Chiricahua National Monument, AZ

Wanting to continue our trek east to get closer to home, we return to Chiricahua (pron. Cheer-ee-CAH-wah) National Monument in southeast Arizona. We were first here as RV rookies only a few months into our new RV travelling lifestyle, and experienced our most difficult boondocking "night from hell". We are now much wiser and more experienced understanding better our and the trailer's capabilities.

It turns out there are a few campsites for big rigs like ours in the national forest adjacent to the park. There is even a very large camping area up Pinery Canyon Road about 7 miles from the highway where a large gathering is currently occurring - the Valentine's Rainbow Reunion - a group of about 50 pretty well-behaved hippies. Anyway, we manage to squeeze into this gorgeous little spot, under the ponderosa pines with a creek flowing right behind the trailer. I love falling asleep to that babbling brook sound. And Grady absolutely loves his walks here. Sometimes he just finds a sunny spot under the trees, rolls over onto his back and suns his belly for 10 minutes.

We drive further up Pinery Canyon Road in the Coronado National Forest. Near the peak, there is still some ice and slush on the road even though we have hit a heat wave here and the temps are over 60F during the day. This icy falls reminds us that it's still winter, and at this elevation (over 7,000 feet) we could be experiencing snow.

photo given a "surreal" effect to enhance the features - see Brad in the back? There are only a few hikes in the park, and we can't remember which one we did during our previous visit. So we just select the one that isn't too long, or too short. Lo and behold, it's partly the same trail we did before! This is at the Grottoes on the Echo Canyon trail, the most popular trail in the park. Last time though, this is as far as we ventured before turning back since we were constrained by time. This year we have several days to explore, so we continue and do the entire loop, about 4 miles.

Marilyn on the Echo Canyon Trail. Some of these rock pinnacles are hundreds of feet high.

Brad on the Echo Canyon Trail. These are pretty cool rock formations; basalt from ancient volcanic activity.

Coronado and desert frustrations

We continue our journey west through Arizona, inching closer to California.  This morning the clouds threaten rain - the first of our journey in the south, and we can see that the road is wet as we near the Coronado National Memorial, but we witness not one drop of the wet stuff ourselves.  The park is named after Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, a Spanish explorer from the 1500s who was sent by the King of Spain to look for gold, which he never found (I think he was only looking on the ground, not IN it).  His route took him through the San Pedro River Valley near these majestic mountains.  We drop our trailer in a parking lot at the foot of the mountains, and drive a nail-biting, hair-pin turn filled, one-lane dirt road to Montezuma Pass at the top (elevation 6,575).  What spectacular views of the San Pedro River Valley to the east and the San Raphael Valley to the west.  Many other mountains are visible all around us, but also visible in the east valley below us is a solid, straight, black line which disappears into the mountains beyond.  We read the markers at the peak here and are informed that this is the U.S./Mexican border.  With our binoculars, we can see the American Border Patrol vehicles parked on a dirt road right beside the wall.  We skip over to the other side of the parking lot to peer through the binoculars at the view to the west.  Here, there is no solid black line, but with difficulty, we can spot a barbed wire fence.  The border has cut through the mountain we are standing on, but interestingly, it is more heavily guarded to the east than to the west.  Where we dropped our trailer, the Park Ranger had stopped and told us exactly where to park it; he was carrying some serious artillary - two visible hand guns and who knows what else.  We asked him about the border being so close since it was this morning that we realized we had camped in the RV Park only a few hundred yards away from Mexico.  Drug importation is the biggest threat here.  Inside the park, the Rangers do most of the surveillance and policing, but there are U.S. Border Patrol Officers and vehicles inside the park too.  Anyway, the views are heavenly, and we don't see any illegal immigrants.

