Winter Epic: Seeing Robert, Saguaro National Park, Chiricahua National Monument, Antelope Canyon, Grand Staircase, Death Valley National Park, Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest

Wednesday March, 5

This morning I was leaving. So I showered and packed up everything. I remembered I had some chicken thighs and pizza left in the fridge and freezer. So I cooked everything and just took it go. Packing the car is getting to be a serious game of Tetris. I meet mike and his coworkers at a food truck stop near campus. I was there early so I walked around for awhile. I’ve said it before and ill say it again ASU has some of the best scenery in the country. We all grabbed some food and I said bye to Mike. I’ve been talking to Robert Yanasak and he was down in Tucson AZ. It’s about an hour and a half drive so I made it there around 3. We talked for a little but then drove over to west Saguaro National Park. Robert is big into photography and we drove around talking and taking pictures. This park is in the dessert but there are tons of plants and it is very thriving. There’s a time in the day called “magic hour” about an hour just before dark and right after the sun comes up. We were lucky enough to catch it and everything plant and rock exploded in color. It was as if everything itself was glowing. There were these small yellow flowers that would contrast with the green of the cacti. The whole area even smelt different, sweeter. This was followed up with a beautiful sunset. When we left Robert mentioned a Chinese restaurant he had earlier that he loved. Dinner here was really good, everything tasted fresh. We talked about going to a national monument the next day. It was a 2.5 hour drive away. Robert is staying at a friend’s place, but his friend is visiting her daughter in Germany. When we got back Robert went though the pictures he took and I re read through everything I typed up from the Maze. He was also interested in audio books. I tried to help he get into the site I use but it wasn’t working so well. I added the pictures from the Maze to get it ready to post.

Thursday March, 6

We were both up around 8 am. I grabbed a few things and we packed up in Robert’s car. He drove us west to a little town just outside Chiricahua National Monument, good luck pronouncing that. Not many cars were on the road yet and we stopped to take some pictures of this old timey railroad town. Then we grabbed some food at G’ma D’s. From here we drove into the monument to the visitor center. There were a lot people here today so we walked around the center and watched a movie about the park. The big attraction here is the over look at the end of the 6 mile road, so we drove on up. We have been in the dessert for the whole time, but when we started to climb in elevation it changed to a pretty regular looking forest. Lust bushes and big green trees lined the road, with vivid green moss covered cliff faces above us. Once we made it to the top we walked down to the edge to see thousands of grey, brown, stone pillars. The vivid green moss was covering all of them and made for an interesting contrast. Robert mentioned, and I agreed, that it reminded him of Bryce Canyon with different colors. We walked around a bit and Robert posted some of the pictures right away. He had an atlas in his car and I looked over a few things. My little brother Elliot has been talking about flying out to Colorado for spring break. Were hoping it could work out where I could pick him up from the airport and hang out for awhile. I looked into a few different things we could do. We were pretty much done looking around here, and decided to start the drive back. We saw a BBQ place in town that was an old train car they converted. This made the lunch decision really easy, two smoked pulled pork sandwiches. On the drive back there was a state park on the way. We got here just before dark, not knowing anything about the place. Turns out it’s a cave that was discovered fairly recently. 2 guys discovered it in the 70’s and managed to keep it a secret for 14 years until they could convince the state to make it into a park. They finally did and they opened for the first tour in 1999. We were too late for any tour but it looks like I will have to add it to the list for next year. We got back to Roberts place at 7pm. Time for me to get back on the road. It was great to hang out with Robert; I really didn’t expect to see him this year. He’s the kind of guy who can make you think in a different way, not really what you think about but how you think about it. And everyone should do that now and then. Next on the things I want to see is Antelope Canyon, just outside Page, AZ. I decided to drive back to Tempe and stay at mikes for the night. I called him up and met him at, of course, Monkey Pants.

Friday March, 7

While I had access to the internet I wanted to post everything from the Maze. I went over board and added 70 pictures, so it took some time to upload. Then I looked up a few things, including the info about Antelope Canyon. Its basically private land that the Navajo Indians turned into a park. I’m not exactly sure how it all works but either way, you have to go through a guide service to enter. So I made my reservation at Adventurous Antelope Canyon Photo Tours. Now it was time for the long drive back north to Page.

