Abby – Page 6 – The MoHo and Other Traveling Tales

Another gorgeous sunny day on the Oregon Coast May 4

Still have no good internet access, so am sitting in the Mojo Café in Brookings. Managed to upload three days of blog fun but the photo upload is crawling along and I am going to give it up and head back to camp. The rest of the photo links will be posted sometime when access is a bit better. (Photos are all posted now both on Picasa and Smugmug with a link at the bottom of the post for this day!) Good a time as any to catch up on a very few of the 200 plus blog posts in my reader list accumulated since we left Monday morning. Gee, you are all so prolific!!

I woke up as the sky was barely lightening to see a shroud of fog hovering over the ocean, but by the time we got up at 6:30 it was completely gone. There was barely a breeze and the skies were completely clear. We planned to kayak again today, this time on the Pistol River and estuary about 17 miles north, but first we decided to begin our day with a hike down to the beach.

This time we took the South Beach Trail, another well maintained route down the cliffs to the ocean. South Beach Trail takes off just a couple of sites east of ours and meanders through deep green forest before approaching the view parking lot and cliffs to the beach. The path down the cliffs is steep, but not too much so to manage easily back up without stopping. It is even paved with asphalt, so no slipping and sliding on loose rock and gravel makes it really enjoyable.

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Once on the beach, the sun was so warm Mo had to take off her jacket and we walked as far south as the incoming tide allowed, throwing the ball for Abby and enjoying the warm, windless morning. I haven’t experienced the beaches of Oregon without wind very many times, so I thought it was wonderful. Abby even wore out after much fetching, and once even stopped to rinse her sandy ball in a tidepool before picking it up again and bringing it to Mo. Did she do that on purpose?? It seems so, but who knows. Abby IS incredibly smart.

We are unhooked from internet and telephones, but still have the morning news with the cable here at the park. It’s amazing how one thing after the other gets all the focus. The killing of Bin Laden and the decision about whether or not to release his death photos have completely superseded the tragedies in the south. I don’t understand why news can’t actually be news of what is going on everywhere, instead of what happens to be the “big story” of the moment. The flooding and tornado damage in our country is more important to me that all the political posturing about the Osama thing.

We spent a bit of time relaxing in the morning sunlight before taking the baby car north on 101 about 17 miles to our planned launch site on the Pistol River. Once we passed through the beautiful forest and started the descent to the ocean, the difference in wind speed was intense. Parking first at the north side launch, then at the southern approach, we walked out to the river to asses the situation. I think the winds were close to 40 mph and the tide incoming. We thought it would have been ok going upstream, but were a bit worried about getting back downriver. Driving upriver to some other listed launch sites didn’t yield anything more promising, so we once more traveled back to the Pistol River State Park day use area and saw that even with the incoming tide, the connection between the river and the south arm estuary was completely dry. It was cold and the wind was intense, so we looked at each other and said, “Maybe not”. Time for Plan B.

In some of the literature we gathered for the area while driving about town, Mo found information about a little known historical site. In the Brookings area, you can hike to the only spot in the continental US where enemy bombs were dropped during WWII. Nobuo Fujita, a young Japanese warrant officer, flew his small pontoon plan off a Japanese sub on the Oregon coast near Cape Blanco on September 9 1942. His assignment was to drop incendiary bombs into the forest, start a huge fire and panic the nation. Only one bomb out of five detonated, and it ignited the woods up in the hills near Mount Emily. Due to wet conditions and the fact that the bomb only partially detonated, the fire only spread 75 feet. It was quickly put out by four forest service workers.

Twenty years after he dropped his bombs the Brookings Jaycees invited Fujita to visit during the Azalea Festival. He came to ask forgiveness, and presented his sword to Brookings. You can read more detail about this amazing little piece of history here.

We drove several miles east along the Chetco River before turning off on the dirt and gravel road to Mount Emily and the bomb site. The trip reminded me of the many years I spent driving remote forest roads like this one exploring wild areas. The nice part about this trip is that I was only going to hike on trails and I didn’t have to climb these steep slopes with a shovel and a pack through thick brush. In this area, the conifer forests have been burned, and the canopy is often dominated by second growth alder. While a coniferous forest is often lovely, they are also very thick and dark, and a bit forbidding. I really enjoyed the fluorescent lime green light filtering through all the leaves of the springtime alders.

