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Last Night, Sedona

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As we left Flagstaff on 89 A we were following a couple of motorcycles and I was contemplating how it would be to take a bike on those hairpin curves coming up. It was at that moment that I saw one of the bikers point to the left. I was confused as I thought it was a hand signal but there was no turn off there. Concentrating on what the motorcycles were doing I almost missed it! Sandy yelled “Deer”. I glanced around but didn’t see it so I reply with a loud..”WHERE!” Of course her reply was “There!”. (Who’s on first?) Anyway I finally spotted a doe bouncing off through the pine forest. It was definitely a mule deer. It ran with its tail down ( a white tail deer has a tail like flag when it runs) and it bounced more than bounded. It made me think of a cartoon animal bouncing with springs on its feet.  Yea! Wildlife!

It’s my last trip down the winding Oak Creek Canyon for this trip. And as if the sunset gods knew it was my last chance the sky lit up in reds and golds over the red rocks of the area. Afraid I wouldn’t get to the bottom in time to get “my sunset picture” I pulled off to a wide spot on the shoulder. I grabbed my camera and bolted outside to see what I could capture.

Unfortunately there was no iconic rock formation for the foreground (like Snoopy Rock or Bell Rock) but I won’t complain. Who knows when I will have another chance like this.

Parked as I was in a precarious place on a winding road, I didn’t dare stay too long or wait out the setting sun. I grabbed what I could and returned to the car to finish the drive down the canyon.

It seems like Sedona was putting the finishing touches on our trip, a nice sunset, a bouncing mule deer. Too bad we didn’t see any javalina’s while we were here.

It was time to think about packing up, clean out the fridge and getting ready to leave in the morning.

Back at the Time Share, we stopped at the reception area to print out our boarding passes and complete the check in process online. I dropped off a couple of boxes of clothes that I was shipping home and then it was time to go back to the unit and finish packing. It was nice to be able to drop off the “if it fits it ships” boxes. The Time Share charged my card for incidentals for the postage and then they gave the boxes to the postman on Saturday. If I had to go to the post office in the morning I wouldn’t have had time before we left for Phoenix.

A nice perk of the time share is an apartment sized washer and dryer. We’d used it mid-week and tossed in a last wash now so that we could take home clean clothes. It’s nice to get home and not be faced with a pile of dirty laundry. On the other hand, if the TSA is going to paw through my suitcases giving them dirty underwear might be a deterent..maybe? I’m still miffed over the loss of that $50.00 camera battery but what can you do???

I will wrap this up now as we did absolutely nothing special that last night so I won’t waste your time with useless drivel. 🙂 I mainly wrote this post to tell you about that final beautiful sunset. As always I have to say that the pictures don’t even come close to doing it justice.

Petrified Forest

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Ahh the Petrified Forest, who hasn’t heard of the place where trees have turned to stone? It was quite a ride from the Oak Creek Canyon Overlook. We headed north to RT 40 and east toward Winslow. Along the way we passed Meteor Crater. I’ve been there but to my surprise Sandy said skip it. She said if we had time after the went to the Petrified Forest and Painted Desert we could stop on our way back.

I was surprised how much longer it was after passing Meteor Crater. It was past lunch time so we stopped at a Denny’s for a quick lunch. We had fish! In the middle of a desert we ordered fish! It was really good. Ironic isn’t it?

Back on the road we finally began to see signs for the Petrified Forest. There were lots of places willing to sell us a bit of the petrified wood too. It’s illegal to take any of the petrified trees or bits of wood from the National Park but not all of the Petrified Forest is in the confines of the park so there’s ample opportunity to get a sample. We finally spotted the Visitor Center where I wanted to stop anyway to collect my National Parks Stamp.

We got some good rangers and volunteers again.  We explored the exhibit of  dino remains that were on exhibit and heard stories about the petrified wood and how it’s so hard that only diamonds are used to cut and polish the “gems”.

We bought a CD that is  a ” Driving CD” audio tour. It included a rough map to help us see where we were in relation to what we were seeing.

The whole tour is about an hour a and a half if you drive straight through. We didn’t plan to linger too much but we weren’t going to rush through either. We were playing cat and mouse with the weather again.

 Little rain storms kept cropping up all over. It would rain, kind of hard at times but then it was over and the sun was back out just as fast. We could look out over the landscape and see these little pockets of rain.

The tour started right at the Visitor Center called Rainbow Forest Museum. In addition to the fossils on display here there is a short trail that winds through a section of the Petrified Forest. It contains some of the most massive logs in the forest including the big one named “Old Faithful”.