Marilyn about to descend into the cave

Marilyn & Brad in the cave surrounded by flowstone

Also inside the park is a cave.  We are allowed to explore this cave on our own, unlike any commercialized cave.  It is a steep .75 mile climb up a rocky trail to get to it (so I'm figuring it had better be worth it!).  It doesn't have a lot of the beautiful mineral formations that many caves like Carlsbad has, but to be able to wander anywhere in the cave is fantastic.  We are not allowed to touch anything because it is still considered a living cave, meaning the formations (stalactites and stalagmites) are still forming, but we see a lot of evidence of vandalism, although it's hard to say when some of it happened.  For instance, all of the stalactites that are within reach of people have been broken off, but did that happen before the park became a park or after?  We suspect before, otherwise the government would likely have protected this cave better.  Also, people have scratched their initials into rocks that have fallen from the ceiling, but thankfully not the columns.  We find a small crawlspace, and Brad starts drooling.  He drops the backpack, grabs the flashlight, gives me the camera and says, "I'm goin' in!"  Great!  We have 2 flashlights and a Coleman lantern, but for me to be left by my lonesome while he scrapes through the hole on his belly into the unknown is still frightening, and damn!  I forgot to get the truck keys from him!  I cannot see his light or hear his voice for at least 5 minutes - an eternity when you are waiting for your spouse in near darkness, not knowing what has happened to them, but he does return, very dusty and dirty.  "I could have gone further," he says, "but it was getting really narrow, and I don't have a helmet or kneepads, and I thought you might be getting worried."  Thanks!  I was, because you have the truck keys!  The cave extends about 600 feet in length, with 20-foot high ceilings.  It is very dry with a mostly sand bottom.  It is a steep decline to get into initally, made all the more difficult because it's like looking into the abyss after hiking in the bright sunshine outside.  But it was a new and exciting experience to explore a cave unsupervised.

The next day, we head further northwest to Tucson and Saguaro (sa-war-ro) National Monument (the western part of the park, as there are two parts).  The road sign says that there is a 12,000 pound limit - yeah, the truck and trailer are pretty close, so we'll give it a go.  It's a steep climb at the beginning, but hopefully the Visitors Centre is nearby and we can find out about the hiking trails.  We come to a parking lot and actually manage to fit all 50 feet of us into it, and ask people if they know where the Visitors Centre is.  "Yeah, it's just up here somewhere."  Thanks for the explicit directions.  We debate whether to turn around and leave, or go on - we both have a bad feeling about this, but we go on.  The park also seems very busy; the traffic is unbelievably heavy, but it is Saturday.  Well, we find no Visitors Centre, just a sign about 3 minutes later saying "Leaving Saguaro National Monument".  Really?  I consult the map again.  Hmm.  Well, I see.  This road does go straight through the park for a short bit.  There was a dirt road that turned to the left, not a road I'd like to take our 31-foot trailer down, and no sign saying there was a Visitors Centre.  Unfortunately, we have no literature on this park, even after all the Visitors Centres in the various towns we've been in.  We decide to move on.  But the saguaro cacti are beautiful, and the concentration of them here is numerically challenging.

After that disappointment, we head for the Sonoran National Monument just west on I-8.  Now remember, national monuments are part of the national park system.  But again - no Visitors Center, no sign that we're even entering the Sonoran National Monument, nothing!  Jeepers!  Why bother naming these bits of desert and putting boundaries around them on a map?  We give up and stop for the night in Gila Bend.  California, here we come!

Funny Grady story.  Brad and I pop in a old Journey CD as we travel along the interstate - the great, old 1980s songs mostly.  It's amazing that after 30 years, we still remember all the words, and yet we have difficulty remembering the details of what we did a couple of days ago!  Ahh, well, back to Grady.  Brad and I are singing along at the top of our lungs, and the tunes are cranked pretty good.  Grady is in the back seat, meowing at the top of HIS lungs - perhaps singing along too, or maybe just trying to be heard.  Maybe he doesn't like Journey.  Randy Jackson, care to vote?  "The cat and the old guy are pitchy, but the pretty, young lady in the passenger seat is pretty good.  She's going straight to Hollywood, baby!"

Chiricahua National Monument

A few days ago, we enter Arizona.  We stay a couple of days in a town called Safford, but we don't do anything there other than have our oil changed in the truck and do our grocery shopping, so let's move the blog along to the Chiricahua (Cheery-cah-wah) National Monument which is in southeastern Arizona in the Coronado National Forest.

Chiricahua National Monument

We find out about this area by picking up brochures from the Visitors Center in Safford, and it looks interesting so off we go.  It's only marginally out of our way (we're heading to Tombstone - yes, THE historic town of Tombstone).  The Chiricahua National Monument is like a huge City of Rocks State Park.  Rock formations, again caused by fallen volcanic ash, compressed into rock, have weathered into columns and pillars of vertical stone, standing like an army ready to march into battle.  The view is so bizarre, to see these pillars amongst the trees and set against the valley below, it looks surreal.