After almost 14 miles of winding road, without seeing another single car coming or going, we found the trail head. The hike was perfect, some ups, some downs, about a mile each way through beautiful forest to the bomb site. The signs were wonderful, telling the story with photographs of the Japanese sub, the pontoon airplane, Fujitsu and his son, and the people responsible for putting out the fire. As usual, the hike back to the trailhead seemed to go much more quickly than the hike out, and the ride back to town also seemed to pass much more quickly. We again passed our special stops found on the way in, the lovely little campsite along the creek, and the amazing very tall waterfall hidden among the alders.

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On the way back down the road, we were discussing how little wildlife we had seen. In the bomb site brochure, it was mentioned that the remoteness of the road often allowed for seeing a bear or two scampering across the road. Literally minutes after we had this discussion, we suddenly saw two bear cubs scamper across the road. It was much too fast for us to truly catch anything with the camera, but then one cub ran up a tree right next to the road, and obligingly waiting for us to take his photo. Once again I am reminded of how much I want a real SLR with a real telephoto lens when I go to Alaska! The baby bear was sure cute, and Mom and sibling were no where to be seen down the incredibly steep slope.

Back in Brookings, we decided it was time for some coastal fish and chips. Funny thing, being a harbor town, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of fish places around. We both remembered a place south of town where we once had a great dinner with friends, but couldn’t find it. Finally found it with the help of the phone and the place was closed up tight. We then drove back through the 101 strip, but nothing appeared, and we decided to go down to the Harbor to see what was there. I had heard about the Oceanside, and after much dinking around, we finally found it. It was also closed up tight!

By this time we were both pretty tired and hungry and grumpy, but neither of us was quite ready to give up and go home and eat soup. We passed a funky little restaurant called the Chetco Seafood Company, with a blinking beer sign in the window, and a couple of people leaving with go bags in their hands. Tired won out, and we parked Abby where her barking wouldn’t get attention and went in. First sign of a good choice was the decent glass of chardonnay for 3 bucks. We ordered fish and chips, and kept asking each other, “Is this really this good or are we just hungry?” I decided it really WAS that good. The fish was light and incredibly fresh, the breading thin and light and delicately spiced and not the least bit greasy. The fries were perfect and the cole slaw perfect as well. We shared a cup of chowder filled with fresh pink? clams to start and it was perfect as well. Maybe we were just hungry, but it may have been the best fish and chips I have ever eaten.

More photos of our day are located here.

Baptism in the Winchuck River

(The rest of the photos for this day are HERE on my SmugMug site)

As I mentioned previously, Brookings is in a sort of “Banana Belt”. Most of the Oregon Coast is chilly and windy much of the year. There are often beautiful days with sunny skies in the fall, and sometimes when it is least expected. Those clear warm fog free days happen more often in Brookings than farther north, and even more than in Crescent City to the south in California. The rainfall here is around 74 inches a year, with precipitation falling on 150 days. I am comparing notes and paying attention because while we were at Fred Meyer the other day, Mo just happened to throw out the thought that Brookings might be a nice place to live.

The original plan when Mo built her house was to live there ten years or so and then move on to something smaller and more manageable, perhaps a condo in a place where there was no winter snow. She chose Brookings once, and having lived on the California coast for more than 25 years, the chilly fogs don’t bother her in the least. I, on the other hand, am a sun worshiper. I need light and warmth. I often think I could live in Florida. I love green and flowers and plants. Brookings right now is filled with green and flowers, and it looks terribly tempting.

Thank goodness a decision isn’t imminent. Mo has lived in the big house at Rocky Point for almost nine years now, and the “ten years” has evolved. So many things to love about Rocky Point, and Mo’s home is lovely, with her assistance throughout the building process, it is a very personal space. The large beam in the living room and much of the woodwork came from huge Douglas firs milled right there on the property. So now the plan is 2020. Instead of a certain number of years, we picked a date. Arbitrary to be sure, but in our 80’s, the thought of shoveling snow isn’t a good one. So, again, somewhere in Southern Oregon, but it could be just about anywhere. It’s kind of exciting to have this change out there in the future, something fun to think about and now I look at Brookings in a completely different way.

