🙂 After all that physical therapy and all that exercise, I made it to the much-anticipated hike up the West Fork of Oak Creek. As you may recall, along about last October, at the annual silent auction fundraiser for the choir, I bought a ticket to an excursion organized by two of the day school‘s teachers. At that time I thought surely the back pain I’d inflicted on myself the previous January would go away in time for me to get in shape by late April, 2013.
Well, of course, it didn’t. By February of this year I still could barely move, much less go hiking…or even walk very far. Two doctors and six weeks of intensive physical therapy later, I’d recovered enough to walk briskly and even climb. This left…well…seven days to get ready for the hike. As of yesterday, I sure wasn’t in top physical shape (and probably never will be again…so we’re told ;-)), but was one heckuva lot better than I have been.
It was great fun! The organizers have been at All Saints so long they actually remembered my son, who’s pushing middle age these days. Several other people associated with the church or the choir showed up, all of them really neat people, a pleasure to be around. Early yesterday morning we boarded the school’s large van for the short ride up the freeway to Sedona, and by mid-morning we’d arrived at the trailhead and were on our way!
Here are some of the sights…
In the 1870s, the Mayhew Lodge stood near what is now the paved road through Oak Creek Canyo0n; before that, there was probably a homestead. A small grove of apple trees survives from that time, as well as a few red-rock ruins. As usual, click on the images for larger, higher-definition views.
View of the creek from the bridge near the trailhead.
This, we’re told, was the lodge’s chicken coop. Up behind it is a cave that was used for storage.
From the outset, sandstone cliffs loom above you.
And loom…
And loom… Yes, that is actually the real color of the sky.
Here’s part of our merrie groupe. Check out the cute little dog: each of our guides owned one of these doughty miniature poodles, acquired at the same time from the same litter. They make awesome hiking companions and are so delightful I’m thinking maybe a poodle would make a better roommate for The Queen of the Universe than another (difficult-to-find!) corgi.
The trail meanders up the canyon. We crossed the creek maybe a half-dozen times during our five-mile hike.
We paused to rest a few minutes on this sandstone bench.
Strange nest of a type of tent caterpillar. Weird, huh?
A rockfall dropped this truck-size boulder and a bunch of its companions across the path. Our guides could remember a time when this little fellow wasn’t there.
Some more debris from that rockfall.
More scenery…
Our guides are into geocaching. One of them climbed up here to retrieve a stash left by a previous visitor.
We stopped here for lunch or snacks. The little dogs had a grand time swimming in the creek here!
These lichens on the rock look like artwork…
Here’s the whole canvas!
More scenery.
After that stop, we headed back to the car, like so many horses trotting for the barn.
You know you’re there when you see those old, old apple trees again.
After the hike, we stopped in Sedona for lunch and drinks at Indian Gardens, a nifty restaurant and market in a historic building, said once to have housed a roadside gas station. It has a lovely big back patio where we could sit with the little pooches, enjoy some delicious sandwiches, and soak up a little tea…or, in my case, a Black Butte.
I’m ready to go again! One of the women on the hike, also a choir member, suggested she and I should get together for other trips. So it looks like we’ll be hiking companions. This could get to be a great deal of fun.
You sound so happy!
How old is your son these days??
Il a trente-six ans. Hard to believe, given that I’m only 26 myself…
Beautiful scenery, Fam. Love to see tree-covered canyons and streams in the desert. As you know, we lived in a different kind of desert, where it was all browns and greys, and any green was the thorny acacias.
Y’know, I don’t remember seeing any native trees other than date palms. We lived on the fringe of the Rub’ al Khali — about the only stuff I recall on the desert was what we called camel grass, which was a sort of greasy, small-leafed shrub.
The Americans planted oleanders and jasmine hedges, which would grow in sand with a little camel manure mixed in. Somebody had planted a tree in our backyard that looked a lot like a mesquite — that might have been an acacia.
The Sonoran desert is quite a rich habitat, especially along the allegedly dry washes that we regard as riparian habitat. I recall being surprised, when SDXB and I arrived in Alaska and Canada, to find the forests up there are quieter — much less cacophony of bird calls — and that you hardly ever saw a rabbit or a lizard or a coyote around. And no hummingbirds! We did see moose and grizzly bears, but oddly, that was about all the wildlife that made an appearance. And bald eagles.