4-1-2007
Headed North

I just love this camp spot on the ridge. Before I left in the morning I went out and snapped this of camp.

 
The morning view…

I went into Globe as I thought I had heard that they were going to have a car show in town. I saw Larry, who was a guy that was camped up on the ridge near me about a month ago. He had to show me a cartrige that he had found at a battle site where Geronimo fought the cavalry. He said that the historians had gone through and found over 400 cartridges but they evidently had missed this one. It is a copper case and it is a rim fire. I’m not sure but maybe 44 caliber? He has one of the most interesting ‘outfits’ out on the road. He is a desert camper and spends the winters down here in this area mostly, I think, as he is very secretive about his movements. Dang ‘ol rum runner.

Two views of his rig. He has a couple of those little Chinese mini bikes packed in there. This was a full size motorhome but he said it got mice and leaked so he just cut the top off and it is better now. He sleeps in the cab and other wise ‘lives’ outside in the desert. He goes to Washington for the summer as it gets too hot down here for him.

At the gas station I met this guy with rocks in the back of this pickup. He said he was out visiting and found this pickup for his dad. He is from Michigan and he said the trucks rust out back there and this one was really nice and thought his dad would like it. He happened to go by a place that was having a sale on rocks and he bought these because they were so beautiful. I told him when I first saw them in the back of the truck I thought it was a half a beef all skinned out. He paid fifty bucks for the one in the middle and got the two others as a two-fer for thirty bucks. He was really proud of his purchase

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When I got into down town I found the street blocked off and lots of vendors with a variety of stuff.  Most of the stuff was regular craft show stuff as well as quite a few antique vendors.

I found that one of the restaurants that I often went to had a place set up for feeding the folks. One of the things I usually buy when I go there is a green chili burro.  This area is the only one that I know of that calls burritos just plain ‘Burro”. I love them and this one was good but smaller than the ones that they serve at the restaurant. Oh, burros don’t have any beans in them, just green chili and meat.

The place I found to park my train was next to these hot rod guys. It turns out that they are Airstream fans and have had several of them and now have a Silver Streak. There are lots of hot rods in the area and it is nice to see them out on the road and being used.

I talked with a couple of other guys that were motorcycle fans. They had gotten old and now ride Honda Gold Wings but could sure see the possibilities of doing the back roads with the Fatdog.

I headed out north on 77 and went down and across the Salt River Canyon.

When I stopped to take a photo this guy pulls up with this cool roadster.

He said it is made in Europe and has a two liter GM engine with 340 HP. It was sure nicely put together. He said it was a LOT of fun to dirve.

It didn’t take him long to pass when he got a chance. Actually he zoomed on by for my appreciation I am sure.

I don’t go fast with my little train but was able to pass this guy. I am totally impressed with guys that overload their outfits and this guy is somebody I am sure I could be a friend with. Hell, he might even be a relative of mine, I would be proud if he was.

I made it up to Show Low in the afternoon. I have been looking at the map and was very interested in a little road that takes off from there headed west called the Mogollon Rim Road. I finally found it and totally forgot to take my little camera. It is high country and it doesn’t follow along a rim or cliff which is what I was expecting. It evidently is the divide line that runs along a ridge with the  Fort Apache Rez on the south and the Sitgreaves National Forest on the north. The road apparently was just dried out enough for some limited travel. The road was dirt and there were foot deep ruts and some slick spots. The road goes though some burned forest and some of those trees had fallen across the road. I guess some of the quad guys that had gone before me had brought chain saws and had cut notches in the trees to allow them through. Some of the smaller trees they just drove over. It was a lot of fun but I sure had to be careful out there. that road goes all the way over to Forest Lakes but I finally had to bail off because it was getting late and I got worried that if anything happened it would be a LONG walk getting out of there. There were only a few signs and when I saw one for Pinedale I took that road. I think maybe latter in the year when more folks drive the road and maybe after it was touched up some with a grader, it will be a nice ride. It is a road through a bunch of trees and when I got to the Pinedale area there were some really big houses. I had parked the train at the Big K parking lot and when I got back I happened to open the computer and it hooked itself up to the Days Inn wifi. That is cool, so I decided to just spend the night there with a few cattle trucks and two motor homes. There was a Safeway next door so I was in a good place to feed myself.

