Slugger is so cute. When he is afraid of something he turns his head way to the side. I guess if you don’t look then it’s not as scary. For example, when Mike does Slugger’s toenails, Slugger will turn his head way to the side – kind of like kids do when they are getting blood drawn. Anyway, Slugger is afraid of cattle guards and we had to drive across a few of those on this dirt road. So, since he is the navigator, he was watching the road carefully. Each time he would see a cattle guard coming he would turn his head way to the side until after we crossed it. Just too cute.
When we started the hike it looked pretty but nothing super special. We were however all by ourselves which is always nice. Needless to say, it was very peaceful.
Here and there beside the trail were some very pretty flowers.
As we continued on the hike it just got prettier and prettier. We started getting into red rock country.
In the center of the canyon there is a river that runs the entire length. It is the same river that goes right by our campground.
The trail only came near the river in spots but when we were near the river Wazzu would run down and get in the water and just leisurely swim around in circles.
Interestingly enough, she seems to understand the concept of cooling off as even though she got very wet she never shook off. I guess she knew she would stay cool longer if she kept the water on her.
After walking through some meadows and along some rocks we came to a nice little pool area on the river. It was a great place for Slugger to do some swimming.
It was a very nice picturesque little spot with some really neat huge rocks we could walk on that overlooked the water. The water actually looked deep enough that we could have easily dived off into the water but we didn’t want the dogs to jump in after us. LOL!! From where Mike and Slugger are in this picture you could jump or dive off.
We were having a great time here but we had other things to do today so we had to continue along. My Oh My (ha – my favorite song right now) are we ever glad we continued on. We came to the part of the trail that is literally on the side of the red rock cliff walls. The first part was fairly wide - probably 24" wide.
The trail went along the side of the walls for a while and got narrower all the time. It was so scary!
The dogs actually negotiated it just fine but of course I went much slower. (I will admit that it was kind of fun rock climging!) So Wazzu kept turning around to come back to check on me. A couple times when she was turning she almost fell – rocks went tumbling down into the water as she turned. One time I don’t know how she caught herself as two feet fell off the trail and she was using every bit of ballast her tail could supply as she was tipping over the edge. I was so scared – I think she was too. But fortunately she managed to hang on somehow!
Here is Slugger watching his footing around the egde of the rock cliff. He is so much the same color as the rock that he really blends in.
As it turns out, at this point in the trail you are supposed to swim across the river. Ya, right! So this was the end of the trail for us. Wazzu and Sparkie however somehow knew the trail continued on the other side of the river. Wazzu swam straight across
but the water was way too cold for Sparkie so she tried to do a tight rope act across some skinny branches/logs that went the width of the river. She did fairly well but did fall in a little a couple times.
Wazzu had a great time playing crazy dog on the shore opposite of us.
We had been playing around there for a while when we noticed Sparkie was missing. After looking all around I just happened to look up. And there was Sparkie straight up above me - how she negotiated her way up those rocks I'll never know.
This was such a pretty area and we had it all to ourselves. Again, I’d like to bottle this time we had together. The weather was perfect, the atmosphere was perfect, everything was perfect. It was a great time when all the cares of the world didn’t exist.
On the way back, we stopped in a little meadow and while Mike was entertaining the dogs by the river I hid a bunch of hard boiled eggs. The dogs love Easter egg hunts – and this was no exception. They thought it was really fun to find eggs out in the wilderness.
Just after the egg hunt spot we noticed a little trail that led to another cool spot on the river. Just across the river was an extremely tall red rock wall with a tree that hung out over the river. There was a large rope there and it was obvious kids used this to swing out over the water and jump in. Needless to say, we didn't try that but Slugger did enjoy swimming there. Because of the large rock wall the water looked red due to the reflection.
Interstingly enough, as Slugger swam back he got part way out of the reflection. Nothing was done to alter this picture - it is totally due to the red wall on the left side and no wall behind him to the right.
I had been trying to get a picture of a really pretty butterfly I had seen during the walk. But they just don't fly in any sort of predictable pattern so I was having no luck at all. A while later just as I came around a corner I saw two butterflies sitting on the ground. What luck! This time I was able to get a picture.
Just as we got back to the trailhead there was a really large three that had fallen. The tree was hollowed out quite a ways so of course Wazzu had to check it out.
There was a large area on top of the log so we stopped for a little family picture.
Now that Mike figured he had us a bit entertained he took us back to the RV and headed out to visit some of the local ancient Indian ruins of the area. First stop was a famous place called Montezuma’s Castle, just a few miles from Camp Verde. The site is a similar to the Gila Cliff dwellings we visited in New Mexico last year, and was built by a related group, the Sinagua. Like the Gila dwellings, it is a multilevel apartment-like building constructed in a south-facing natural cave high above a small river valley.
As you can see from the above picture, getting to them must have taken long ladders and steel nerves. Tourists could only look at them from below, and could not get to the cave. It was occupied from 1100 to 1400 AD and then abandoned for unknown reasons. The Sinagua themselves apparently were absorbed by tribes to the north or south, and the Apache later occupied the area. By the way, it has nothing to do with Montezuma or the Aztecs.
Next stop was a few miles north at a weird place called Montezuma’s Well. As with the castle, it was used by the Sinagua. The well is a round lake at the bottom of a huge limestone sinkhole at the top of a hill.
It seems strange to walk uphill to a lake in Arizona. There were ruins of Sinagua dwelling and a Hohokam pit house around the hill.
The lake drains out a small natural outlet tunnel in the side of the hill, called a swallet. (Who knew there would be a name for such a rare configuration.) On the outer side of the swallet the Sinagua had dug irrigation canals to route the water above and parallel the valley to their cropland. Exact same principles used in irrigation everywhere.
Then I drove farther up the Verde River valley to a site called Tuzigoot. It was also built by the Sinagua and abandoned about 1400 AD, but it had a very different layout from the other sites. Tuzigoot is a stone, multilevel building located conspicuously on top of a hill in a bend of the river, with a lake and marsh on the other side.
It had several dozen rooms, all about 12 feet by 8 feet with no doors or windows, just a hole in the ceiling for access. Most of the rooms had deteriorated to just low walls, but a few in the center had been reconstructed to full size.
Here is the inside of one of the rooms.
The temperature in the rooms was amazingly cool compared to the outside. The Sinagua knew how to get out of the heat apparently.
Debbie & Mike
4/4/07
PS Here are some cute pictures of the dogs.
And a picture of Mike and the youngsters enjoying one of the scenic spots.
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