The Red Rocks of Sedona
© Gail A. Sisolak 2012

Characterized by massive red-rock formations, as well as the contrasting riparian areas of Oak Creek Canyon, the area surrounding Sedona is considered at least as beautiful as many national parks. Massive red-rock monoliths bearing the descriptive names of Bell Rock, Courthouse, Church House and even Snoopy stand as sentinels guarding the town snuggled under the dominating and awesome Mogollon Rim, the southwestern boundary of the Colorado Plateau. This rugged, geological uplift, dotted with stalwart volcanic cones reaching nearly 13,000 feet in height, speaks of eons of cataclysmic activity.

Walnut canyon cliff dwellings: Wikipedia: Daniel Schwen

Walnut Canyon National Monument allows you to walk in the footsteps of people who lived in the region more than 700 years ago. You can peer into their homes, the cliff dwellings built deep within canyon walls. The presence of water in a dry land made the canyon rare and valuable to its early human inhabitants and remains valuable today as habitat for plants and animals.  A hike along the Island Trail leads you back in time, and welcomes you into the world of the people archeologists call Sinagua. You’ll see 25 cliff dwelling rooms along the trail; more are visible across the canyon, while enjoying spectacular canyon scenery and plant life.

The Island Trail is a strenuous one-mile round-trip hike, especially for those not acclimated to 7,000 feet elevation. The trail descends 185 vertical feet into the canyon, and returns the same way. Expect to walk down, and then back up, steeply paved stairs.

If the Island Trail is too challenging, you can still try the Rim Trail. This is a self-guided trail along the canyon rim and through a ponderosa forest. You’ll see two canyon overlooks, plus a pit house and pueblo set back from the canyon rim.

Portions of this story were published in the News Journal under the byline of Gail A. Sisolak in 2009. All rights reserved.

• Lowell Observatory

• Grand Canyon National Geographic Visitor Center

• Grand Canyon Hiking Tours

• Walnut Canyon National Monument

• Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument

• Out of Africa Wildlife Park

Top 5 Attractions, Flagstaff (Arizona) – Travel Guide

To plan your trip today:
All About Travel
6104 Northwest 63
Oklahoma City, OK 73132
415.384.3880

Visitor Center 18 Stories above Cliff Dwellings

Now, we’re home again.  Today was spent running errands.  Back to work on Monday.  Aside from church on Sunday, I don’t have anything planned.  Laundry — I’ll have to do laundry….

Remember that one time we didn’t do anything? Yeah, that was Monday, on project at Walnut Canyon National Monument. As the swamper for Jenny Lynn and Tony, I sat around for, well, nearly the entire day while they dealt with their broken chainsaw named Stetson. Stetson’s faceplate wouldn’t fit back on because the chain brake was broken. Our saw lady picked us up from our work site and drove us back into town to go to the chainsaw store to get new parts for Stetson to finish our day.

Stetson was back up and running the next day, and so was our little team. We were tasked with removing fallen trees from the fence, and then re-tightening the wire. To re-tighten the wire, you have to cut it, then you use a stretching tool to pull it taut, and then wrap the two ends of wire around each other to hold the tension. Unfortunately, with the theme of this week being broken tools for us, the stretcher broke on the third day half way through the day. After spending nearly 45 minutes trying to fit a pin back into its spot, we gave up and hiked out. Luckily, the broken stretcher meant we left for the van at just the right time, as we walked up to it only a minute or two before the rest of the crew.

I would not hesitate to say I did far more hiking than actual work. But I did learn how to make a mean looking splice, and a lot about how stretchers work. Funny how it takes something breaking to learn the most about how it works. And the hiking was nothing to sneeze at either. We went through rather steep ravines: up and down, up and down, and some more up and down. Think scrambling and lowering your pack up and down, not just some amble up a hill.

I spent yesterday working a token extra day on the Flagstaff Loop Trail project with 3 others to finish a rock wall there. We were working on what is called a climbing turn, where the trail continues to build up grade while going through a corner instead of a flat platform at the corner, which is a switchback. I learned quite a bit in one day about trail construction, especially about turns, slopes, grades, etc. It’s pretty amazing how much thought, planning and effort it takes to construct a proper trail, yet social trails get developed all the time and sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference.

In other news, I am currently halfway through a Wildnerness First Aid course, learning how to apply tourniquets and improvise backboards with cache haulers. Between the extra day of work this week, this medical course and the fact that I only took 4 days of vacation time, I am only 10 working days away from completing my 900 hours of Americorps service. Can you believe it? 900 felt like an impossibly large number back in April, and here I am, 10 working days left and nearly a month within which to complete them. Yippie!

