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Snapshots: Wickenburg - The Dude Ranch Capital of the World

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Snapshots: Wickenburg - The Dude Ranch Capital of the World

The area that is now Wickenburg was once Yavapai Indian land and the river that runs through it is the Hassayampa which means “following the water as far as it goes” in the Yavapai language. In 1863, German prospector Henry Wickenburg came to the area in search of gold. He found it and opened the Vulture Mine which would eventually produce 340,000 ounces of gold and 260,000 ounces of silver.

Ranchers came to the area as well and soon a community sprang up. In 1895, the railroad came through Wickenburg which spawned even more growth. The town was incorporated in 1909, making Wickenburg the oldest Arizona town north of Tucson and the 5th oldest in the state. In 1866, Wickenburg missed being named the territorial capital by just two votes.

Today Wickenburg is a quaint little community with a real wild west feel to it (some of the light posts are even wearing cowboy hats). There are some amazing art installations around town and the Desert Caballeros Western Museum is one of the best in the state. I love the design of the Saguaro Theatre which was also probably my favorite theatre in Arizona. You’re never alone when you’re in Wickenburg as life-like statues are spread throughout town making for a family friendly feel. I hadn’t planned on staying long in Wickenburg, but it’s a great town worth exploring and I was there way longer than I expected to be. Next time you’re in this part of Arizona, stop in for a spell. You’ll be glad you did. I hope you enjoy these photos from tiny Wickenburg - the Dude Ranch Capital of the World.

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In Focus - Tumacácori National Historical Park

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In Focus - Tumacácori National Historical Park

Father Eusebio Francisco Kino established the Mission San Cayetano de Tumacácori on the east side of the Santa Cruz River in January of 1691, making this the oldest mission site in what is now Arizona. The name “Tumacácori” is an English bastardization of a Spanish interpretation of an O’odham (Pima) word, the meaning of which has been lost. It is how the native people referred to this region. After years of violence at the hands of the Spanish, the O’odham people rose up in the Pima Revolt of 1751. Laying blame on the abuse of the Jesuits missionaries, they were pardoned by the colonial governor and the Jesuits would be expelled from the colonies beginning in 1757. The mission was moved across the river and renamed Mission San José de Tumacácori and the first actual church was built on this new site.

Franciscans would try and pick up where the Jesuits left off and in 1800 they began work on an ambitious new church, trying to match the majesty of Mission San Xavier del Bac to the north (a photo of which appears at the very bottom of this post). The church was never fully completed as the missions were closed when the Mexicans won their independence in 1821. Today, the mission is a part of Tumacácori National Historical Park and a visit is a must when you’re in the area. You can learn more about the O’odham people, the Spanish missionaries and colonial life in the missions and it’s a very cool place for a wander.

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Snapshots: Fort Apache

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Snapshots: Fort Apache

Fort Apache was constructed between 1874 and 1932 and served as an important military outpost during the Apache Wars. It rests in the midst of the beautiful White Mountains of Eastern Arizona. and is well situated at the convergence of the North and East Forks of the White River. The area is the ancestral home of the Cibicue and White Mountain Apache tribes who welcomed the United States Army to build the fort there, as they had a common enemy in the Chiricahua Apache. The White Mountain Apache are very proud of their service as scouts in the U.S. Army, and the role they played in the defeat of the Chiricahua and the capture of the great Chiricahuan leader, Geronimo. I learned a lot about the Apache Scouts and their campaigns at the wonderful "Nohwike' Bagowa" (House of Our Footprints), more commonly referred to as the Apache Cultural Center & Museum. which should be everyone’s first stop on any visit to Fort Apache.

After visiting the museum, I set off to explore the rest of the fort on a self guided walking tour which took in all of the wonderful historic buildings which remain on the post. After Geronimo’s capture in 1886, the fort remained an active military post for many years, finally closing in 1924 (although several Apache scouts remained in the army until 1947). After the army pulled out, the Theodore Roosevelt Indian Boarding School was established and the land was transferred to the Bureau of Indian Affairs as part of the White Mountain Apache Reservation. The school is still there and functioning today. I had a great visit with the kind and welcoming people of the White Mountain Apache band and really enjoyed my visit to this fascinating historic fort. I hope you enjoy these photos from Fort Apache.

