La Cienega National Conservation Area

 

 This 42,000 acre area is designated by Congress in 2000 and is a vast desert grasslands with rolling oak studded hills that connect the two sky island mountain ranges. Cienga Creek has a perennial flow and the riparian corridor is the heart of this area. It has a rich diversity of vegetation and wildlife and includes the fawning grounds for Pronghorn. This is the site of one of the oldest ranches in Arizona and the buildings and corrals of the Empire Ranch are part of this and open to the public to wander through. This is all managed by the BLM and dispersed camping is allowed so we can pull over and park most anywhere. We are enjoying peace and quiet and spectacular views. The grasslands and mesquite trees make it feel a little like we would imagine an African Savannah and I am waiting for the elephants and rhinos to wander through. There is hardly anyone here with our closest neighbor just visible about 1/4 mile away. So far we have seen eagles, hawks, and falcons hunting in the grasslands, and coyotes singing at night under the stars in this very dark sky, and while a lot of this is for 4WD some of the gravel roads are passable by us and we hope to explore as much as we can. This is a free camping area and while it is at over 5000ft we are enjoying warm days and frosty nights. Will stay here as long as the weather allows. Wishing again that we had brought our bikes.

Tubac and the Presidio

After moving down from the mountains we holed up at Tubac between Nogales and Tucson to wait out some cool and potentially rainy weather. We met up again with Doug and Frankie and spent the days nosing around the over 100 galleries and shops in this art filled town. We visited the old Presidio which is the remains of the Spanish Fort, and had an excellent Mexican meal.

This is a lot like Port Townsend and we are overwhelmed with some very expensive art and crafts, and Mexican goods. Good thing we don't have a lot of extra room.

Madera Canyon

After a week of cool and cloudy weather in Tuscon Mountain Park we headed off south of Tucson to Madera Canyon in the Santa Rita Mountains. This canyon and its water filled creek traverse four life zones between the desert floor and the snowy mountaintops at 7000-9450 ft. It has become world famous for its flora and fauna, and they say that the variety of climates within the less than 10 mile length of the canyon is similar to that found in driving from Arizona to Canada. Our campground was on a oak, pine, fir, and juniper forested hillside at 5050 ft with grass lands leading up to it.  The canyon is also famous for its bird population  with over 250 species found here in the spring/summer/fall season. Not a lot of birds around in the winter unless you are up early in the cold mornings. We spent 3 nights here in the 13 site campground and hiked as many trails as we could.
A windy morning and two impending rain storms sent up back to lower elevations to sit out some colder than normal temps for the next few days so we are off to Tubac.

Kartchner Caverns

 After the cold weather and snow it is nice to be back to the relative warmth of Arizona. Yesterday after a long drive we landed at Kartchner Caverns State Park about 50 miles east of Tucson, and today we decided to spring for the guided tour of the Caverns. What a treat and worth every penny. In 1974 two amateur cavers from Tucson discovered these limestone caverns by sliding down a small sinkhole and being brave enough to explore skinny crevasses and hundreds of  feet of crawling through long dark small chambers until it opened up into many rooms. They named in Xanadu and kept it secret for many years while they worked to find an entity that was willing to protect it. Finally the AZ State Parks system got involved and these caverns were opened to the public in 1999 after a massive $35 million dollar investment in opening entrances to them, engineering walkways and lighting, and putting in systems for air and humidity, and monitoring systems to keep them healthy. We can see why it is expensive to maintain. Now we are not so sorry about missing Carslbad Caverns. No cameras or photos are allowed so these pictures came off the web.

