Gone Fishin' (06/15/24)

 

Not actually- we haven’t fished since hitting the road 15 years ago, but we have gone off exploring for the summer. Once the memorial day crew departed, we were in hurry up and wait mode. We wanted to prep to leave for the summer- taking the truck camper and the Bronco- but we couldn’t leave until June 6. Both of us had More medical tests, some here in Havasu, and Paul's in Phoenix starting the 7th. It gave us time for one last visit to El Paraiso, a favorite restaurant of ours.

We still packed the camper pretty quickly and put the boat into storage for the summer. Because we aren't taking the fifth wheel, it needs to be in the garage, and the boat won't fit, so we rented a storage unit.

Moving to Phoenix for 4 days in June with temps in the 105 range didn't sound like fun so we elected to stay in a federal campground near Jerome AZ, about an hour and a half from our doctors.  At 7500 ft. It was still pretty warm, but not as bad as the city. On the weekend we managed to fit in a 3.5 mile hike in the forest, and lunch at the Haunted Hamburger in Jerome. Its a well known restaurant and very busy, but we managed to score excellent seats.

We have been to Jerome several times. It’s an old mining town that sits on a hillside. Its hard to believe this town once contained the second largest JC Penney store in the chain, back in the day. It closed when it started sliding off the mountain (which has happened to more than one building).

On Monday, June 10, we got the all clear to leave for the summer. We couldn't go far, however, because we had signed up for something in Las Vegas that doesn't happen until the 14th. There is an event called the Bronco Off –Roadeo, an all day lesson on how to drive a Ford Bronco off road.

Having a couple of days to kill, we decided to explore some of those things close to home that we never seem to find the time to see. The town of Searchlight is small and is best known for their police. The speed limit on the main road thru town goes down to 25 from 45 mph and believe me, they take that 25 mph limit seriously. Its well known that its a bad place to speed. We have never tried it, nor do we want to. Nearby,  there are several things to explore.

Using the Boulder City Elks as our base, we first headed to the ghost town of Nelson NV. There is a tour you can take of El Dorado gold mine but it requires a reservation and a minimum of 4 people. Silly me, I thought with temps well over 100, Nelson would be deserted but it was so busy there was even a tour bus there. Yikes.

We wandered the property, enjoying the owner’s sense of humor as well as his collection of "stuff". 

The water to the sink outside the single bathroom was shut off, with just hand sanitizer available:

 He freely admits to being a hoarder. The RVs were interesting to look at (he builds them himself) but we decided to stick with what we have.

 

Having the whole day to kill we spent a fair amount of time talking with Tony, the owner, and learned a bunch about the mine and his family. And, we Did get to take the tour of the mine, which was given by his daughter and son in law. She was full of stories about her family and the mine. They bought the property 30 years ago after it had sat dormant for 100 years. The mine entrance was filled with 100 feet of silt, which was cleared out, with bucket and shovel, by child labor.

That's right, every weekend the owners’ 5 kids spent their days crawling into the mine pulling out dirt. I guess to say she wasn't happy about it would be an understatement, since according to her she ran away twice. All seems well now though.

Tony and his wife Bobbie decided to leave the mine much like it was back in 1863 when the original miners were digging it out by hammer and chisel. Still, it took them 6 years to get the mine ready for tours.

Back in its heyday there were 200 miners working this mine. There was no need for a town, since this was very early days and most of the men were single. It was very much still the wild wild west. In fact, the first 70 people who are buried in the cemetery did not die of natural causes- at least that's what they say. The mine was active until World War 2.

We learned a little more about the use of a canary in the mine. They were used as an early warning system to alert miners to potentially lethal gasses. The cage was left on the floor since gas would be heavier than air, and only male canaries were used. Apparently male canaries that don't have a mate sing complex songs incessantly, to attract one. With all that singing, the miners didn't have to keep looking to see if the canary was still alive. We also learned that they would trim the bird's nails so they couldn't dig in to the perch. I guess a canary with nails remains upright on the perch even after its dead.

Anyway Paul thought it was one of the best mine tours we have ever been on, and that's saying something because we have been on a LOT.

