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| Just Finished! |
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| Mountain poppy |
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| More Poppies? |
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| Mountain Terrain |
Yesterday, we decided to drive to a new area, where my sister in law Jean, had recommended a six mile loop called Go John Trail, in the Cave Creek Regional Park, three or four miles south of Carefree, the destination town, with its immense boulders, looming above and around Carefree, with lots of spas.. It's an easy twenty five minute ride west, on Scottsdale Road, filled with bikers and bicyclists, all out to enjoy the Saturday morning.
We paid six dollars to enter the park, somewhat of a discouragement to some people I would think though there seemed to be lots of people at various parts of the park on Saturday. We were hesitant (I was) to take on the six mile hike, especially when we saw the mountains looming in front of us when we started. And it was 8:30 in the morning, all ready getting hot, with an expected high of 87º. We started up and the trail was pleasant a gradual mile climb but the surface was wide and mostly sand, one even a four wheeler might be driven on. We walked slowly, of course, one switch back after another as we climbed and climbed, stopped to admire the view or to take another boring picture of the landscape we never get bored with. We finally started down hill some what, the trail narrowed and we worked our way along the side of the mountain until we gradually, after another half hour, ended up down in the valley, looking up at the summit, down among stream beds, lots of cactus and brush. Walking this far is much psychological and I tried not to think about what was coming up, but as the time built on the mountain, even though I was tired, I knew we had only and hour and a half to go, then an hour, so I kept up the pace and my spirit and enjoyment. After a mile and a half, we did head up the mountain again, on what I would call a dry bed, or it looked and felt like one, as we had to walk carefully on rocks and over rocks. Parts of it also appeared to be shale, the surface stratified. This part took lots of time to navigate and we often had to stop and rest it was so steep and difficult. That's why the trail was said to be 'difficult' at times. We usually passed someone coming towards us every ten or fifteen minutes. Lots of dirt bikers which amazed me as I have no idea how they navigated, either up or down this stream bed. Once we finished this part, we began a long gradual switchback around and down another mountain, till we could see developments off in the far distance. We kept going another half hour, passed horses, more bikers, and finally could see our parking area off in the distance, getting there about three hours and fifteen minutes after we started, thrilled with our accomplishment, hot, dusty and salty from sweating.
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| Back Side of the Moutain |
We then drove to the town of Carefree, parked at the town square, to walk a bit, look at all the kinds of shops you see in most touristy areas around here. They sell jewelery, Indian artifacts, turquoise, paintings, all stuff we have no or little interest in buying. So we stayed only for a half an hour, part of that was taken up with having a Blue Moon at a cafe.
We returned home to an empty house around 1:30, jumped in to the pool to refresh ourselves, then Evie sun bathed for a while and I watched the Masters and napped. Claire came home around 3:00, and her daughter Becky also stopped over, so we helped her get dinner started and sat outside in the shade, munching on carmel corn and chips until Pat and Sean arrived. We then got out the heavy appetizers, caught up on Becky's life (she has a new job), and listened to Sean tell us how to think about the world. Ah youth, there certainty and chutzpah. Actually, he has a good sense of humor and was fun to be around. Dot arrived around 5:30, with a lemon meringue pie and a pan of cinnamon rolls she had just made. We all jumped in and had a roll before dinner, to Dot's delight,
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| Dinner on Saturday Night |
Dinner was a ten pound ham, which Dot had bought on sale (she cannot pass up a deal) earlier in the week, scalloped potatoes, brussel sprouts, and of course, cinnamon rolls, all good. We sat outside after dinner, stuffed, waiting to 'unstuff' and have our pie. Claire brought out a game, Head Bandz, where everyone wears a head band, with a card with a word on it. Each of us was given a minute to ask questions of the group and figure out what the word on the card was. Examples would be 'restaurant', or 'Paris" or 'screwdriver.' It was fun and we laughed and played it for an hour. Then it was pie time, lemony (what else) and smooth though a bit runny, perhaps not baked long enough. Still perfect on a cooling Scottsdale night. Pat was tired, like the previous night, wanted to go home, so they packed up the leftovers, and went back to Dot's condo. We stayed up talking till about 10:45 and went to be, sore, a good sore though if you were to see Evie or I trying to get up out of a chair, you would think we were invalids.
Time to get ready for todays' five miler, with Evie, the relentless one.
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