Ajax and Beyond

Yesterday we headed out with a group of 4-Wheelers from the Casa Grande Club. Bruce & Judy, Bill & Maureen, Sue, Russ, Tom, Larry & Jean, Ralph & I, and of course, Growlph.
Although some of the Jeepers had been to the area outside of Superior, running through to Florence Junction, Ralph & I hadn't been there before so it was a new experience for us. Bruce headed the run since he was familiar with the trail but he wasn't expecting the changes that had occurred during the heavy rains we've had this winter. The trail was bumpy to say the least. Off camber and tippy in quite a few places, we found some of the dry washes with running water but none of the water presented a problem during the crossings. Our destination was the old Ajax Mine, a silver mine active on and off from 1915 to 1948. A minimal amount of gold and copper were also mined there. The mines are still there, along with the large concrete ore loader, an impressive structure. We could only imagine what it must have been like there when miners hauled truckloads of ore over the narrow, dangerous roads.
Since this is one of the first weekends we've had without rain, lots of people were on the trails, ATV's, dirt bikes and all kinds of four wheel drive vehicles shared the trails with us, making it interesting when we met someone going in the opposite direction on a narrow, high, one lane trail. Lots of careful maneuvering was required but the skilled Jeepers made it through with no carnage to report.
Bruce also took us to see the ancient petroglyphs carved in rock by the Hohokam Indians some as old as 2000 years ago. Archaeologists are still working to interpret their meanings.
To read more about the ancient Hohokam Indians, check this out:
History - Hohokam
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It was a good run, a beautiful day spent with fellow Jeepers, good people and good friends, nice!


The mountains outside of Superior


more views of the mountains


all six Jeeps taking a break

Stretching our legs and taking a break from the bumps

the impressive ore loader at Ajax Mine


a dangerous open vertical mine shaft at Ajax Mine

Growlph cooling his paws in the creek

The Ralph & The Growlph

Taking a break for lunch

Ancient Hohokam petroglyphs

...more petroglyphs

Then And Now...

We took a ride down the Apache Trail before the rains come again tomorrow. The trail was in unusually good condition having been recently bladed after the last rain storm closed the trail for a few days. Perhaps people from Phoenix and snowbirds had the same idea we did because the traffic on the trail was exceptionally heavy. There have been times we've had the entire route completely to ourselves but this time it appeared everyone from Canada, Michigan or Minnesota decided to enjoy the beautiful weather as well. It's entertaining to see people's expressions of terror as they descend Fish Creek Canyon with its sheer 900 foot drop offs just outside their car windows.
Back in the early 1900s until it burned in 1929, Fish Creek Lodge offered a resting place for road weary travelers. In his book "Images of America," (great little book, we highly recommend it) Richard L. Powers offers many old photographs of the lodge as it appeared through the years, fist with mule teams and horses parked outside, then in later years, automobiles and tour buses. There isn't much left to see at the old lodge site, just a few old crumbling foundations and lots of broken glass bottles. We speculated that it must have been a tradition for travelers to break bottles after they were finished with whatever contents the bottles held, at any rate, old glass littered the ground.
A few wild poppies were beginning to bloom giving us a glimpse of what should be one of the best wildflower seasons ever. Now, I guess we'll hunker down and wait until the next storm passes. Dry desert, yeah, right...

You can read more about the Apache Trail here:
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Apache Trail Arizona Map Attraction Guide AZ Tours

Tour buses lined up outside Fish Creek Lodge


The Superstition Mountains looming high above
with a wet weather waterfall running down the side of
the mountain.

View from the lodge

Fish Creek Canyon

Not much remains of the old Lodge

I Told You So!