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Snapshots: Standing on a Corner in Winslow, Arizona

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Snapshots: Standing on a Corner in Winslow, Arizona

There’s much more to Winslow, Arizona than just that lyric from The Eagle’s hit song Take It Easy, but they are definitely using it to their benefit. Standing On The Corner Park at 2nd Street and Kinsley Avenue is beautifully done and brings in hundreds of tourists a day to this little town of just 10,000 or so residents. The real highlight of the town, though, is the beautifully restored La Posada Hotel, one of the original Harvey Houses opened in 1930. It is still operating as a hotel and I had the pleasure of dining in the Turquoise Room restaurant during my stay (in town, not in the hotel). There are also some great parks down by the railroad, a nice little brewery and plenty of souvenir shops. I also loved the town’s Visitor Center which is housed in the old Hubbell Warehouse which was a railroad hub for John Lorenzo Hubbell’s western trading posts. The lady working there when I visited took me around and showed me all kinds of neat artifacts from the town’s history. When I was leaving, I thanked her and with a well practiced wink she waved and said “hey, take it easy”. I hope you enjoy these photos from tiny Winslow, Arizona.

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In Focus: Petrified Forest National Park

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In Focus: Petrified Forest National Park

Petrified Forest National Park in eastern Arizona contains a beautiful collection of petrified wood and also includes the Painted Desert, Blue Mounds and an old stretch of Route 66. It’s a park best explored by car, but you won’t really appreciate it unless you get out and hike out into the wilderness. Petrified Forest was designated a National Monument back in 1906 and was upgraded to a National Park in 1962. I enjoyed my visit to the park and hope you enjoy these photos I took exploring the Petrified Forest.

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This Week on the Road - May 25th-June 1st

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This Week on the Road - May 25th-June 1st

Hello Everyone! First and foremost I wanted to thank you for all of the kind messages and comments you sent this week. Each one made me feel a little bit better and they were all appreciated. I do believe that my bout with Covid is over and while it was not a fun time, so many of my friends are currently infected that at least I didn’t feel as isolated as I could have. The illness was bad, but the loneliness was difficult as well. I’m used to being alone and I’m comfortable with being alone, but I always have the option of going to a bar or a restaurant and at least being among people. With this I wanted to minimize contact as best I could so I got take-out and sat in my room or my van. It’s also been hard not being able to exercise as much as I’m used to, but I have read too much about people pushing themselves through Covid and doing permanent damage to their lungs through scarring and didn’t want to risk it. But it seems to have passed at this point and I am ready to get back to some of my routines which I’m really looking forward to. This won’t be a long newsletter this week as I’ve spent most of my time recuperating and driving, but there have definitely been some cool moments – most notably the two days I spent on the North Rim of Grand Canyon.

When I left off last week, I was recuperating in a hotel room in Flagstaff. Flagstaff was a godsend to me last week, with its walkable downtown, Whole Foods and especially the cool, clean high-desert air. It was also one of the most photogenic towns in all of Arizona, but sadly I didn’t take any photos as I just wasn’t really in the mood. I will return in the future though, and I look forward to getting some photos when I do. I did make it out to Walnut Canyon while I was there, a small National Park site about 20 minutes out of town. It’s a beautiful little park where an oxbow bend in a seasonal river has left an island of land surrounded by a deep valley. This landscape provided a nice protected location for a small Sinagua village site about a thousand years ago. The ruins in the park became a hotbed for looters and tourists in the late 19th century, prompting government protection of the site. Most of the ruins there are reconstructions, but it’s still a lovely canyon to stroll around. Back in Flagstaff I also enjoyed a wander through the old Weatherford Hotel which has been lovingly restored after being threatened with demolition. Despite my illness, I did have a nice stay in Flagstaff.

I left Friday morning and after a short stop at the Navajo Bridge, which is one of the major crossings of the Colorado River in Arizona, I headed on up the Kaibab Plateau to the North Rim of Grand Canyon. I have been to Grand Canyon no less than a hundred times in my life, but always to the more popular South Rim. The South Rim has always been the centerpiece of the park since the railroad arrived over a century ago. The North Rim is higher, averaging almost 9,000’ above sea level, and far less crowded. I spent two days there - taking photos, doing short hikes and just sitting on the rim and reading my book -and I loved every minute of it. It was beautiful, cool, relatively quiet considering it was a holiday weekend and a perfect place to wind up my stay in Arizona. I enjoyed two sunrises and two sunsets and found some wonderful viewpoints along the canyon rim. There seemed to be quite a few rim-to-rim hikers and it is a pretty serious 21 mile hike from the South Rim down and then up the Kaibab Trail. After dark, the talk seemed to all focus on those hikers who hadn’t yet made it out of the canyon. Some made it out later in the night and many finally emerged the following morning admitting they had either underestimated the hike or overestimated their own abilities or, most likely, a combination of the two. It was fascinating to see and listen to and I provided what reassurances I could, knowing all too well how easy it is for hikers to struggle up out of the canyon. All-in-all, I really had a great time up on the North Rim and will definitely return there in the future.

