Our Last ATV Trip of the Winter Season

What a great day it was today. Sunny and warm and a great day for one final trip into the desert! We wanted to visit our baby owls and see all the flowering cacti one last time. We met up with Ann & Trent out at our old RV park where we store our ATV and we were out on the trails just after 1 pm today. I couldn't believe all the cacti that were flowering. This is the best year so far for us. The colors were tremendous

 A field full of Engelmann Prickly Pear cacti flowering. They have a lovely yellow flower

 We visited one of the Great Horned Owls' nests. You can see one of the babies peeking down on us. It has grown so big in just a week!

 The Mom is in the nest with the two babies, you can see the second baby just to the right of the larger baby and right in front of the Mom. They are so cute! I just downloaded Doug's pictures and he got a couple of fantastic pictures of the baby owls

You can really see the Mom and two babies in this picture
 

I can't believe how big the babies have gotten
 

 If looks could kill.........

When we got the the first nest we had found, the Momma owl flew away immediately. There is only the one owlet in this nest and you can only see the top of his head in the nest. He must have been sleeping or he is a younger owl and the nest is deep
 

You can barely see the head over the top of the nest

 Flowering Buckhorn Cholla cactus flower. They can range from brick color to pink and orange or yellow. We saw every color today

 The Strawberry Hedgehog Cactus are still flowering

 This one is a Staghorn Cholla cactus. They have a bright scarlet flower only

 A yellow Buckhorn Cholla

 A close up of a yellow Engelmann Prickly Pear cactus flower

 Staghorn Cholla cactus

 Burgundy Buckhorn Cholla - I told you them came in many colors!

 I was so excited when I saw this Gila Monster cross the road right in front of our ATV! The are one of only 2 very venomous lizards in the Sonoran desert and very rarely seen

 He/she was a very healthy specimen

 Its colors and designs on his skin were quite remarkable

 Of course I am reminding Doug to not get too close as they can move quite fast and they have a very nasty bite - along with being venomous!

 Creepy looking eh? It really made my day to see it though

 More cactus flowers, they are so breath taking

 We went down to the Harris's Hawk nest to see if we could see the babies yet. Last week when we were there with Kathleen and Brad, the Mom was on the nest and we could hear the baby(s) chirping but didn't see them. Well today there was nobody in the nest and the parents and one immature hawk were soaring above the nest. We couldn't believe the little one was flying already. This is one of the adult hawks

 This was the other adult hawk

 One of the adults landed on a dead tree

 The young hawk landed on top of a saguaro cactus and waited for its parents to tell it what to do

One of the adults taking off from atop a saguaro.

It was a great trip, we saw so much today. It was bitter sweet coming back to the park knowing it was our last ride of this winter season! We had Ann & Trent over for dinner tonight to help us eat up some of our food so I can get the fridge and freezer cleaned in the next two days. We are down to 2 more days leaving Wednesday morning for home. Boy did this winter go fast, it was a great winter, with wonderful friends and lots of company

Our last full moon of the Season

Full moon this month was April 06th and everyone from our ATV group has gone home but Ann & Trent and us. Kathleen and Brad were still here so we sat outside at our place and watched the moon rise. We could have had a campfire in our fire pit but it was such a warm evening we didn't feel we needed one! The moon was spectacular as you will see by our pictures

 Moon from our backyard

 The little bit of cloud cover made for interesting pictures

 The moon was so big and bright it almost looked like a harvest moon!

 We are going to miss this view for the next 6 months!

 We have never seen a saguaro flowering and this year, with the super warm weather we have been having, the flowers are weeks early- yahhh All those little nubs around the top wioll all eventually be flowers. The flowers open about 2 hours after sunset and stay open till the next afternoon. The flower remains open for less than 24 hours.

 There are flowers and buds on all but one arm. Our old RV park is in the background and you can see it is almost empty as most people have already headed home.

 Close up of the flower

We went out to the second owl's nest to see if there was any progress and look what we found! Two baby owls. One is looking at us and one is turned around.

 

Now they are both looking at us. This is a first for us. To actually have found two Great Horned Owls' nests and then seen the babies is such a privilege. I could sit out and watch them all day!
 

 We didn't really realize how much we would miss being able to camp when we sold the motor home so all winter we talked about buying a small toy hauler trailer so we could pack up the ATV and go out into the desert boon docking or to the State/County parks for a few days every month. Nothing like sitting around a campfire, listening to the coyotes and watching the stars! Of course, in typical Sharon & Doug fashion, we left it till the last possible moment to buy something! To be fair to ourselves, we have had so much company since January, we really didn't have the chance to go searching. After looking at a variety of used trailers, we just found a trailer in Tucson of all places. We found it on Craig's List and it was owned by a retired couple so we knew it would be kindly treated. We looked at a few owned by young families that were newer but in much worse condition,they had been used hard! We invited our friends Ann & Trent to come with us to Tucson so off we went on Thursday morning. As soon as I walked into the trailer, I knew this was the one! We got a very good deal as we paid cash, so we are now busy loading it for the trip home. We'll have to declare it at the border but not a big deal anymore. As long as you pay the declaration fee and the tax, they welcome you to bring your RV into the country! We are still leaving the ATV down in Arizona in our cargo trailer as we really don't have time to ATV while in Campbell River but will use the trailer to go to Yellowknife to visit Catherine and Alberta to visit Christopher and family

 Side view of the trailer

Back view of the trailer where the door drops down to a ramp to drive the ATV into the trailer.