The road led us into a series of mesas called Flattops.

 It is in this area that archeologists have found evidence of the Paleo Peoples who lived in the area.

They were hunters and gatherers so most of the remains are artifacts such as tools and weapons. They can track the development of trade through the years as their artifacts changed over time.

Jasper Forest has a large deposit of  red hued petrified forest. The logs here were buried in  mud so the minerals from that mud settled in the wood and created the red color. Now the bluff is eroding and the logs are being revealed.

One of my favorite stops was Agate Bridge, a natural bridge of a petrified log. The railroads shored it up with concrete so it stands today.  I am going to share a  story but if you go I am sure a guide will tell it better than I can. The story is that 2 cowboys were playing poker and one bet the other that he and his horse couldn’t ride across the Agate Bridge. If the Cowboy made it he would win a $20.00 gold piece and bragging rights. If he lost, the challenging cowboy would get the dead man’s saddle and boots. Well the horse was surefooted and the cowboy was a good rider and they made it across safely.  Anyway, you won’t catch me on that bridge.

The Blue Mesa was a great spot! The views here were of a striated multicolored landscape. Blue Mesa has also been called the Purple Forest because of the purple or lavender color of the crystals in the petrified wood here. There’s a 1 mile round trip hike that I would love to take if we had more time. The area we are in is also referred to as the badlands, just like the Badlands we visited in South Dakota.

The teepees came up quickly and there was no mistaking them! They are really memorable. They look just like the teepee of the plains indians. There is little plant life or vegetation here . The landscape is so surreal it’s almost like stepping onto another planet.

Our tour led us to Newspaper Rock. It took some looking but I finally spotted at least some of the Petroglyphs this stop is named for. The Petroglyphs are scratched into the surface of the rock. It removed the dark stains on the rocks known as Desert Varnish. Joe (From Native American Journey’s) had mentioned it to us on that tour. Apparently scientists still aren’t in agreement on exactly what the Desert Varnish is but it didn’t stop the ancient people from using it as a black board for their art.

We saw the railroad tracks and the river lined with Cottonwood Trees. Our next stop was at Puerco Pueblo. As we listened to the tour we pulled into the parking area. It sounded like an abandoned pueblo similar to what we saw a Tusigoot. In the interest of time we chose to move on. We wanted to be sure we had time to  see the Painted Desert.

Oak Creek Canyon

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It’s the last full day in Arizona. Tomorrow we have to be up early to drive to Phoenix and board a plane back to reality, in this case reality is Albany Airport. So what to do today? We can take a drive…Monument Valley, Sunset Crater, Cameron Trading Post, Meteor Crater, Petrified Forest, Painted Desert…or a spa day…no more tours. I’m “toured out”.

We’ve been kicking this around all week. About the only thing we know for sure is that we’re going to do our souvenir shopping this morning then the day is ours!

Turns out the souvenir shopping didn’t take us long. Sandy knew exactly what she wanted to get and for whom. I stopped by the camera shop and Sandy actually found the last item on her list there so we were done in record time. We decided to take one last run up to the Native American stands on 89 A  for a last look at the jewelry and dream catchers.

After we made the last of our purchases there I asked Sandy if she wanted to stop at Slide Rock Park and she said no she wasn’t in the mood for hiking and it was still too cold for swimming in my book so we drove on up the winding canyon road of  89 A for the last time.

 At the top of the canyon where the road begins to straighten and flatten there is a sign for Oak Creek Overlook. I have never stopped here but figured why not. I don’t know when or if I’ll get back so let’s take 5 minutes and see what it’s all about.

Rand-McNally, that premier publisher of road maps, named this section of 89 A that winds through Oak Creek Canyon a “most beautiful drive” . The designation made it the first scenic drive in Arizona. A breathtaking series of switchbacks and hairpin curves makes maneuvering this highway a challenge unless you obey the speed limits…then it’s not too bad. I can now say I’ve driven this road at least a dozen times and I know what the road is about but as I mentioned in my post about the Bottom of The Canyon I had never looked into the canyon before. As the driver it is far better to keep your eyes and attention on the road.

Now as I parked my car at the top I wasn’t sure what awaited me at the overlook. We could see a lot of people. Far more than either of us expected but as we got closer we realized it was because the Native Americans had set up tables to display their crafts similar to the ones we had left just south of Slide Rock. I wandered through the tables but didn’t see anything more than what I had already purchased. I mainly wanted to see the canyon and it didn’t disappoint.