Yesterday was one of those gorgeous, sunny days, with temperatures climbing into the 60’s. We hiked a couple of the trails in the park, first to the Harris Butte, and then again down to the beach in the early morning sunshine. It was a perfect day for our plan to get the kayaks in the water. We have a copy of the “Canoe and Kayak Guide” for Oregon South Coast, covering the sloughs and rivers from Newport to the California border. Our choice for yesterday was the Winchuck River, a smaller river near the southern border with an outlet to the ocean. The guide warned of low water, but this time of year we thought things would be in good shape. The suggestion was to launch before high tide, paddle upriver till the tide shift, and then follow the tide back to the launch site near the ocean.

The launch was lovely, on a sandy beach with shallow water that deepened quickly. We paddled upstream under the Highway 101 bridge and followed the river along the farmlands and river homes along the way. Even this close to the ocean, the water was really shallow, with some gravel bars and areas that were less than 4 inches deep. We managed to get through it without grounding, a good test of the new kayaks, but then as we reached some very shallow riffles the current got very strong as the river made what looked like a gentle drop.

I think we paddled for a good 20 minutes, going absolutely nowhere, before we decided to get out and portage the riffles along the rocky beach. We thought if we could get around the riffles, we could continue upriver a bit more. I held Mo’s boat in the strong current while she got back in with Abby, and then attempted to launch into the current myself. I thought of my friend Jeanne, a whitewater kayaker who launches her tiny shoe kayak off rocks and over waterfalls. I, on the other hand, couldn’t manage getting into my boat in a simple fast current. I must have hit the current sideways, or still wasn’t balanced in the middle, and over I went into the very cold water. Even though it was only a couple of feet deep, the current was incredibly strong, and it took every bit of strength I had to hold on to my boat and paddle to keep it from going downriver. Our cockpits are large, open things, and even if we had skirts on, these aren’t the kind of kayaks that you roll over and back up in deep water. Instead, my cockpit filled with water, and my boat banged on the rocky bottom until I could get it hauled up on shore and dump all the water out.

I’m glad it wasn’t terribly cold out, with sunny skies, and I again remembered some kayaking advice, “Dress for the water, not the weather”. Of course, I probably won’t ever do that, since a wet suit seems to be a huge pain in the neck, and I like easy fun comfortable kayaking. It definitely taught me another lesson, though. I saw just how easy it is to roll over in a kayak. In all our years of boating, this has never happened to me, and I get cocky and sometimes don’t wear my lifejacket. I had it on yesterday, since I usually do wear it in unknown water, but now I will wear it all the time, even in gentle Recreation Creek. Good lesson. I didn’t need it yesterday, but I could have.

Amazingly, I had the camera around my neck and inside the jacket and it didn’t get wet. The water and 2 bottles of beer were safely stashed inside the closed hull with wallets in a dry bag so all was well. Once back in the boat, we decided it might be time to go back downstream. Paddling up, I don’t think we really realized how strong the current actually was. In no time at all we were back at the launch site, floating easily and quickly by all those cute little river houses out to the sea.

We also read about the danger zone where a river meets the sea, and now instead of heading into the waves to play, we stayed back cautiously. Again I think of Jeanne, who reads my blog faithfully, who will probably laugh at my caution. Jeanne climbs mountains in Nepal, jumps off waterfalls in Costa Rica and skis down back country cliffs in wild British Columbia. I love watching her adventures, but I have no plans to ever try any of those things. In fact, yesterday looking at the surf, I wondered out loud how people manage to take kayaks out there. I think true sea kayaks are more nimble creatures than our comfortable, big cockpit, wide, stable boats. Maybe someday I’ll go take a surf lesson on a warm day with an instructor. Maybe.

We saw no sign of the recent tsunami damage at Brookings Harbor

We didn’t get back to camp till 4 or so, and after a very late lunch of egg salad, we both fell into a weary nap. The evening was long and warm, and a bit later Mo built a great campfire that we enjoyed long into the dark night. There wasn’t a bit of wind and the fire felt wonderful. It is nice that in this state park, campfires are allowed, but don’t plan to bring any firewood from any other area. It’s called “Burn it Where You Buy It”, and is important to keep beetles and other pests from traveling from one place to another. The California check station now asks specifically if you are carrying firewood as well as certain kinds of produce.