Saturday March, 8

I didn’t get a lot of sleep and had to be up early. I stopped at a hotel to grab breakfast, and then drove over to where the tour starts. I got their too early and just sat in the car for awhile. At this point I have hiked some pretty extreme places by myself. So I was turned off a bit by having a guide. But it was even worse when about 12 other people showed up, some were children. 6 of us were signed up for the 4 canyon hike. So we all piled in a jacked up 4X4 SUV and drove over to the entrance of the canyon. I sat up front and talked to guide a bit. Turns out there are 96 canyons in this area, and he has been to all of them. He is also part of the family that owns and manages this land. We drove up a large wide wash area until we came to Sheephead Canyon. I have to admit every time he said the name of a canyon I was slightly suspicious that he was just making one up on the spot, how would we know? He said this was the longest one we would hike. I asked how long it was, he said 1.25 miles and the others are about .25 each. This was when I started to realize several things. Everyone here had nicer cameras then me, not unusual. But these looked like really really nice cameras. Also everyone else was stopping every 20 steps to fully set up for a picture. The guide and I were the only ones walking way ahead of everyone. I was thinking this was going to be a serious hike with some picture taking, I was wrong this was very little hiking with very serious\professional photographers. I was fine with this and learned a lot, I just wish I had some proper gear to be able to play around with. So we hiked to the end of Sheephead and I climbed around a bit. When I was up a ways the guide tell me to toss him my camera. So I do and he asks to change the settings. Of course I say go for it. Just by him doing that my pictures looked 10 times better. I was curious about what he did so he explained it to me on the walk back to the car. Off to canyon 2, Rattle Snake Canyon. There was another group of people in this one but we were all able to shuffle around each other. This one was much shorter and not as many places to take pictures. I was outside the canyon with 2 others waiting for everyone to finish. And decided to hike up and around the canyon. Back at the car we drove over to upper Antelope Canyon. This is the big attraction and there were lots of people here. The guide was really great at his job and he would just wait for people to be able to get the best pictures. He would also point out where the best shots were, which was very helpful to me. This place was incredible, 40 foot winding walls with a gap at the top of once a few feet. I could only guess at how something like this was created. At 12:45 we all gathered around one spot with a beam of light shining straight down. He would throw dust in the air to get the entire beam to glow and everyone would take some amazing pictures. It was such a cool sight; I only hope my pictures can do it justice. Before we left, the guide also had a few spots where he would throw handfuls of sand onto a ledge making a “waterfall” run off. The last canyon was called Owl Canyon. Lots of owls live along the walls. You could see where by all there shit but no one was home. The only owl I saw was in the first canyon. I asked him about the other canyons in the area. These are the only 4 accessible by vehicle. The other ones you would have to hike or horseback ride too. They don’t offer anything like that but it might be soon. I would love to spend a week camping on horseback exploring this place. I was glad I went and learned a lot. The people were cool too, one couple was from Vegas and we talked along the way. They also hiked the Maze and got stuck in the bottom by a foot and a half of snow. His name was Erik and he is the only other person I know who has built a rock wall residentially! He said to call him when I’m in Vegas and we could go climbing at a few places he knows about. I won’t have the opportunity this year but I’ll have to hit him up next time. When we got back to start I drove west to Kanab, then north east up through Bryce to Escalante, UT. Here I was hoping to sign up for the lottery system hike in The Wave. About 40 people show up every morning for a chance at 10 hiking passes. I asked a few people around town but it really didn’t seem like I was in the right place. I talked to the ranger on the phone a while back and this is where he said to be. I didn’t have any internet to check so I had to hope for the best. I set my alarm and called it a night.

Sunday March, 9

Sure enough I was in the wrong place, I’m still not sure where I was supposed to be? I drove around for awhile through the Grand Staircase, stopping at the overlooks. I was cooking up some breakfast and 2 guys my age pulled up. I talked with them for a minute and they just came from Death Valley. From there I drove west through northern Vegas to Pahrump NV. This was about an hour from Death Valley.

Monday March, 10

I stopped at a hotel for breakfast, they asked for a room key. I said I forgot it, she just asked what room I was in. of course I was in 102, she checked it off list saying “Dave?”. Yup. I ate quickly, didn’t want to be there when Dave showed up. Then I made the drive over to Death Valley National Park. Death Valley was pretty plain. Not a lot of color to it, pretty much all a solid brown grey color. Most of it was a large flat bottom surrounded by mountain. I looked around the visitor center for awhile. They only get 2 inches of rain a year, the hottest temp recorded was 136 degrees. Any precipitation trying to make it here has to first pass over the Sierra Mountains then 2 other ranges. It’s the lowest place in the US and most of the world, at 282 feet below sea level. The ranger at the visitor center suggested a hike to me and I drove over. This was a hike up a canyon with a few off shoots. The canyon was wide open and not to interesting. The off shoots were the fun part. The walls were larger stones held in place by thicker sand. It felt like the whole thing could crumble down at any time. I took one of the off shoots all the way up to the top of the mountain. This gave me a good overview of the whole area. In the low flat places of the valley, there are salt deposits. When I got back to the car I was pretty dirty. So I was looking around for a shower, and I asked a ranger. There are a few resorts in the park and one had a pool with a shower attached. He also told me it would cost $5. Ya, we will see about that. I found the pool and a guy was walking in, I just asked him to hold to door. Then I took a shower but I didn’t really have anything else going on. So I laid by the pool for a while. There were a ton of people here, pretty much all retired people who live in their RVs. From here I went west over a few mountain ranges, then north along the east side of the Sierra mountains. I pasted though several small towns, I wish I had more time to stick around. There are tons of great fly fishing spots all along this drive. I made it to the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest just as it was getting dark. The visitor center is closed in winter and the road leading up to it. But you could still drive through up the mountain for a ways. This gave a great view of the sun going down behind the Sierras. I’m not exactly sure what a bristlecone Pine looks like, there for I’m also not sure if I saw one or not. I drove back down and over to Bishop, CA. I wanted to do the rest of the drive during the day, to be able to see the mountains. So I sat here and typed for the night. I was sitting at McDonalds after it was closed and a guy pulled in and parked. Then the cop pulled in. He ended up getting arrested for DUI.