We've had some really fantastic weather all week long, sunny, mild...simply perfect so we decided to head out on a Jeep run on FR609. It's a fairly long run up in the mountains, one of our favorites. Larry and Jean and a couple of friends from Tucson wanted to go along too on what should have been a pleasant drive up through the pines and pastures, stopping along the way to visit a cave we wanted to explore again. All week long the weather people have been reporting that rains were expected beginning Saturday and continuing on and off throughout the weekend. Heck, what do they know?
We awoke this morning to spotty clouds, but the worse part were the mountains, we couldn't even see them in the distance, they were completely covered in clouds. I muttered something about it being a damned fool idea to head up there in bad weather, but my objections were met with, "nah, it looks okay to me," so off we went. Crossing Tonto Creek can be a bit of a challenge, but after ignoring the rather large barricade and sign declaring "road closed" we made it across the flooded creek without a problem. The clouds were getting thicker, darker and more threatening as we headed up the mountain. Rain was beginning to spatter on the windshield, mud was getting deeper, so deep that we all decided to stop and let some air out of our tires to give them more traction getting through the mud. We were fairly high up in the clouds by this time, the fog was closing in along with the heavy sleet that was pelting us and covering the muddy road in white pellets. The Jeeps were sliding, fishtailing, making the drive pretty treacherous and we knew that the road ahead wouldn't be any better so deciding discretion is indeed the better part of valor, we turned back. I've got to admit feeling rather smug on the ride back home but I held it in as long as I could before I blurted out, "I told you so!" .... only to be met with a distinct "harumph" from Ralph.
Oh well, better luck next time.

***

Tonto Creek crossing, "road closed" (what road?)

Foggy and rainy, mud soup

"view" of the mountains?

The forest primeval

Sliding through the mud

Redefining The Desert

Webster's says;

Main Entry: desert
Pronunciation: de-z-rt
Function: noun
Results
1. arid land with usually sparse vegetation especially such land having a very warm climate and receiving less than 25 centimeters (10 inches) of sporadic rainfall annually.

b. an area of water apparently devoid of life
2. wild uninhabited and uncultivated tract
3. desolate or forbidding area

Holy smoke! We've had about five straight days of steady rain here, it sure doesn't fit the definition of "desert" we find in the dictionary.

Gila County Sheriff's deputies were going door to door out here, warning people that evacuation might be eminent due to the potential of heavy flooding in our area. It was a wild week, the rain didn't stop except for a brief time yesterday when the sun broke through just long enough to show us that it was still up there where it belongs. We were lucky to escape relatively unscathed, happily evacuation wasn't necessary, although we did have the Jeep loaded with things we might need to survive a few days away from home. There were times we did get a bit nervous, particularly when the "dry" wash behind our house began to flow like a small river, we've never seen water in it before. Pinto Creek, the larger wash near us is roaring along the way to the lake along with every other formerly dry wash and riverbed in the area.

We've had more rain in five days than Arizona normally gets in an entire year. The mountains have gotten record breaking snows in some areas and even some ski resorts are closed because there's too much snow!

Growlph, our picky little Schnauzer has to be forced to go outside, he despises getting his paws wet, the poor little guy prefers to hold his business rather than risk getting wet. He's been wet and dry so many times, we're sure he's going to mildew if the rain doesn't stop soon. Ah, there's nothing quite like the essence of a wet dog. (Eau de Schnauzer?)

Our electricity was out for a few hours on and off during the week and yesterday, we had no phone service outside of our small calling area..no internet...Egads! We managed to stay snug, dry and warm in front of our wood stove so all in all, we have no real complaints.

Many major roads are closed for various weather related reasons including some interstate highways in the northern part of the state. The Forest Service has closed quite a few back roads due to unsafe conditions. Anyhoo, it looks like our Jeeping may be put on hold at least for a while until the trails have dried out a bit.

The entire state has had its share of something, flooding, dust storms, hail, sleet, freezing rain, wind, blizzards, snow.... we can't help but wonder what's coming next...locusts? pestilence? famine?

****

Here are some pictures we took this morning between the raindrops, it sure doesn't look deserty to us!

The Ray Mine

It's a beautiful day today, clear, cool and sunny. We decided to take a ride to an area we've passed before but never had driven through. It's a big circular route leaving from Globe and heading down to Superior and then across to Winkleman and back up to Globe. It's all paved highway, no backroading today.... about 90+ miles or so.
We've read about the Ray Mine being the second largest open pit copper mine in the state and wanted to see it first hand. Wow, what a gruesomely awesome sight it is! Huge doesn't begin to describe it, the photos can't show the true enormity and scope of the operation. Although we don't consider ourselves to be "tree huggers" or extreme environmentalists, we can't help but ponder what impact such an undertaking has on the environment, even the signs at the scenic overlook at the mine tell about sulfuric acid being used in the processing of copper ore. We watched as giant dump trucks crept back and forth dumping load afer load of mine tailings, leaving concentric mountains in place of the ones Mother Nature had previously put there. Yep, the world needs copper, lots of it and it's got to be mined somewhere...but.......sigh

The little dots in the center of this photo are giant dump trucks



A huge shovel and a $20,000 truck tire. (so the sign said) and a frustrated Schnauzer who wanted to piddle on the truck tire but couldn't because it was fenced off.