Laughlin, Forgettable. Pahrump, Memorable

We are heading north on Highway 95 now, on very smooth, very straight 2 lane road. Mo is driving and there is very little traffic. As our trip is winding down, both of us are a bit ready to just hit the road and keep moving rather than lingering much longer. The original plan included a possible trip into Death Valley and a possible route north on 395. We both love Death Valley and have spent time there, and we have traveled 395 many times. 395 is gorgeous, and the Alabama Hills near Lone Pine is one of our favorite places. But we have been there. Somehow this time the open spaces of Nevada called us with the direct route north.

I love traveling through this part of Nevada. The vistas are so wide, huge alluvial fans as far as the eye can see, sloping gently upward to the contorted rugged volcanic ridges, broken by layers of uplifted sediments, and subtly colored by all the eternities of evolution of this landscape. As a soil mapper, one of the indicators we use to identify soil change is the vegetation pattern. Here in this part of the world those subtle changes are easily visible.

Crossing a playa with crusted salt surfaces, up a bit more to a low basin covered with greasewood, tells me it is still salty. In the distance, at the foot of the contorted hills the greasewood drops out and creosote appears, a faint hint of filmy green across the distance. Less salt. Rising higher, the gray mounds of low sage and an occasional Joshua tree. Each of those variations will indicate to me that the soil is changing, not only the salts on the surface, but the hard petrocalcic layers below the surface, the mixed up crazy gravels and cobbles of the alluvial fans, the shallow bedrock soils of the ridges.

Mapping soils in the desert is a beautiful thing, at least if you have a 4 wheeler and access. In this day it seems that unless the mappers are on federal lands, the access in extremely limited. People are protective of their rights, their property, and no longer trust the government. A geologist or a botanist or a soil scientist may be a threat and not a help in their minds. It’s a bit of a sad thing for the young soil scientists coming up now, trying to do their jobs, constantly hindered by suspicious landowners. I was lucky. I mapped almost a million acres of ground, much of it wild and free lands in the Pacific Northwest, just a tiny bit of southern deserts. Lucky me!

Traveling north from Phoenix to Laughlin was uneventful. We took Highway 60 northwest and avoided the fast pace and crowded traffic on I-17, but once we arrived at I-40 near Wickenburg the RV’s were almost bumper to bumper. It was the mass exodus of the Canadians in full force. Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan plates in abundance. I never saw a Quebec or Ontario, though. Laughlin wasn’t far from the Interstate, and before long we were dropping down to the Colorado River and the town of Bullhead City. Right before our turnoff to a possible RV park we found the Mojave County Park, with what looked to be fairly nice sites along the river. With a fee of $21 for the night, we settled in to a back in site near the river. The temperature read 99.9 degrees and within a few minutes it read 100. March 31, and 100 degrees! We pulled the shades, turned on the air conditioner and napped and read in the cool dim light until 6:30 that night!

When the sun finally let up a bit, we took a walk down to the river so Abby could cool off and swim, and got in the Tracker to check out Bullhead City and then cross the bridge to Laughlin and the casinos. Twilight was deepening and the lights of the casinos looked dramatic and lovely reflected on the river. Laughlin itself wasn’t much to speak of, especially with the extensive construction on Casino Drive. The marquees said nothing about shows, only advertising their buffet dinners and hotel rooms. We drove up to Harrah’s and almost left before we finally found an entrance to the Casino. We can at least do things like this at night now and then, because Abby seems to be content to settle down and sleep in the car if it is dark outside.

Mo and I like to play the slots a bit, and to us it is a win if our 20 bucks each lets us play a couple of hours and have fun. Cheap entertainment. Neither of us is likely to go over that 20 limit and we rarely win anything, but I still like the lights and the glitz of the casinos. It’s especially fun to watch the people there. We saw one very old lady, very skinny, dressed up in diamonds and sparkles, with shiny reflective leopard skin jacket. leather pants, and sequins everywhere. After a short time at Harrah’s, we went to the Royal Palm Casino, with it’s marquee shouting out that it had the newest slot games. Here we found a sign to the River Walk, which I had heard was a nice thing to do in Laughlin, but it was dark and buggy out, so we decided against it. Another move into the Colorado Belle Casino, dolled up to look like a big riverboat was our final destination for the evening, with our $20 increased a bit with some bells and whistles and then again finally gone.