The walkway along the canyon rim follows a curving path giving you breathtaking  views into the depths of the canyon. Trees rise up and tower along the slopes. I had no idea the canyon was so deep or huge! Now I understand why  Oak Creek Canyon is sometimes referred to as a smaller cousin of the Grand Canyon.

The views reminded me of Joe’s (guide for Native American Journey’s) explanation that Oak Creek Canyon was formed along a fault line and that the fault had shifted twice to create this massive rift. Oak Creek, a tributary of the Verde River, flows along the bottom of the canyon and is credited with carving out much of what is today the existing Canyon. Oak Creek is one of the few perennial streams in this high desert region of Arizona.

As I continued on along the rim I spotted a red tail hawk floating on the thermals. To my surprise I was actually above the hawk when I first spotted him. The sun rays caught his back and feathers and turned him into a golden raptor and then he was circling higher and soon above me. It truly took my breath away to realize that the canyon was so deep that I could stand on the rim and watch a hawk start his upward spiral from below me. I would have expected that at the Grand Canyon but it was a surprise to me here.

As the moment passed I moved onto the last section of the lookout and there was the shot I have wanted since I first drove Oak Creek Canyon in 2008. There were the switchbacks and hairpin turns all laid out before me. Three big loops of highway and if you looked closely way down at the bottom the last bit of highway peaked through.

I am so very happy we stopped here. Even though the stop was short compared to some of the other things we had done, it was a real high point for me in this trip.

We had decided to drive on toward Winslow and the Petrified Forest. That’s quite a long drive so we wrapped up our visit and headed back to the car. I think I was still walking on air!

Schnebly Hill Road and Vista

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Back in Sedona we parked the car in the same lot we’d used before with the 3 hour parking limit. We stopped in the Candy Shop to ask if we would be ok this late in the day if we ran over the limit. We didn’t know much about this tour or how long it would take.

Snoopy Rock

When we were talked into booking this tour we were just passing by a little kiosk and had stopped to look at the Montezuma’s Castle photos on the  wall. That was all the salesman needed. After he hit a brick wall with several other tour offers he noticed the camera around my neck and suggested this tour for Sunset Photos of Sedona. The tour was being booked through the concierge department of Diamond Resorts, the Time Share Group that I belong to so he offered us a discount if we took the tour. After some private discussion we agreed since Schnebly Hill Rd was not someplace we could really take the rental car on our own…or so we’d heard.

We arrived at the kiosk at 5 pm just like the salesman told us but no one was there. We hung around til about 5:10 when I said I would go look for the tour group. The tour was through “A Day In The West.” and I had seen their ticket booth down the street. I left  Sandy at the Diamond Resort booth in case the salesman came back and headed off to find the other ticket office.

At the “A Day in the West” ticket office I explained we were waiting down at the other location but that no one was there. The ticket agent said the salesman must be new because we were just supposed to come right there. She had our reservations in the computer so I trotted off to get Sandy. When I got there Sandy said no one had shown up there yet so back to a”A Day in the West” we went.

The folks at “A Day in the West” were a lot of fun. They all had a great sense of humor and were joking and kidding each other while we waited for our driver. One of the things I love about these tours in the jeeps is how gentlemanly the drivers are. I have seen women drivers but I haven’t had one for a tour, but the men offer their hand to help you in and out and are very attentive to your needs. I can’t say comfort because if you are looking for comfort you don’t want to take a jeep ride!

These jeeps are  four-wheel-drive high-clearance vehicles and although I won’t say for sure that they have special axles it sure feels like each  wheel can move independently. When they tell you to buckle up …do it !

On my last trip I took the Soldiers Pass off-road trip and I sat in the front. It was bumpy but I didn’t feel like I was being tossed all over. This time I let Sandy have the front seat thinking I would have a good vantage point for pictures in the back. Boy oh boy! I don’t know what the ride up front was like but if it hadn’t been for the seat belt I would have been on the floor or bounced  out of the jeep as soon as we hit Schnebly Hill Rd.

On a map Schnebly Hill Rd looks like any other meandering ride through the region but in fact with our guide pointing out the various rock strata and filling in the cultural background, this tour became a lesson in time, geology and local lore.

Back when Sedona was first settled the farmers and tradesmen took their goods to market in Flagstaff. The trip required the settlers to travel south 11 miles to  Beaver Head Station where they could then head east then north and in the process travel up a mountain. The whole trip took 4 days  one-way. Needless to say they were always on the lookout for a shortcut. The result of that quest was Schnebly Hill Rd. It took persistence, back-breaking manual labor using the picks and shovels of the day and a little black powder to eventually carve  a rough wagon road out of the steep canyon and connect with a dirt road that ran from Phoenix to Flagstaff.

