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Benson, AZ

Kartchner Caverns SP

 

 

Well we're back in Arizona now.  We'll be in various parts of Arizona visiting family and friends until May.  This is the last part of our journey circumventing the US.  We'll spend May & June back in California visiting our family and a bunch of friends and that will end our first year of fulltime RVing adventures.

 

After leaving New Mexico, we find ourselves in much, much warmer weather.  And thankfully, much less wind.  We headed for Kartchner Caverns.  Our friends Doug and Dotty brought us here a couple of years ago and we just loved the caverns.  What makes this cavern different from most, is that it is a living cave.  The temperature inside the cave is usually 70 degrees with 99% humidity.  Most caves are very cold and you usually walk down a steep staircase or take an elevator.  At Kartchner you take an outdoor tram up to the cave entrance.  You are not allowed to bring anything inside.  They take great care with the cave and you first walk through double sealed doors where you walk through a very fine mist.  This keeps fine bits of lint from falling off our clothes or bodies and harming the cave.  Then most of the walking is on a fairly level, wide, well lit walkway. 

 

 

 

 

Also, the fact that between first discovering the cave and developing and opening it up to the public, they were able to keep it secret and unknown to anyone out of a small group of those involved for 14 years!  That's pretty amazing.  Most caves have been vandalized over the years.  This cave was kept pristine as much as possible.  It's different than any other you'll see.  It is a must do visit!

 

 

Since there is no photography allowed inside, these pictures are from the internet.

 

Since we had done both tours before, we were here to stay in the beautiful campground and do some hiking.  This is a wonderful state park with 62 campsites that have water and electricity for $25.  Some large pull throughs, bathrooms with showers and a dump station.  We also picked up great Verizon 4G.  AT&T cell was rather poor though.

We set camp up and headed out to do the 2.5 mile Foothill Loop Trail before it got dark. 

 

Pretty rocks and we're loving the beautiful flowers that are starting to come out.

 

Heading up and around.  Love the Whetstone Mountains in the distance.

 

 Made it back as the sun was setting.

 

Something we have done for fun when the kids were younger was orienteering.  It's like a treasure hunt using a topographical map and a compass.  You aren't always on a trail either.  Well now with cell phones as popular as they are, there is geocaching.  It's pretty much orienteering but using GPS coordinates.  I've had an account but haven't been able to use it for years.  I got that fixed and we started up again.  We found our first cache near the state park.  It was actually a very easy one.

Steve with our first cache.

 

Our other goal was to hike the Guindani Trail.  It's 4.2 miles and 5620 ft elevation at its highest point.  Once you get through the grazing pasture the trail followed a creek for a while which still had some flowing water.  Hurley was happy to plop down in the pools and cool off.  Beautiful views from far off in the distance.  This was a nice hike with some semi desert grassland and juniper-oak woodlands.

 

 

Some of the wild life. 

 

 

  

 

View towards Sierra Vista.

And of course, cactus everywhere.  You do have to watch your footing as some of these ankle stabbers grow very low.  I slipped on one part of the trail and my calf slid into one and Steve had to pull several needles out of my leg.

 

When we were first gathering info about this lifestyle we were fortunate to be able to meet up with two  couples who were passing through where we lived at the time.  We met Dale and Ruth and Bill and Loretta and picked their brains about the lifestyle and how did Ruth handle working fulltime from the road as Steve was not retiring yet.  Sadly, Bill passed away a short time ago and will be missed by many.  Cudos to Loretta for deciding to continue fulltiming.  She has been workcamping at the park she has been staying at in Benson.  Once she returns from a family visit in NJ, she is taking an RV Driving course so she will feel confident moving around in her motorhome.  Ruth and Dale are about to finish/or just finished their second year on the road.  Dale makes and sells custom jewelry at local festivals.  Ruth continues to work from their rig. 

(Dale, Ruth & Loretta)

It was great to see them again as fellow RVers now!

Beautiful butterfly and hummingbird garden next to the visitor center.

 

On our last day, Steve really wanted to find a geocache that we weren't able to locate before it got dark. Down the trail we came with the flashlight dodging the cacti, rocks and bulls that had given me the stinkeye.  I think the sight of Hurley didn't make them happy and I didn't want to get charged..