Originally we thought we might stay two nights in Laughlin, having heard and read much about it from RV’rs and travel magazines. Not for us, I guess. We aren’t enough into gambling and town camping to really enjoy it that much. we also didn’t bring our kayaks along on this desert trip, and the Colorado River here was wide and fast. It seemed there were lots of water craft around, including noisy jet skis. Instead we decided to spend our extra night at Pahrump, another place much touted by RV’rs for the winter. I guess we would find out the next day.

Family and Friends in the Desert

Our first preference for a destination wouldn’t necessarily be the big cities of Tucson and Phoenix. We both love the wide open vistas of the desert, preferably without telephone poles and skyscrapers, and miles and miles of traffic. However, another advantage of traveling in an RV is the opportunity to spend time with friends and family that we might not manage otherwise. Hence our decision to spend quite a bit of time both in Tucson and in Phoenix.

In addition to our friends in Sahuarita, we spent another day with a long time friend of Mo’s in Green Valley. Joan lives in another large gated retirement community with winding streets, a dog park, a community center, swimming pool, and lots of amenities nearby in Green Valley. Joan’s home is big and cool and with her recently glassed in patio, was a great place to leave Abby and her dog Rusty while we spent the day visiting the historic town of Tubac, just a few miles south.

Tubac was at one time a Presidio, and there is a nice state park in addition to several charming guest houses and a ton of interesting shopping choices. It was a bit like going to Mexico without having to go to Mexico, and some great art thrown in. We looked around town, enjoying the colorful pots and garden art, and exploring the Art Museum. Lunch was relaxed until Joan checked her messages and found out that Abby had been barking incessantly since we left and the neighbors were in a bit of a snit. Bummer. Abby is so good in so many ways, but the separation anxiety makes it hard to leave her anywhere except with a dog sitter who is paid to sit with her. We skipped the rest of our shopping excursion and rushed back home.

Once there, Abby was a perfect lady, lying quietly at Mo’s feet as if nothing was wrong at all. She is a perfect house guest, even if Mo isn’t there, she will be quiet and calm with whomever is caring for her. Only the slobbered up windows gave any indication that anything was ever wrong at all. We took the dogs to the dog park for some fun and then came back to Joan’s house for another lovely supper and more conversation around the dinner table. Once again, it was a long dark ride back to Tucson and home and the patiently waiting cat.

Early Wednesday morning we were back on the road heading for Phoenix. We did look into the Luke AFB Military Family Camp, but it certainly didn’t have the reputation of our previous digs at Davis-Monthan. The instructions said “choose a site and be sure the electricity is operating before you check in”. Another review referred to the constant barrage of fighter jet aircraft noise day and night. With temperatures in the 90’s this week, we definitely couldn’t boondock, so dipped into our Streets and Trips program to see what might be available north in Phoenix.

Just a few miles from one set of relatives, we found the Royal Palm Mobile Home and RV Resort. When it says “mobile home’ and ‘”resort” in the same line we usually figure we are in for one of those places that wants to sell a lot. Since it was a CampClub listed park, however, we called anyway. Sure enough, they had a spot with full hookups, 16 bucks a day. Electricity! Of course, the WiFi was extra, and I never did get it to work, and the owner gave me some sort of complex story about why they didn’t have cable tv, but it didn’t matter much because we were there to visit relatives, not relax in a city center kind of RV park. When we finally checked out the pool on our morning walk this morning before leaving, we decided it was pretty small for a park as big as this. It was also pretty darn warm!

We landed in early afternoon, immediately turned on the air conditioning and called the relatives to schedule a convenient time to visit. Once arrangements were made for the following day, we used the iPhone to check out what to do in Phoenix. Found another website, “The Fifteen Things to do While In Phoenix” and when we got to number 7, drive the Apache Highway, both of us said, “Yup, that’s it”. We could take the dog, be in the cool car, and still get out to see something interesting. I’ll write about that part of the day in a separate blog, because it was an incredible treat, and I took lots of photos. We didn’t get back to the park until late, and with a sandwich for supper we fell asleep with the windows open and the Fantastic Fan on full blast.