Hueco Tanks

Nice Rock Shelters at Camp

Moving east from the Las Cruces area we crossed over into El Paso TX and headed for Hueco Tanks State Historical Park. Huecos are large holes in the rocks that hold water (tanks). A place that not only was used by the natives but was also a stop for the Butterfield Stage Coach Line.We had called ahead and found that this is a very restricted park and hard to get into and see, so we reserved a space a day ahead. We are only allowed 3 nights here, and we need reservations to move outside the camping area and visit the historical sites. There are 3 areas here and we are only allowed into one by reservation, and the other 2 areas need to be with a guide. All this protection is for the largest collection of painted rocks in the US. This place has been a sacred site for 10-12000 years and many of the paintings are still pristine. There are thousands of them on surfaces low and high. And there are over 200 paintings just of masks, a record for one place, we were told.

  It is also a world class free climbing area because of all the holes in the rocks. Climbers need to bring their own mat and set it at the base of the climb. So the small 20 site campground is full of younger rock climbers in tents and just a few of us here for the historical sites. Our guide was taking just 4 of us. It was a lot of scrambling over big boulders, sliding under overhangs, and climbing up smooth rocks. With so much to see we just got a taste of it. A lot of it has been destroyed or written over by the US Army in 1880's or passengers on the Stage Coach line. The decision was made that anything over 50 years is historic so they are not attempting to remove the later drawings and names.

We knew that there was a little front going to move through but unfortunately the weather started to turn before our tour was ended and it started to rain making the ground muddy and the rocks slick so we needed to cut it a little short. We headed back to our cozy covered wagon and since we had an electric hook up we turned on our little space heater. The evening became ugly with wind and rain, just like a storm at home. The rain quieted down about 10 as it turned over to snow, and the wind gusts that were rocking our van died down after midnight. We woke in the morning to a dusting of snow on the branches and rocks and it continued to snow most of the day, but without much of it sticking. We spent an indoor day warm and comfortable, reading and playing cards, and another night colder with our electric heater on. When we woke the next morning it was 19 degrees, our coldest night yet. Our van has electric holding tank warmers and good insulation, and we were fine, but the tent campers looked miserable. Lots of them sitting in their cars with the engines running. Good thing that they are the young and hardy rock climber types. They were not friendly to us wimpy older RV types. Weird to be on the other side of that scorn and arrogance after all our years of backpacking and tent camping.

Tom, our retired Archeologist Guide

So snow in all the passes and the mountains that we wanted to visit on our next leg and more predicted. It is winter after all, even though we have been trying to ignore it, and some of these mountains are over 7000 ft. It is over 800 miles to cross Texas on highways jammed with long haul trucks, and we are not up to it. So we will wait on Big Bend and Carlsbad Caverns and Fort Davis for a spring or fall visit another time and head back to the warmth of AZ. We are fair weather campers this winter, if we wanted cold and snow we could have just stayed home.

Nearly full moon and alpenglow

Rockhound and Chiles

Looking Down on the Campground

Yum .... we never get tired of it.

We spent a night in New Mexico south of Deming at a State Park where they encourage you to dig for rocks and take up to 15 lbs of them home. We know nothing about recognizing opals from jasper and have no where to put them.. A nice sunny and warm afternoon, good views, and short trails to the hillsides. Then another night north of Hatch on the edge of the fields where they grow their famous chiles. We woke to 23 degrees. Yikes .... this is why we left home. We hear serious snow is coming to this area so we are outa here. A quick stop at the Pepper Pot in Hatch for a return visit from 2 years ago, some fabulous combo plates of chile rellenos, enchiladas, beans and rice, and only our fourth meal out in two months on the road. We cruise the highway with all the trucks through El Paso, past the wall/fence of the border and on to an interesting campground.