Also near to Searchlight there are two national monuments, one of which, Avi Kwa Ame, is fairly new. Not having much time left we chose to explore Castle Mountain National Monument. 

We know there isn't much there to see but we are easily entertained. Driving the dirt roads, we were surprised to find they are in pretty good condition, since I doubt many people explore here. Its very remote and not much to see. We found out why the roads were so good when we arrived at Castle Mountains gold mine- a very active gold mine, complete with fence and guard. 

She kindly told us where we had made a wrong turn, and how to find the national monument.  Once we did, we found a few ruins of some old mining equipment, but nothing substantial.

The roads in this area were not nearly as nice as the ones leading to the mine. This land was made into a national monument to preserve the flora and fauna (from the gold mine maybe?).

Exploring done, we moved on to Las Vegas a day early. The daytime temperatures in Las Vegas right now are over 100, so as soon as we arrived we looked for a way out. We were really interested in hiking, so we packed a lunch and drove up nearby Mt. Charleston, where the temperature was in the high 70s. We did a six mile hike, Lower Bristlecone Trail, in the Spring Mountains Recreation Area.

It wasn't the greatest trail, it was probably an old logging or mining road, and the views were just ok. But, it was exercise, and killed some time. The following day was our Bronco Off-Roadeo day!

Joshua Tree Nat’l Park (02-28-12)

The Joshua Tree is to the Mohave Desert what the Saguaro Cactus is to the Sonoran Desert.  That’s what it said on the sign. The Joshua Tree is actually not a tree, its a Yucca plant.  They only grow about an inch a year, and can grow to be over 40 feet tall.  I have seen these trees before, but I never realized they were part of the Mohave Desert System.

Hidden Valley trail

What was most impressive to us, in Joshua Tree National Park, was not the Joshua Trees, although they were plentiful and interesting to see, but the boulder configurations.  Every where we turned there were huge rock formations.

 

We checked in at the Visitor’s Center to get a game plan together for the day. We decided to walk several trails- the first one was the short Hidden Valley Trail, where the boulders were so inviting, it was difficult to resist climbing. Somehow, it feels like a Disneyland for adults, although most of the boulders would require some serious rock climbing experience to climb.



The San Andreas Fault line from Joshua Tree



Driving to the top of one of the several mountain peaks within the park,  our view of Coachella Valley was impressive. The San Andreas Fault, which is over 500 miles long and reaches across the state of California, is clearly visible as a line of raised earth along the center of the picture.  It’s a little spooky to realize that the valley is growing by about two inches a year, due to the action of the Pacific Ocean Crust sliding past the North American Crust.  That action is what causes many of the earthquakes in this area.

Lost Horse Mine

Our second trail was longer, 4.5 miles, to the Lost Horse Mine.  It was named the Lost Horse Mine because a cowboy was looking for his horses that had disappeared overnight while he was camping in the area,  when he came across a sign post marking a gold claim.  He bought the claim and over the years, 10,000 ounces of gold were taken out of this area.  There are actually over 300 mines in Joshua Tree National Park, but very few produced any gold.  What we’ll remember about this trail is the fact that we froze our butts off.  At this elevation the temps were in the mid 40’s and the wind chill was probably in the 30’s because it was pretty windy!



time to turn this sucker around



For our next adventure we decided to stay in the truck.  We headed down a road called Geology Trail Rd., an 18 mile auto drive that shows off some of the unique geologic features of the area.  4 wheel drive is recommended, so off we went down the sandy, one way, unpaved road. Unfortunately, the box with the brochures that explain what we would be seeing, was empty, so we took the tour without the information.  Almost halfway through, we realized the sign should have also said “and if you are a dually, don’t bother!”  The road got so narrow, we definitely added some “Texas pin striping” to the truck.  That’s when the shrubbery intrudes so far into the “road” that it scratches down the side of the truck.  When we found a wide spot in the road, we turned around and carefully made our way back to civilization.

All in all we saw a lot in one day, and will try to extend our stay where we are so we can do some more hiking in Joshua Tree.  After doing a drive by one of the campgrounds and hearing Elaine’s opinion about the National Park campgrounds, we have decided that no matter what they say, we don’t fit in their sites.