It's March 22 and soon we will celebrate our 45th wedding anniversary. We think that maybe we'll drive the 85 miles to Lake Havasu, enjoy a Chinese Buffet, and walk the London Bridge (brought to Lake Havasu City in 1971 from London England). It's the second biggest attraction in Arizona behind the Grand Canyon. Ya just never know what you will find here.
One of the joys of camping free here at the Dome Rock BLM (Bureau of Land Management) area is:
Enjoying the campfire and some wood-roasted hot dogs and grilled buns.. um, um, um, um
It's not fair that it's been warmer in Michigan for a few days than it is here is south west Arizona!! Next week will be in the high 70's to mid 80's though... That will be great...
Another enjoyment is hiking up the side of mountains that are close by. The first one we climbed had a lot of loose shale on it, which made for interesting climbing. But we made it to the top. When we got there and looked down the other side, here was a trail that came up close to the top of the mountain. Oh, well, we enjoyed the climb.
We carefully took this self-portrait while standing on the top of the peak. What a view.
looking southeast toward the La Posa Plain. Visibility is over 8-9 miles
Our truck is in the middle of this picture, if you can see it.
We checked out a shallow cave we found. Nothing in it.. It has been pretty windy here the last couple of days, so it is good to have a hooded shirt.
When we got back to the RV after the climb and the hiking, we discovered muscles that we forgot we had. Sheryl said we needed to take a walk or a climb the next day too, or we'd have sore muscles. I wasn't quite sure of that logic 'cause the fronts of my legs were already hurting from trying to keep from rolling down the mountain instead of walking. So at 4 p.m. the next day, we set out to walk to and then climb the mountain directly in front of our door.. about 1/2 mile away which doesn't sound like much. But there were four washes to traverse. And that adds greatly to the walking time. This Mtn is 1/3 again higher than the one yesterday!
It may not look too much like a mountain but trust me, it is! We decided to walk up the left slope because it looked easier. And it was, until we got 2/3 up the mountain and the small rocks that we were walking on and around turned into BIG rocks and boulders that we had to climb around. But we made it to the TOP.
On the way up, we spotted a couple of barrel cactus getting ready to flower.
There was actually quite a bit of desert vegetation on this mountain, more than on the mountain we climbed the previous day.
The way down the mountain with shrubs
Desert Cactus.
The blooms are quite pretty... and the spines are very sharp.
Our RV and truck are just about the middle of the picture. There's another camper and truck to the right of center. This is taken from the rocky top of the mountain, even though you cannot see down the side of it. We are a LONG WAY UP... 2/3 of the climb was gravel and small rocks, but the top 1/3 was all ROCK .
Sheryl is standing in front of the mountain (which is one-half mile away in the background). And would you believe that when we got to the top of the second mountain, we saw ANOTHER trail leading up to the it's backside. Go figure. I guess that next time we should check out all the back trails first before we going climbing.
The next day we decided to take a trail up Dome Rock Mountain with the truck. About a third of the way up we discovered an old mine shaft.
We got our flashlight and started in. There was evidence all around that people had been here OR might BE HERE!... We stopped and turned around rather than go in a startle someone. Since there, we've read that there are many old mine shafts around the area.. some that are still active and producing precious metals and stones, even some gold.
Sheryl loves to look for rocks. True to it's name, there are beautiful, white QUARTZ rocks scattered all through the landscape. Naming the area (Quartz-site) Quartzsite. There are many different varieties of rocks just laying around.
So goes another great day in the land of the desert of the "Republic of Arizona."
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