I will be making one more entry into my blog either Sunday evening or Monday as we are going on one last ATV ride out to see all the cacti flowers and to check on our baby owls and see how much they have grown, so remember to come back one more time to have a look!

Another day in Camp Verde and Sedona

We took Brad & Kathleen on a day's trip to see Sedona and all the archeological sites in the Verde valley. It was a beautiful trip up and a lovely warm day. Not too hot that we had to worry about sun stroke though so that was a plus! We started out going to Montezuma's Castle. Since I already posted pictures of this site when we took Norm & Dianna there earlier this year, I am only starting my pictures when we went to Montezuma Well

 Actually, I lie! This picture was taken as we went down to Montezuma's Castle. It is a Scarlet Flowering Hedgehog.

 Montezuma Well is a geological marvel where a limestone roof of a large cavern collapsed to form this small lake. There are springs in the base that keep it fed and it has one underground outlet in one corner of the submerged lake where water exits to the valley on the far side and into the Verde River. The springs produce exactly the same amount of water as what exits the sink hole so the level of the lake never changes. The ancient Sinaqua Indians built Pueblos on the ridge around the sink hole, cliff dwellings in the side of the sink hole and there are cave dwellings down at the water's edge. The picture above is of some of the cliff dwellings.

 This is the sink hole lake looking down from above

 Brad, Kathleen and I went down the steep stairs to the bottom of the sink hole and you could really see all the cliff dwellings all around the lake from this vantage point

 You can see more cliff dwellings up to the right

 Hard to see in this picture but there were remnants of cliff dwellings all along the side of the lake

 This is right down at the bottom near the water's edge and you can tell the caves had been used by the Indians due to the blacken roofs from their cooking fires

 Another bottom cave dwelling with walls still intact

 Some of the walls from the ancient homes still intact. Ignore the graffiti on the walls, how anyone can desecrate such a spectacular site is beyond me!

 Another view of the dwellings down at the lakeside

 Looking across the lake from the bottom dwellings. It was so beautiful cool down there and i imagine a welcome respite for the Indians in the scorching summer heat

 Looking across the lake you can see more cliff dwellings in the centre of the picture

 More cliff dwellings everywhere you look. You can imagine how well they were made that they are still here 1000 years later!

 They must have been very small people to get through doorways that small!

 Doug up on top where the remains of the pueblos are

 Doug, Sharon & Kathleen above the lake

 Not sure what this bush is but it sure was pretty

 Remains of another cliff top pueblo

 More wildflowers down by the river's edge

 We climbed down the outside of the sink hole to see where the water came out under the ground on the other side of the sink hole. The canals the Sinaqua Indians made to channel the water to their crops in the valley are still present. They were absolutely amazing. You can see one running under the wooden walkway by the poison ivy sign. Needless to say we stayed on the trail.

 The rock face was so amazing showing the different rocks imbedded in the wall

 A huge Sycamore tree growing out at an angle, You can imagine its size when you look at Doug's arm next to it

 Doug had to test the water temperature as the water came out of the underground tunnel to the otherside of the cliff wall. The water was warm Doug said. He tasted it and said it tasted good!

 Another picture of the Sycamore tree as it grows out of the side of the cliff

When we left here, we headed for the V-Bar-V Ranch Heritage Site.

 The V-Bar-V Ranch has a red colored cliff wall covered in petroglyphs. It is the best preserved petroglyphs in Arizona. It was hard taking pictures with the limited light we had due to the large shade trees and the angle of the sun.

 This site is also one of the only petroglyph sites that had a lunar calendar depicted on the walls. There are 2 rocks imbedded in the cliff wall near the top that when the sun shines through at certain times of the year and lands on a drawing of the sun on the wall or drawings of corn etc. it tells the farmers it is the spring/fall equinox or summer/winter solstice and also when the sun hits the corn depictions it is time to plant. You can see the shaded and sun areas and the drawings on the wall. You can see the sun rays are now past the sun drawing on the left meaning we were a few week's past the spring equinox. It was totally amazing

 Close up pictures of the petroglyphs

 Lichen growing on the rocks can make it easier or more difficult to see the petroglyphs depending on the time of day

 After we had our fill of the petroglyphs, we then drove in to Sedona. As I have already posted pictures of Sedona again earlier in the year. I have only added a couple to the site.

 These pictures were taken up at the airport overlook, looking down at part of the town of Sedona and the red rocks

 We stopped to take a picture of Cathedral Rock and of course I just loved this Juniper tree and its twisted trunk

 Then we had to get Kathleen in the picture with me!

 We found another one that Doug loved so had to take a picture

 Cathedral Rock - the most picturesque formation in Sedona

We had another lovely day, a long busy one and we arrived home to Apache Junction about 8pm and of course immediately put our bathing suits on and went for a swim and hot tub! We took Kath and Brad to the airport the next morning and then took a deep breath, relaxed and got ourselves ready for the task of preparing to go home to Campbell River!