I decided to stay back and get ready to close camp and back up the mountain Steve went alone.  He was very happy to find it this time.

 

 

Next up, a jail visit.

 

Gila Cliff Dwellings, NM

Gila National Forest, NM

Boondocking

 

 

We spent a few days boondocking in the Gila National Forest, just outside of Silver City, NM.  Here is a beautiful picture of one of the great sunsets while we were there.  While we weren't sure at first exactly where we were going to camp, we had a couple from Canada that visited with us at City of Rocks the night before give us a heads up on this spot.  Thanks Art & Suzan!

 

 

We hiked around the area, caught up on laundry, visited Silver City and did some hiking up to see the cliff dwellings in Gila.

 

The drive to get to the cliff dwellings is about 2 hours even though it's only 44 miles or so because of all the switchbacks.  It was a beautiful drive.

 

 

(click on picture to enlarge)

Normally we like to go to the Visitors Center first to learn about things, talk to the rangers and watch any videos they might have.  But today, the rangers were warning of a strong thunderstorm cell which was just sitting a few miles away.  You can watch it on a large Doppler TV screen.  It shows all the lighting strikes.  He suggested we get up to the caves first because if the storm or any lightening strikes get within 20 miles, they shut the trail down.  So up we went.

 

Getting ready to hike up.

 

Before you can cross the bridge and head up the steep trail, there is a ranger there to tell you a few rules.  She kept trying to tell them to us but this guy in a leather jacket kept interrupting saying he's been up here a hundred times and he already knows the rules.  The ranger gal responded, "Well I don't know that you've actually been up here before and know the rules, so just let me finish please."  Of course he kept on interrupting but she warned him that he would be stopped if he tried to go across the bridge before she finished.  He finally let her finish to which she ended with "And if you have any questions at the top, there are 3 rangers there to answer any questions.  Or you could just ask this guy since he's been here 100 times, he probably knows everything".  Touchet!

 While hiking up, don't forget to look down.

 

Lots of pretty wild flowers popping up.

Starting to see some of the caves.

The ancient Puebloan people who built these cliff dwellings belonged to a larger part of what is now the Mogollon area.  They grew corn, beans and squash on the mesas and hunted game.  It is believed from analyzing the timbers used in the dwellings, that the time period was about 1276.  They didn't stay long.  By 1300 they had moved on.  It isn't really known why.  It is thought that perhaps they merged with other tribes.

There are 6 caves containing dwellings in the cliffs.  Most you can go into.

 

 

 Remnants inside the one of the cave rooms.  To the right are actual corn cobs left from long ago.

    

Amazing dwellings.  On the right, inside looking out.

Amazing how they were able to get all the rocks and timbers up the cliff and carve out areas within the caves.  You can see the soot that is high up on the cave ceilings.  You notice the walls come up a coupe of feet short of the ceiling.   This is to let the smoke out.  The front faces the sun so they get a nice natural warmth in winter as the low sun enters the cave.  In summer strong breezes blow up from the valley floor.

 

It was a beautiful to walk through and the rangers to a great job of making sure no one is touching anything.  There were a few petroglyphs, but they were faint and further away than my camera could capture.

 

 

We took a different road back to where we were camped.  It was flatter and the dirt and rocks were in many colors of red, purple, orange, gold and pink.  I just couldn't seem to get picture of it.

I was sure happy to be back in pine trees again!

 

 We came upon the Santa Rita Copper Mine.  Wow, look at those colors!

 

 

Silver City has a very colorful, eclectic downtown with bridges that cross over the river into the old part of town.  It was surprising to us that the town seemed so empty.  Most of the pictures I took were from the middle of the street.

 

 

 

Old Victorian Houses

Beautiful tiles decorate this building.

We wanted to go in here, but it was too early for beer or lunch.

This is the sister store to the Pink Store in Mexico where he had so much fun.

Just on the other side of the main bridge by the Visitors Center is this old log cabin.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back home for one more spectacular sunset before we head out for Arizona!!

 

Good Night New Mexico