Incidentally, a great business opportunity would be to make waterproof purses. I still don’t understand why this doesn’t exist.

Back to our regularly scheduled programming: blogging about my job. After my project was changed about 5 times in a three-day span, I gave up and just left my bag packed for the second one, an 8 day fencing project, and decided that would have to suffice for whatever I ended up doing. After killing two hours worth of time at the office for a 30 second meeting, I found out I was going to lead a small crew to volunteer at the university’s demonstration garden for three days while camping at Walnut Canyon National Monument, and then off to Woo-packy National Monument (that is most definitely not how it is spelled but that’s what you’re going to get) to finish out a fencing hitch there. Needless to say, that changed again to the 3 days at the garden, 2 days off, and then 5 days at the Grand Canyon National Park doing revegetation. Just kidding, that’s still not the final breakdown of work: one day being swampers for a saw crew at Walnut Canyon then 2 days at the garden. We packed all our camping things into the van Wednesday morning, headed out to Walnut, sorted firewood out of brush piles (I believe this is called fuels reduction), finished our work day, and then got told we weren’t camping and were actually going to be staying back at our houses in Flagstaff. Is your head spinning yet?

But this is ACE and we pride ourselves on being flexible. it’s Friday and you need us on Monday? Yeah, we’ll be there. I haven’t minded this much at all except I feel like I’ve become quite scatter-brained these past few days. Where is my binder with all my paperwork? Oh, I left it at the office when we went to pick up dinner fixings. I still can’t find my headphones but here’s to hoping they reappear.

Well it’s a few days later and my headphones are safely back in my possession. We also made it through a week of firsts – my first time supervising, my crew’s first time working as they were brand new to ACE. My first project without camping, my first project without food sorted out ahead of time, my first project with a driver since I didn’t have van training.

Our two days at the NAU demonstration garden went really well. We were tasked with finishing a path of pavers started by a previous crew. Gaps were left in the path to plant creeping thyme; there not being a big enough budget to fill all with thyme, we used crushed glass to fill the rest. It looks so pretty and adds a touch of sparkle and fun to the path. 4 out of the 5 us lived in Cisco house – my house – so the only non-Cisco resident came and stayed on an empty bed in the house so we could cook crew dinner together and socialize; we watched a film called Trainspotting one evening.

We wrapped up our work week with a crew dinner at a Greek restaurant, and are enjoying two days of rest before five days of revegetation work at the Grand Canyon. Yeah, back there again!! I’m looking forward to gardening and landscaping the GC. What, you thought that place was built by nature? ACE built that canyon.

Anyways, I’m off to continue my lazy weekend of laundromat, Biff’s Bagels, bike ride with a 3 hour break a mere .84 miles in, wildflower picking, movie watching. See y’all next weekend.

The title of my daily adventure is probably a little misleading.  I didn’t go to the Grand Canyon today, but it is a stop on this Reader’s Digest Scenic Drive.  I planned to visit it at a later date to ensure good weather.  I hope that doesn’t end up being a mistake, because it was absolutely gorgeous today.  The portion of the loop drive that I conquered today was southeast of the Grand Canyon near Flagstaff.

I started out the morning visiting the complex across the highway from the campground.  It included a motel, filling station, post office, restaurant, trading post, and of course restrooms.  I ordered breakfast so I could charge my computer and finish posting my blog.  I can’t imagine trying this in the days of dial up.  I probably wouldn’t have left the restaurant all day.

After breakfast, Petey and I visited Wupatki National Monument.  The Wuptaki National Monument is home to a variety of pueblos once inhabited by the Sinagua and Anasazi Indians.  The ruins include Box Canyon, Lomaki, Nalakihu, Citadel, Wapatlo, and Wukoki.  The pueblos were established in the 1100s and the land was farmed without the presence of water.  The inhabitants hung pottery bowls and built check dams to collect rainwater.  If rainwater didn’t come, they had to walk ten miles to collect water from the Little Colorado drainage.  The ruins are typical of many pueblos found in this region.  Walls are constructed of nearby sandstone and limestone and are cemented together with local soils.  The area was abandoned in the mid 1200s.  Archaeologists aren’t sure why, but a lengthy drought could have been a cause.

The Citadel, the modern name given to the ruin, was built atop a rock.  The walls

View from Citadel

extend up from its edge.  Archeologists consider the pueblo a remarkable achievement and wonder why the Anasazi often built so high.  Was it defensive, for sun and breeze, or to protect the limited cropland along the slopes and wash bottoms.