Brad standing on a balanced rock, Chiricahua Nat. Monument

There are many hiking trails in the National Monument.  We take two while we are here.  Echo Canyon to the Grottoes and we do go a bit beyond but because we forgot to bring the map and don't recall how far the trail goes exactly and it's getting late in the day, we simply retrace out steps (good thing too - it's a long trail), and the Massai Point trail at the top of the drive which is a short half mile trail.  You can also take a shuttle from the Visitors Center to the top in the morning and hike your way back down which would take several hours.  I'm sure that would be a great hike, but we decide to move on as the previous night was a very rough one for us because...

At the Visitors Center, one of the Rangers and one of the campers/visitors tell us that we can camp on the BLM land (Bureau of Land Management - equivalent to Crown Land in Canada) in the National Forest just outside of the park for free since our trailer won't fit in their campground and the nearest RV Park is 35 miles away.  We express how long and big our trailer is, and the camper says "Oh yeah, you'll have no problem.  Just don't go too far up the road, because it will get narrow.  But there's lots of dispersed camping up there."  Dispersed camping or free camping is allowed on BLM land anywhere in the U.S. where a previous campsite (with a fire ring or a pull-off) already exists.  AND, the Ranger has a map showing where the National Forest starts and where the dispersed campsites are on the road as the first 4 miles are private property.  So we feel confident that we will find some sites to camp for the night.  We drop our trailer in one of the park's parking lots first near the entrance station, do our hike, and at the end of the day come back and hitch up and head off to find a campsite for the night.  It is dark as we head up the gravel road - and it's a nasty gravel road with that washboard surface, so Brad drives really slowly.

Brad making room for the trailer during the night from hell!

I'll save all the intricate details - we got stuck.  There are NO large campsites for big trailers or motorhomes in this area of the National Forest - none, nada, zilch.  We spend 3 hours - yes 3 HOURS - trying to turn our trailer around in a campsite suitable for a tent or a truck camper.  But it is IMPOSSIBLE - the angles are wrong and there isn't enough space.  During this 3 hour period, I keep catching my pant legs on tiny nettle bushes that I can't see in the dark, scratching my legs and ruining my pants (I'm not wearing jeans tonight), I fall through the cattle guard that is on the road at this point and scrape and bruise my ankle (lucky I don't BREAK my ankle) and I bang my head on the underside of the trailer while walking between the truck and trailer and I stand up too soon, not realizing the trailer is on an angle, resulting in a really big goose egg on the top of my head.  I'm also freezing as I'm the one outside the truck directing Brad which way to turn and how far to back up and whether the truck bumper is going to hit the sign posts on the cattle guard and whether tree branches are going to ruin our roof.  Brad is sitting in the warm truck.  It's about 45F out tonight.  Several times, Brad has to stop, get out and cut down tree brances that are in our way, either beside or on top of the trailer, and yet we still manage to put a few small holes in the rubber roof.  After the first hour, I stop worrying about whether a bear, coyote, wolf or mountain lion will sneak up on me as I am too cold, pissed off and worried to care.  Brad is desperate for a beer.

We finally end up unhitching and taking just the truck up the road to see if there is a place where we can turn around and we do find something where we think we can.  We still haven't eaten dinner and it's after 9:00pm.  So we go back and heat up something to eat - now we're just exhausted.  What will we do once we turn around?  There's nowhere to go.  Up the road from where we are, there is a slight pull-off where we decide to just sleep for the night.  The trailer is hanging on the road about a foot, but we don't care.  This road isn't used much, so it's not like someone will hit us.  It's now after 10:00, so we just go to bed.  In the morning (everything looks better in the morning, doesn't it?), when we're at least rested and I'm not crying, we take the trailer up to the spot we found the night before and Brad has no problem turning the trailer around.  He makes an easy three point turn and we're outta there!  However, we do go back to the Visitors Center and give them you-know-what for sending us up there.  The Ranger (same one) feels really bad when we tell her our story.

We try not to let the night's events taint our feeling of wonder for this place, because it is beautiful and amazing.