The next stop was the Canyon de Chelly which is a National Monument. I am always leery of these organized sports areas but I thought I would take a quick look. My buddy Mark had stopped by and taken a walk down into the canyon on his way down to ride with me this winter. He said it was really nice so I went on it. It is always interesting to get in some place with my little train and get out. I made it into the visitors center after almost turning around because it didn’t look like I might be able to get in and out. It was made for those big motor homes pulling cars so it wasn’t that bad. When I asked about camping there was a volunteer that said that there is a free campground just down below I could stay at, otherwise all the land around there is private Indian rez land. I took a chance and drove on down and found a spot at the very edge and didn’t have to try to back up and in or otherwise unhook the bike trailer and stack things up. There sure were lots of folks down in the campground but the good part of this campground is that it seems like everyone has a dog and they come by my camp and I get to pet their dogs. All the dogs have been really friendly except for one Airdale/Airhead that was a rescue dog. I know about those airhead rescue dogs, you too Tucker? This area is surrounded by Rez and the Rez dogs are all over the place. All the camp dogs are on a leash, but the Rez dogs don’t have supervision and are cruzing for things to eat. I had to put my little ice box up so they didn’t help themselves. Oh, there were about twenty ravens that came though in the morning to clean up what ever the dogs didn’t get.

I took a ride in the morning out on the road that goes along the north side of the Monument. They have a few places where you can drive to the edge of the canyon. Indians have been living here for five thousand years the sign said. They didn’t say exactly as they want to be socially correct or sensitive but evidently each new group killed off the others and took over. The Navaho finally got it and they have been farming down in the canyon. They are still doing some farming evidently as I could see some fields but this time of year it was just starting to green up and no field work was being done.

There had been some snow last week someone said and it left this nice little drinking hole on the edge of the canyon.

The trail down to the edge of the canyon goes across rock and there are stones to mark the trail.

Can you see the Antelope House down below? That is what they call this because an Indian who lived there a hundred years ago drew on the walls pictures of antelope.

This one is called the mummy cave. Evidently some of the first explorers found a couple of mummies here. 

It would have been really nice to have a telephoto lense for these long distance shots.

I just love these trees growing out of rocks. It seems to like it here eh?

I stayed on hwy 64 and went south on 12 down to Fort Defiance where I started up hwy 7. The road turned to dirt and somehow I got lost in the maze of roads. I ended up on hwy 264 and went west to Ganado and on up to Chinle and to the campground. That little stretch of dirt road was not too bad but I sure would hate to try it when it was wet. It was a little damp in spots but that seemed to help pack the loose sand although it did make the clay ground tricky.

I Stopped at the Hubble Trading Post which is another one of the National Monument sites. This is the barn which is the building I liked the best. There is hay storage above.

This is inside the trading post. The big old counters were really cool and they had some interesting things for sale.i don’t think the horse work collars were for sale but were more for looks like a lot of thing in the store.

a basket covered with pitch to make a water jug.

I liked these cold weather gloves. This is high country and I bet it gets cold up here in the winter. I’m not sure but I think this must be 6 or 7 thousand feet.

This room was full of Navaho rugs for sale. Something about the size of a bath towel can be $4,000. Some of the rugs had photos of the weaver who made them.

Four horns…..

They had a really nice collection of baskets and they had them hanging from the roof beams which I thought was a nice way to display them.

This is a common sight. There is a hogan with a regular stick built house next to it.

I made it back to Chinle and saw this guy selling hay and thought I would post it for my hay buddies. They were really nice looking three wire alfalfa bales for $12.50.

I have the south rim to explore tomorrow. There is only one place where they let you hike down into the canyon otherwise you have to hire a Indian guide for $15 an hour. I think that is what Mark did when he came here. There is also a tour that they take you in a big 6X6 old army truck up the canyon and you can hire a guide and take them with you in your high clearance 4x4 for a tour.