April 20 – 21
We showed up on Janet and David’s doorstep in the afternoon on Friday. Our arrival was announced about a quarter mile before by their four dogs who just couldn’t wait to meet us. This is our first visit with J & D since before the pandemic and it was surely good to see them both happy and reasonably healthy. They had recently moved down from the tiny town of La Sal in Utah for a more reasonable altitude and to be closer to decent health care.
While Mary and Janet visited the dogs, David and I retreated to his office, where we looked a some of his photographs. He is a completely self-taught photographer and wanted advice on how he was doing. I was able to offer some tips, but he was doing quite well on his own. We later sat down to Janet’s wonderful lasagna dinner while we caught up on the past 5 years.
Saturday morning we were out the door and headed to Watson Lake. Mary told me we had been here some years before, but I had little memory of place. Mountains of large boulder piles, reminiscent of the Alabama Hills or Joshua Tree National Park, surround a reservoir whose waters are too polluted with toxic mining materials for swimming. The city of Prescott felt it was still useful as a recreational site, so created a hiking and climbing resource for the area. It is actually quite beautiful. There is camping, and hiking trails are many.
The day started out very warm and was getting hot by the time we arrived at the lake. Janet picked out a nice 2 mile loop hike that would take us high along a ridge of the lake, down to the dam and back. Our hiking app had it at 2-miles as well. In reality, it was 3-plus miles, quite rocky with lots of ups and downs. My only complaint about AllTrails is that the distances are often not quite accurate.
There were interesting rock formations early on, that resembled cinnamon rolls – or maybe I was just hungry. Lots of cactus and plenty of views.
One little formation resembled a elephant head if one stood in just the right spot.
We eventually arrived at the dam and found a nice cool shady lunch spot near the base. Here we could watch a few birds and other small critters frolic while we ate and rested up. It was now quite hot and we were all feeling it.
Finishing lunch, we headed out again, this time following along the canyon. From a distance, I could hear people calling out to one another. As we got closer, I finally located the source. A climber was ascending a shear rock face. She seemed stuck at a certain point and kept calling out, “I’m not strong enough!”. She kept trying though, and seemed to have completed the move as we moved past.
The trail moved us up higher along the ridge and revealed some nice rocky landscapes. There was also just a bit of a breeze up here. Something we all needed as the temps hit the mid-80’s.
In the end, we were all gassed and nearly out of water. On this day, the trail was more than moderate as it was described in AllTrails. It was a good hike – just too hot for us. We returned home, rested up a bit and had a nice dinner out.
Perkinsville
Sunday, April, 21
A good night’s sleep did us all some good, but we were not up for another hike in this hot weather. We opted for a drive and photograph kind of day and Janet was kind enough to do the driving again. This time, we drove towards the ghost town of Perkinsville. While we weren’t going to get to the town itself, we did travel through some interesting terrain.
From an overlook, we got a panoramic view of that included the San Francisco Mountains with some amazing sandstone hills in the foreground. The haze in the sky was a little disappointing, but you get what you get on any given day.
We explored the road, stopping from time to time, until about midday when we came to the Perkinsville Bridge over the Verde River. Just nearby, train tracks and a crossing.
At the south end of the bridge, a corral with a traditional natural tree limb fence sat. A very rural scene. We played here for a while, but lunch called.
Janet suggested getting out of the heat so we parked ourselves under the bridge, along the river bank. Several other groups were nearby. It was really the only shady cool area around and it was a very welcome respite.
After lunch we were all ready to head back. We stopped again at the earlier overlook and found the clouds had increased, and the haze decreased.
We only made two other stops. Both for large Bull (or gopher) snakes. The first was quite large, but was half in the road and half in a bush – we couldn’t see its head. The second was just a mile or so later. It was sunning itself fully in the road. Their bites would hurt, but no fangs, no poison. They are amazing to watch.
We finished our stay with a dinner of cowboy spaghetti – cooked by Mary and enjoyed by all. We said our goodbye’s in the morning and headed out about 50 miles to or next destination for a couple of days. We managed to get a reservation on short notice at Dead Horse Ranch State Park in the town of Cottonwood.
Marking Our Place 