The fence/wall and a view of Mexico

Chiricahua Mountains & Indian Bread Rocks

Spring Valley & the Chiricahua's

Bonita Canyon Campground

Beautiful cliff faces

 We were heading east and saw a sign for Chiricahua Mountains National Monument and neither of us had ever heard of it so off the highway and down south on a 2 lane road we went to see what it was all about it. Another beautiful place! The access was across the beautiful huge grasslands of Spring Valley dotted here and there with old homestead ranches, and then into this island of mountains that rise over 9000 ft. This monument has been here since the 20's and protects an amazing array of balanced rocks and pinnacles. It was developed in the 30's and has some fantastic rock CCC structures and elegantly designed rock step trails. We spent the night in the wooded campground in Bonita Canyon and then went early up to the hiking trails. Cold wind blowing and a little snow on the road, reminded me of going up to Hurricane Ridge. We were at 6700' and Steve was being a diehard still in his shorts. We hiked a few short trails in amongst the rocks and hoodoos and pines, oaks, and firs. This is Apache country, and we had views out to the south of the Dragoon Mountains and the Cochise Stronghold and to the other side a view of the Cochise head rock profile on the neighboring mountain. We need to come back here in the spring or fall when the ice and patchy snow are gone off the trails and hike the Echo Canyon trail down through the balanced rocks and to the campground. We are intrigued by the Cochise Stronghold but will wait for a warmer season to go to that high mountain hideaway.
We returned to the grasslands and rather than go back to the highway we took the 25 mile dirt road over Apache Pass and past Fort Bowie. Fort Bowie is a hike-in to ruins where the US Army set up their garrison to keep the Apache Indians from their main water source, a spring, they had been using for thousands of years, and this forced them out of the area and eventually into a war that lasted 10 years. Cochise finally surrendered and the tribe was relocated to Oklahoma. So sad.

Sue winding her way thru the rocks

We then went to a BLM site called Indian Bread Rocks where we camped for the night at a place that was sacred to the natives. More beautiful flatter stacked rocks and no one around and we could imagine that we were holed up in our new-age "covered wagon" and it was easy to see the Apache's watching us from the ridges. (But there was no "thunk" of the arrow hitting the side of our fiberglass wagon in the wee hours of the morning) We don't have the courage that it would have taken to travel this country with the Apaches raiding and destroying wagon trains and settlers as they fought to preserve their homeland from the white invasion.

Look out on top

Echo Canyon with Cochise Stronghold in the Distance

Indian Bread Rocks

Indian Bread Rocks Camp

Balanced Rock

Indian Bread?

Can't you see the Apache's hiding on the Ridge?

New Year's Eve Gift

Looking down at our campground from Brown Mtn

Finally ... we are getting some beautiful weather. The last few days are above normal temperatures with yesterdays high of 81. We got to get back into shorts and even the evenings have been warmer in the low 50's. We are still in the mountains west of Tucson at about 2700 feet.

We spent the New Years Eve day climbing Brown Mountain. Only about an 800 ft climb in less than a mile but was a bit more than my knee was really ready for with lots of steep rock steps and uneven switchbacks. But I made it up and we then walked the up and down along the ridge to come down the back side and a little more gradual descent back to our camp, about 5 miles all together. Could not imagine that I would be able to do that even 2 months ago. Must be the dry air and the artificial lube job that is doing the magic.

That evening we made Oaxacan-style tacos on the grill with our new friends Doug and Frankie and stayed out under the stars visiting. About 8:30 we saw a meteor/fireball streak slowly across the tops of the mountains and disappear over the hill. It was a brilliant yellow orange and had a long turquoise green tail. Really spectacular and everyone out in the campground was exclaiming over it. We saw in the news the next day that it was seen over a wide area. Really beautiful in a dark night sky with the coyotes singing close by. So that was our magical New Years gift direct from the cosmos and a sign of a good year to come for us.

After a lot of discussion we have convinced ourselves
that we don't need to come home right now. So easy to have these conversations when there is no one here to contradict our rationale. Since no one seems to need us (a good thing, actually), we are heading a little farther east while the weather is clear and warm and we will see some new roads and new sights. It has been nice being in some of our favorite places and visiting with new friends but we are ready for the adventure of new places again.

We hope everyone had a fun and joyous New Year's and we send the magic dust from the tail of the meteor your way too for good luck in the coming year.

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