Mother Nature didn't intend for mountains to look like these

Thousands of feet deep into the open pit

Lots of copper is being hauled from this site

Jeeping The Pinal Mountains

Great Day! Yesterday we went Jeeping with some good folks from the Casa Grande 4-Wheelers Club, Bruce & Judy, Bill & Maureen, Russ & Jackie, as well as a cheerful Border Collie named Socks.

We headed out with no particular destination in mind except to explore some of the areas in the Pinal Mountains, south of the town of Globe. The Pinals offer a range of vastly differing scenery ranging from lush pine and Manazanita forests to desert plateaus thick with barrel cacti, creosote bushes and scrub. Altitudes were mostly high, some close to 8000 feet, offering gorgeous, sweeping views of the mountains surrounding us.

The roads were fairly good with the very notable exception of the trail leading from Pioneer Basin up to Pioneer Pass. We've always been told that this trail in particular could be a problem, especially in bad weather. Fortunately, the day was clear and sunny and the trail was dry. After taking a long, bumpy trail we came upon a house and an old mining camp. The lone resident, a "different" fellow, a true hermit lived there with only the company of his dog, many miles away from the nearest civilization. Bruce stopped to chat with him and ask about the road conditions ahead. I don't know what was said but just past his place the trail turned ugly. We had to make the choice of attempting it or turning back from whence we came. We decided to attempt it. Since we drive a mostly "stock" Jeep while the other three are built more for this kind of terrain, we were a bit concerned about whether we could make it through without any carnage to our Jeep, but our worries proved to be unfounded. Ralph's Jeep driving experience served him well, we made it through with only a relatively few groans, stiffled screams and gasps from me....good job Ralph!

It was nice meeting new people and making new friends with the same interests as ours'...to enjoy the scenic beauty the backroads of Arizona has to offer to fellow Jeepers.

Ready to hit the trail

There's the road far below





Sweeping views of the Pinals

Howdy folks!

Challenging to( say the least)

NOT a road well traveled!

Pioneer Basin

We were rewarded with this spectacular view

Jeepin' to McMillenville

We decided to head for the former town of McMillenville yesterday. Back in the 1800s McMillenville was a fairly large silver mining town, it even had a post office, established in November, 1877 until October, 1882. Nowadays, not much remains of its former glory.
During the town's heyday it was subjected to a major, brutal Apache raid. It seems that the area was once part of land designated by the government to be part of the Apache reservation. Then, silver was discovered there by a pair of wandering prospectors, Charlie McMillen and Theodore Harris, March 6, 1876. It wasn't long after that the government decided to "resurvey" the reservation, low and behold the government determined that the land containing the rich silver strike wasn't part of the reservation afterall... hmmm mighty suspicious, (seems typical of government activity but that thought is for another post and probably not appropriate here...okay Laura, step away from that soapbox!) anyway, it's a small wonder the Apaches were angry.
In Nell Murbarger's wonderful book, "Ghosts Of The Adobe Walls", Nell describes the town as she found it back in 1950. There were still adobe ruins of old miner's cabins present but even then, not much remained of the town. The original main mine, the Stonewall Jackson is now located on private property, the rest of what remains is on Tonto National Forest land.
We found outlines of old buildings, some Indian ruins along with the old tin cans that can usually be found at this kind of site. We even found a shard of Indian pottery laying near an eroded wash.
Although little remains of the ghost town of McMillenville, we stood amid the ruins with Nell Murbarger's words echoing in our ears, " I left the old town of McMillen to its gray adobe ruins, its small gray lizards....and the gray ghosts of its departed dreams."

barely the outline of an old adobe cabin

a miner's cabin probably stood here

Ralph checking out more ruins

after McMillenville we checked out FR 584, oops the road ends here

The view from FS 584