After sunrise and breakfast at the lodge on Sunday, I headed on down the road. After a brief stop at Pipe Springs National Historic Site, I drove on to St. George, Utah to catch up with my friend Jenny. Jenny worked at the same tour company that I did for a number of years and has continued guiding with other companies since. Right now she guides hiking and llama-packing tours, primarily in the Desert Southwest, and is also in the process of building out a small school bus to live in. I haven’t seen her in years and we spent the day catching up and talking about old times and new adventures and about our mutual friends and what they’re up to. I always enjoy her company and it was nice to have someone to chat with for a while. We had some tasty tacos and then went to a trailhead parking lot outside of town where we parked our vehicles side-by-side for the night.

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This Week on the Road - April 28th-May 4th

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This Week on the Road - April 28th-May 4th

Hello Everyone! It’s hard to believe it’s May, but it definitely is. Even in the middle of the desert, flowers are blooming, bees are buzzing and the days are getting longer and longer. That means it’s almost time for me to go back to work so I can fund these adventures and I’m really looking forward to being back out there guiding tours for a while. That being said, I am hoping to really enjoy these last few days of freedom because guiding is pretty full-on and I know it’s going to be a busy summer. Yesterday was my 5 Year “Vanniversary”, marking five years since I bought Shadow Catcher up in Lansing, Michigan and began this wonderful adventure. We’ve seen good times and bad, but it was definitely the best purchase I’ve ever made and the adventures we’ve had together have been pretty epic. This week has brought us north into central Arizona where I’ve found cooler weather, beautiful landscapes, cute towns and endless miles of hiking trails. It’s really been exactly what I needed and it’s been a pretty great week out here and I can’t wait to tell you all about it.

My hotel night last week was very relaxing and refreshing and I felt significantly better when I headed off to the Diamondbacks’ baseball game Wednesday afternoon at Chase Field. I was a little surprised that the cheapest seats in the stadium were $29, higher than most ballparks, but on the other hand I found free parking nearby and they had inexpensive hot dogs and corn dogs, so it all worked out in the end. The stadium was beautiful and stayed pretty cool as long as you found a seat in the shade. It does have a retractable roof which I guess they save for even hotter days (it got up to about 97° while I was there for the afternoon game). I got a kick out of knowing my uncle and cousin were at a Milwaukee Brewers game this week and they had to close their roof because it was snowing. It was not an action packed game, but the Diamondbacks did pull out a win for their hometown fans. They were playing the L.A. Dodgers and there were a LOT of Dodgers fans there as well. After the game I went and enjoyed a cocktail at Bikini’s, a Phoenix Tiki institution which has been slinging Mai Tais since 1947. It was a nice enough place to stop in for an afternoon drink and then I stopped into Tombstone Brewery for an excellent session IPA and found a nice corner to sip my beer and read my book for a while before calling it a night.

Thursday morning I headed over to tour the Arizona State Capitol, or more accurately the State Capitol Museum. Much like Louisiana and Florida, Arizona has a horrendous 1970s era capitol building, but thankfully, also like those other states, they hung onto their original capitol building and opened it as a museum. The museum had a fascinating display of information and artifacts from the USS Arizona which was sunk in Pearl Harbor in 1941. They had a nice tribute to Sandra Day O’Connor who, while born in Texas, served much of her career in Arizona. They had the phone on display on which O’Connor got the call from Ronald Reagan conveying news of her nomination to be our first female Supreme Court Justice. I was impressed by their lengthy exhibit on Arizona’s World War II Japanese internment camps. I also loved the Arizona Model Railroaders’ room which is a work in progress but had trains pulling through several Arizona towns as they wound their way around multiple levels of tracks. There was also some beautiful Arizona art on display and several smaller exhibits and I found the whole place a very worthwhile visit. Outside of the Capitol are several war memorials which were all beautifully done. When I had finished my visit, I took my book and sat under a nice shade tree and read for a while. Then I headed south of downtown to the home of my old college buddy, John Bushko, who I haven’t seen in 25 years. It was wonderful to meet his wife and children and catch up on all that he’s been up to in the interim. We have a lot of overlap in our Penn State friend circles, so it was fun to hear and to share stories about our mutual friends. They made an absolutely delicious dinner to share with me and we sat out by his pool swapping stories into the night. They definitely left me with a different appreciation of Phoenix and another night in a cool bed was welcome and greatly appreciated.

We were all up early on Friday and enjoyed some coffee and breakfast in between John’s early morning meetings (he works with a lot of people on the east coast, so his day workday starts at 6am). I said my goodbyes around 9 as I wanted to get out of town before the day heated up too much. I headed east through Apache Junction and Superior to Globe, an old mining community with a cute historic downtown and a few great ghost signs on the sides of their buildings. Globe’s old courthouse has been converted into a lovely art gallery and they also had a cool old train engine in one of their local parks. I was there for about an hour and then headed up the hill to Tonto National Monument, an old Sinagua Indian ruin in the middle of Tonto National Forest.

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