The next morning we first visited Mo’s cousin Jim, who with his wife Linda has lived in the Phoenix area since 1994. They love living here and love the convenience of their location in the city. Their home was at the base of a mountainous park nearby, and within a lovely resort now owned by the Hilton. Linda served us a great breakfast, and then Jim treated us (mostly me) to his technical savvy about all things computer related. He also showed many of his great photos taken with a Nikon D-60 on his huge flat screen very high def TV. Nice morning. Jim is very much into the family genealogy and we got a great tour through some family history and stories.

Mid-day, we had just enough time to get across Phoenix to Sun City Grand near Surprise to visit Mo’s Uncle Albert and his wife Caroline. They live in a sprawling, very elegant, Del Webb community with 4 18 hole golf courses, a huge recreation center, and a club for just about anything in the world you could want to do. Their home was all soft white and pristine, with wide open views of the golf course. Caroline served us lunch while Uncle Al continued the stories of the Ross family history. Mo’s mother was from a family of ten kids, and Uncle Al was one of the younger uncles. Mo has lots of great memories of the many uncles teaching her to play basketball, taking her fishing, and doing all sorts of fun things along the mighty Columbia River where she grew up.

We looked at many more historic family photos from the homestead in North Dakota, the cemeteries we visited last summer, and the family homes in St Helens, Oregon. What a family, and what a history! Of course, the wild ones, the skeletons in the closet were the most fun, with Billy Bob, hanged for horse stealing, being a star. Many of the uncles and cousins have history as military airmen and some have been commercial pilots. Mechanical skill seems to run in the family, so Mo comes by it naturally. Gee, with all those uncles and brothers, it’s no wonder.

Uncle Al kept us entertained until late in the afternoon, when Cousin Jim called and wanted to confirm an early evening date for drinks and supper at Aunt Chilada’s, near their home. We didn’t even have time to stop in to the MoHo to say hi to Jeremy, and just drove through the crazy traffic back across the city once more. Supper was also great, with lots more stories and laughs.

It was long after dark when we finally returned to our park and the patient cat sitting in the window wondering when we might settle down again. The last of the “visiting” is over now, and we are traveling north toward Laughlin before once again winding our way into some wild open desert landscape. Visiting is nice, it’s great to get to see relatives and friends, but it’s time for some companionable silence and wide open vistas, for sure!

Anza Borrego State Park and Coyote Canyon

As expected, I took nearly 200 photos, if you want to check them out here.

Our rig faces northeast, with an open view of the mountains past the low lying, almost invisible buildings of Borrego Springs. Watching the morning sun stream in the windows, listening to all the birds, sipping morning tea in all that desert light was delightful. The day stretched ahead, with predicted temperatures in the 70’s and clear skies until late afternoon, when a bit of wind and showers could appear.

We knew that the park was huge, with miles and miles of dirt roads, some we could manage, and others maybe not. We also knew hiking is something we love but not sure where we could go with Abby. So first stop on the agenda was the main Anza Borrego State Park Visitor Center, just a hop up the road from where we are staying here at the Holiday Borrego Mobile Home Park. After a couple of nights near freeways and truck stops, the silence and darkness of Borrego Springs makes for amazing restful sleeping. In fact, Borrego Springs is listed as one of only two “dark sky” communities, and one of the ten best places for viewing the heavens in the United States.

The visitor center is beautifully done, with interesting displays, excellent volunteers providing information about where flowers are blooming, what roads are passable, where the sheep are located, and yes, where we could walk with Abby. All park roads, dirt or paved, but no trails. I especially enjoyed the geologic maps and prehistory of the area. There is so much to see here, and after buying a hat for Mo and a tee shirt for me, (oh my, will it end up in a quilt someday? I just can’t seem to resist those gorgeous park tee shirts.), we walked around the lovely naturally landscaped grounds before embarking on our chosen journey.

Coyote Canyon seemed to be the best choice, with many flowers in bloom right now after the rains. There were several people in the center, many of whom had only two wheel drive vehicles, but with our little Tracker we thought we could manage at least some of the 4 wheel drive routes.

