.

This was the largest one I caught that day, and he was a good'un indeed.

For future reference, we explored upstream a ways, gaining access around flood debris by skirting along the overhanging cliff edge, where we found more good fishing holes. 

Cranes & Casey . . .

As long as we were kinda close to Willcox, we thought, we should see if our wonderful pal Casey was up for a visit.  We did, and she was, much to our delight.

 

Casey mentioned that some of the sandhill cranes had returned for their winter roost; I could not have been more incredulous when we saw not a few, but thousands at a nearby water reclamation spot.  They were mostly grounded for the night, jostling for space and discussing the day amongst themselves in their usual most raucous way.

As is my wont, I was excited at the sight - very excited - so excited in fact that when I hopped out of the truck for the 300th or so photo, my camera caught and hit the ground - an alarming event, but fortunate in that only the UV filter was broken.

This is a first for my blog: a short video, because it's impossible to convey quite what it's like when these thousands of birds gather.   Give it a listen if you like.

Very cool to see moonrise over Dos Cabezas while we were there.

So, the Solomons . . .

. . . really piqued my interest when I began reading about Isadore & Anna, for whom the tiny town of Solomonville is named.  They were said to be Polish immigrants, and they made a substantial mark on Arizona history.  As I researched more, I discovered that although they did emigrate the day after they wed, Isadore had already been busy in the U.S., Pennsylvania to be exact, and returned to the old country to marry Anna and bring her here.  They were actually German, residing in an area that is now Poland.

They originally settled in Pennsylvania, where their first three children were born, before relocating to Arizona territory where they were preceded by at least one family member.  Impressive indeed what they accomplished from meager beginnings!

This is what Anna had to say about their overland journey:

“We sold everything we possessed except our three children, and started on our journey to New Mexico.  We had a very hard trip even on the railroad, traveling with those three babies was bad enough, but when we reach La Junta, the end of the railroad in those days, and had to travel by stage, packed in like sardines, traveling day and night for six days… When we got there I was so tired out to death.” 

I'm glad that Anna didn't sell her three children.  She may have been exhausted from that difficult trip, but soon recovered, and the family quickly commenced to build a life and a community.

As part of his commercial endeavors, Isadore eventually opened a bank.  As stated on this plaque, the existing building is a two-thirds-scale replica of his original bank that anchored what was known as the Solomon commercial block.

How easy it would be to drive through this or any of a multitude of other burgs that are slipping slowly into decrepitude without knowing the once thriving atmosphere.  The few remaining commercial buildings are shuttered and deteriorating.  Some of the adobe residential structures have been maintained and revitalized; others are left to slowly slump under the weight of weather. 

Anna Solomon maintained a sizable hotel as one of her pursuits; it was the social center of town.  In addition to the bank, promoting the establishment of Graham County and serving as County treasurer, Isadore operated a flour mill, stage line, mercantile establishment, charcoal kilns and farms that supplied various military forts.

To say that they were ambitious seems quite the understatement.  The couple, with their six children, eventually moved to Los Angeles, where they spent their final years. 

It is fascinating to me to imagine the many lives lived fully as we live ours, and that we never have an inkling about - what fun I have learning a bit about some who venture into my radar!

Birds . . .

I will not try to name all the birds we identified on the trip; however, roadrunners were notable in their large numbers, more than I've ever seen before, and the cardinals that frequented our feeders were delightful, and of course those thousands of sandhill cranes put on the most incredible show, even though they were simply settling for the night.

 

An unfortunate addendum . . .

Anticipating an early Saturday afternoon arrival at home, we were tooling along on the 202 freeway through Phoenix when we heard a loud noise from the trailer.  Quick as could be, the señor guided us to a stop in the gore strip, a triangular area where an on ramp merges with freeway traffic.

Thinking we must have had a blowout, a quick check soon revealed something far more dire: the left-side leaf spring had broken, and we were officially broken down with one lane of traffic immediately to our right, and three lanes of traffic immediately to our left.  And when I say "immediately", I mean that each speeding vehicle (and there were sooo many) caused us to rock back & forth.

We felt extremely unsafe where we were, and more so when we exited the truck.  The good news, or so we thought, was that we had roadside assistance insurance.  I even cavalierly remarked, "This is why we have insurance".  

That was about half past noon.  Nearly eight hours later, well after dark, each passing moment filled with worry about our precarious situation, the Wolf Pup was carefully loaded onto a flatbed tilt trailer and taken to a storage yard for delivery to a repair shop on Monday.

During those hours, we became well acquainted with three different DPS officers, DPS dispatch folks and more Good Sam insurance people than we cared to.  I lived through the ordeal and even I would be hard-pressed to explain why it took eight hours to make something happen.  Suffice it to say that we put two cell phones to good use while keeping our seat belts fastened in case some 90 mph vehicle should plow into us.  

What a shame that we were far too distracted and distraught to write the great American novel while we sat there.