Carl Schnebly wasn’t the first to use the wagon route but he was the one whose name stuck. He first used the road to transport lumber to build his home. Then once his home was complete he used it to make regular runs to Flagstaff taking produce for sale and returning with supplies and eventually the mail for his general store.

On a side note once Schnebly started acting as postmaster he had to submit a name for his settlement. Oak Creek Crossing and Schnebly Station were rejected as being too long so the little settlement became Sedona, named  after Carl’s wife.

Along with regaling us with these stories, our driver was mindful of the fact that we took the tour for photo ops. No camera in the world has a fast enough shutter speed to over come the shaking I was taking in the back of the jeep so frequent stops became the name of the game. We still had a lot of haze in the atmosphere but I did manage to get some photos although not the  really above average shot I am still looking for! (Any excuse for a return trip )

Schnelby Hill Rd zigs and zags 13 miles before it intersects any other road but our tour only covered about half that. 6 miles up rugged Bear Wallow Canyon we pulled over to a scenic overlook. This is Schnebly Hill Vista. We hopped out to stretch our legs and shake off the bumps and of course enjoy the view. It wasn’t sunset yet but it was close and it was beautiful.

We got pictures and also took some of the jeep and out guide before we clambered back into the yellow monster for the return trip down through the canyon. Sandy hates heights and expressed that concern to our driver. He was really nice so if nothing was coming the other way, he hugged the far side of the road away from the canyon drop off. Of course perched high in the back as I was, I could see it all! 🙂

You can see the winding dirt road we traveled in some of the pictures.

All together we were probably out for about 2 hours. It was a worthwhile trip but if you have back problems or any physical issues that can be aggravated by being shaken up like a cocktail mixer, I would suggest a different tour. By the time we got back I was treating the jeep like a bucking bronco and using my legs to absorb some of the worse  of the bounces and that seemed to make it a bit easier.

All in all it was a fun tour and I didn’t mind the bumps that much. It wasn’t a “sunset” tour but you could call it a “late afternoon” tour.

Tuzigoot National Monument

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Tuzigoot National Monument is the third leg of our journey to see the ancient ruins of the Verde Valley.

More Passport Stamps awaited me at the Visitor Center.  The Visitor Center has been undergoing renovations since November 2010. It looked like they are putting the finishing touches on the landscaping when we were there. Some facilities are available and there were rangers to offer advice and information. The restrooms were open. Have you noticed a trend? With all the water we were being encouraged to drink we took advantage of restrooms when ever they were available!

Anyway, we were now at Tuzigoot which means “crooked water” in Apache.

As you leave the visitor center a paved path leads off to your left. Follow that path and you will find yourself climbing a small hill. Located on this hill are the remains of a Pueblo village attributed to the Southern Sinagua. The site has been dated to around 1125 and was occupied until the early 1400’s when, like so many Sinagua sites in the area, it was abandoned.

The original pueblo was 2 stories high in places containing 77 ground floor rooms. Entry, like at Montezuma’s Castle was by way of ladders through the roof. Originally the village was a small cluster of rooms housing about 50 people but by the 1200’s the population had doubled and then shortly after doubled again as drought in the outlying areas sent refugees looking for food and shelter.

It was fascinating to climb among the ruins, amazing to think that there are any remains after all these years.

We climbed to the top of the ridge to very topmost ruin and looked out over the Verde Valley.

 In the west we could see the black slag pile in Clarkdale by the river. 

 If we looked very closely we could make out Jerome on the mountain side and Cottonwood.

 There is a flat area across from the ruins that used to be  where the tailings from  the smelter were deposited. In 2007 a few feet of soil was spread in this area and seeds from native vegetation scattered. In time it is hoped the area will recover boasting mesquite and creosote bush.

To the south you can see the Verde River crossing the end of the ridgeline and turning south recognizable from our train ride.

Views of the North and East are of the surrounding ridges and mountains. Not familiar with that side I can’t really tell you what we were looking at but you could certainly get a long view of the surrounding land.

We took our time wandering through the ruins but soon it was time to turn our thoughts to the evening tour. Not exactly “off roading”, we were taking a ride up Schnebly Hill Rd, Sedona at sunset. We had to met our guide and driver between 5 & 5:15. The tour starts at 5:30 so it’s time to get going if we want to be on time.