The road north from Borrego into the park is straightforward, that is until the prehistoric animals start to appear. I recently saw photos of these critters on another blog, but it still didn’t prepare me for the surprise. With the sponsorship of Dennis Avery, a Borrego Springs philanthropist, the Mexican artist Ricardo Arroyo Breceda has created amazingly intricate and detailed iron sculptures that appear as though they just emerged from the landscape as it was a couple of million years ago during the Pliocene, Pleistocene, and Miocene eras. We hope to explore other areas of the park where fossils of this time period have been found, but today our journey was into the granite batholiths of the San Ysidro Mountains along Coyote Creek.

When the park says 4×4, high clearance, they mean it. Although that can mean two different things. We saw sedans crawling along the sandy wash road with success, and then we saw them turn around at “first crossing”. The Tracker made quick work of that one, and on to “2nd crossing” without a hitch. Good little Tracker. We saw a few Jeeps, real ones, not the SUV kind of Jeep, with explorers heading for the deeper reaches of the canyon, but when we reached “3rd crossing”, we decided it might be prudent to check it out and walk. We wanted a good hike today anyway, and this was perfect.

	Park volunteers warned of soft sand, but it wasn’t a bit of a problem for the Tracker
	This was second crossing, still no problem for the Tracker, even though there are some good sized rocks hidden in that foot deep water
	We started walking at third crossing, where the road followed the creek, but had no real clue just what was ahead of this part

Third Crossing was a bit of a surprise, since it followed the path of Coyote Creek, quite full after the recent rains. As we walked (and Abby swam) along the road, we came upon a young man walking back checking for parts that might not be as deep as others. He had driven across, but it was up to his tail pipes and he wanted to avoid an engine cutting out. We watched him plow back through the water and thought, “Good Luck!”

Continuing on with our hike, we noticed a trail of oil running down the center of the road. UhOh. Wonder if he knows he broke something. Then as we hiked up a couple of very steep very rocky grades, we knew that 4×4 definitely means something other than even a little 4 wheel drive Tracker in some parts of this park. We hiked high enough above the Lower Willows area to look down into Collins Valley and up the wild open distance of Upper Coyote Canyon. We didn’t make it as far as the hike into Sheep Canyon or Salvador Canyon with it’s hidden palms. In fact when we looked at our excellent purchased park map, it looked as though we just barely tapped into the wild distance of Coyote Canyon. The best part about all this was the perfect hiking temperatures, and the fact that Abby could be with us, and enjoy the refreshing stream. Not often you see and hear burbling water in the desert.

Once back to the car, and driving out, we saw many more vehicles, some parked having picnics, another big rough jeepy tour thing with six folks hanging on for dear life as he dropped down into third crossing. We wondered just how it might feel for those folks bouncing around in the back of the open jeep when they started up the steep bouldery road into Collins Valley.

This park whetted our appetite for a lot more. Like many others who come here, we looked at each other and said, “This place calls for at least a month in the winter” . We want to come back and explore so much more. Before settling in to our home, we drove around some of the neighborhoods around town. There is a stillness here, even in town, that is so rare in the desert any more. It reminds me of the California desert I knew as a kid, before the sprawling thing happened to Lancaster and Palmdale and Palm Springs. The buildings are low, there are no stop lights, no big box stores, very few stores at all, although we did find the ice cream store on the way back to camp. We loved the way homes here are scattered about the desert in a pleasing manner, that feels as though they emerged naturally.

It’s much different than the overgrown trashy desert rat kind of desert that is becoming the rule rather than the exception. Looking out over the landscape here, we saw no trash, none anywhere. From the quiet dirt roads around town, the desert vistas expand all around in all directions, clean and clear and silent. It is all that I dream of when I dream of desert in winter. It’s a place to soothe the soul and quiet the spirit.

After putting together a great supper with some of that pulled pork I made before we left, we enjoyed sitting out behind our rig on the edge of the park watching the light play on the mountains. Our plans were to leave for the Tucson area Thursday morning, but that just seemed silly. “What is the rush, I said? Why don’t we stay here one more night and take some time tomorrow to go find some of the places we couldn’t see today?” Mo was up for that idea, and we went to bed with the great feeling that the next day would be relaxed and fun, and we would have time to go find all those “points of interest” that we saw on the park map.