Hot springs & cemeteries

I find myself less than 100% regarding explorations of the area we are camped, due in most part, I'm certain, to the pace that I was maintaining at home.  Now that I'm away, I find myself kicking back a bit mentally to some ease of days.  Of the many places hereabout to be explored, fished, hiked, photographed or discovered, my mind allows me to say "mañana", which is not to say we're doing nothing; it's just that we're not attempting to do it all at once.

Our rainy arrival here continued wet through another day and night.  Mt. Graham did not release its wreath of moisture-laden clouds for yet another day, making for some ethereal scenes.

Unsettled weather made a perfect time to be inside for a soak & a massage at Kachina Spa. 

In an odd twist of fate, my massage therapist there was going that very night to a place that I have read much about and have wanted to visit.  The rub (pardon the expression) is that it is private; access is only with permission.  A historic hot spring spa with a fascinating past, including a huge guitar-shaped pool and once being owned by Mick Jagger, I have written about it before, but have never been able to gain access.  

And . . . said therapist invited us along - wow! - but continuing rain & lightning deterred us - dang!  It seemed less than optimum, so we declined the kind invitation.

Solomonville, now reduced to Solomon, is an area that has drawn us, with its ancient crumbling adobes and ramshackle buildings surrounded by fields of cotton - the nearly sole crop in the Gila Valley.  The town was the seat of government for Graham County from 1883 to 1915.

You can be certain if there's a Solomonville, there is a Solomon: in this case, an enterprising Polish couple - Isadore & Anna - who emigrated to the U.S. the day after their wedding, and who affected the course of history in southeastern Arizona.

 

That ambitious enterprising couple commenced creating and supplying charcoal to the copper mines, and continued to expand their influence with multiple merchandising endeavors, hotels, banks, livestock, farming, milling & freighting, to name a few, and Isadore was appointed county treasurer. 

Other pioneers followed as the mines, farms, economy and governing bodies waxed and waned.

Because the Solomons eventually removed to California, they are not buried here.  One family, in particular, drew our attention the first time we drove to the graveyard.  In fact, the matriarch, Rosalia, spoke to Chris from the grave; he wrote her story in a hauntingly beautiful song.  We visited her once more, realizing that when she was born in 1836, that place was still part of Mexico, being prior to the Gadsden Purchase, and that when she died in 1921, it was United States territory.

The majority of the burials there are marked only by haphazardly placed piles of stones punctuated by creosote bushes.

At the end of the day, we returned to the Graham Cemetery on another hilltop across the valley to leave flowers for my sweet sister-in-law, Sharon, and to remember her and her extended family & forebears who are there.  She & I were both Sunday births, and I loved her dearly.

Our day may have been bookmarked by graveyard visits, but the bulk of it was off on an explore.  Smarting from missing our chance to go to Indian Hot Spring, we headed off for one that is open to the public, but that we had never checked out.

And along the way as usual, we found other things of interest, including an abandoned ranch house constructed of poured concrete, replete with extensive corrals and the crumpled remains of a windmill, since replaced efficiently by a solar-powered well pump.

 

As we were out walking up a knoll on the ranch, we were startled and excited by two very low-flying large aircraft.  They seemed to be skimming along following the various levels of the terrain.  We watched as they passed right over us and then gained enough elevation to cross a pass between two mountain peaks.

Usually, despite distractions along the way, we attain our destination goal, and that day was no exception.  Hot Well Dunes promised a hot springs, a tantalizing prize at the end of a drive.  When we arrived, we were surprised that no one else was in sight as we set off through the brush on what appeared to be a path winding around gnarled tamarisk and thick brush.

In an opening through the chaparral, we found a scuzzy waterhole reminiscent of many a cow tank throughout the west.  Was that the hot spring we were promised, because if it was, there would be no dipping on our part.  The site is a BLM recreation area with the major attraction being sand dune ripping & tearing on ATVs, so we wondered if the hot spring was so low on the list of appeals that we had found our shangri-la.

Fortunately, after our walkabout, we pressed on and found that a few folks were camped here & there, and that there really were hot spring pools - two to be exact, and that no one else was utilizing them.

The señor called this shot "The life of Riley-ette", and so it seemed.  The crystal clear water flowing through the pool felt about 103 degrees, perfect for repeated relaxed soaks followed by lying back on the cool concrete, feet in the water, head pillowed on a towel and an almost imperceptible breeze on wet skin.

As with so many things, there is a story with Hot Well Dunes.  The site is out in the midst of a prehistoric lake bed many miles in diameter. In 1928, there was an entity test drilling for oil; instead, at about 1,900 depth, they hit hot water that ran to the surface as an artesian well at about 106 degrees.

The Bureau of Land Management has made improvements and monitors the site where water flows across the desert surface, creating a small riparian environment in the midst of sand dunes left behind when the lake evaporated.  In addition to nature's sand, man has left behind huge drilling machinery parts.  I can never understand how much equipment is left to rust away in the boonies, but I've seen it in many places.  Why is it not worthwhile to haul it out to use elsewhere?