A unique feature found at the Wupatki ruins is the ballcourt.  Rather common at ruins in southern Arizona, ballcourts are rare in the northern part of the state.  Because of the work involved in building a ballcourt and due to the amount that have been found in the state, it has been speculated that ball games were an important part of the Wapatki people and their southern neighbors.  The Wupatki ballcourt is 78 feet wide, 102 feet long, and has six-foot high wall.

The views surrounding the pueblos include the Painted Desert as well as the San

painted desert

Francisco Peaks.  The volcanic mountains are the highest point in Arizona and are considered sacred by the modern day Navajo and Hopi.

In addition, the Wupatki area includes several blowholes.  One blowhole is located near the

blow hole

Wupatki ruin.  There is no evidence that these blowholes, a crevice in the earth’s crust that connects to an underground passage known as an earth crack, were used by the prehistoric people.  Depending on the air pressure, air either blows out of the hole or is sucked in.  Today, the air pressure outside must have been lower than the air inside the crack system, as I felt a breeze come up from the surface.

A 35 mile road through the Coconino National Forest connects the Wupatki National Monument to the Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument, our next stop.  The volcano erupted sometime between 1040 and 1100 and its ash covered 64,000 acres of farmland and created a 1,000 foot cinder cone known as Sunset Crater.  The volcano’s summit stands 8,029 feet and its base is one mile in diameter.  The crater depth is 300 feet.  A variety of different types of hardened lava flow surround the cinder cone including spatter cones.  I took the mile loop through the lava field and by the cinder cone to get a closer look along with a variety of other tourists, though I think it must be spring break in Minnesota and Wisconsin as several folks from the northern parts seemed to be escaping the cold for a few days.

Petey and I continued on to visit the Walnut Grove National Monument just outside Flagstaff.  Gina, my GPS, took me down Old Walnut Canyon Road, which is a winding, poorly maintained dirt road through the Forest.  I got to a section grooved with large tire ruts.  It looked a little too “off road” for me, so I turned VANilla around in the middle of the path.  The nicest guy was following me.

After rolling down his window, he asked “Are you looking for something?”

I told him where I was trying to go.  He said, the section in front of us was the worst part of the road and to just stay on the high ruts.

I asked, “If I’ve seen several ruins today, is the park worth it?”

With a shrug he said, “If you’ve never been before, you should go, and if you don’t want to take this road, you can turn around and get there from the highway, but you’re over half way there now.”

REALLY, the HIGHWAY…I don’t know what Gina was thinking.

We chatted a bit longer about trails in the area, but the more I thought about it, I decided to follow him over the ruts and waved bye when he turned off to go mountain biking.

The Walnut Canyon National Monument was interesting.  Of course, it was listed on www.geocaching.com as a virtual cache and an earth cache so I picked up two more caches while I walked the one mile Island trail which wound around an island section of the canyon just below the rim where the ruins were built.  The Sinagua Indians took advantage of the natural recess of the limestone and simply built walls in the shallow caves.  The dwellings at Walnut Canyon are around 900 years old.  They were used for approximately 100 years before the Sinagua Indians departed the area.  It is thought that the Sinagua Indians assimilated into the Hopi culture in the 1400s.

The island path was rather crowded on this gorgeous day and it was fun to hear other tourist comments.  As some kids were climbing on the walls of one of the dwellings, the young boy exclaimed, “I wish we owned part of this, then we could use one of these as a hideout.”  Another couple stood at each sign and read it aloud.  One sign discussed switchback trails.  The woman, in her 50’s, asked, “What is a switchback?”  I was surprised she didn’t know, so it has prompted me to survey my readers…Do you think “switchback” is a common word, or would one only be aware of it from living in mountainous areas?

Petey and I called it a day after our visit to Walnut Canyon and after surfing the Internet near Flagstaff, we were able to find a campground with a shower that was open about 14 miles south….FINALLY.  As VANilla left Flagstaff for Cave Spring Campground, suddenly before me was a mile wide canyon with a 1,000 foot drop.  I was so surprised…I guess I should have referred to my Reader’s Digest book sooner.  I quote from Reader’s Digest, “Though words strain to capture the scene, Western novelist Zane Grey came close in Call of the Canyons.  ‘The very forest-fringed earth’, he wrote, ‘seemed to have opened into a deep abyss’.”  We took in this view as we zigzagged down the winding highway to the campgrounds for the evening.  Definitely no Internet or cell service here, but I got a shower!  ETB

Wupatki Ruins

FLAGSTAFF, ARIZONA:

Located in Northern Arizona, Flagstaff is a city that lies on Historic Route 66 (the former U.S. semi-transcontinental highway) at an elevation of 7,000 feet near Arizona’s highest peaks (San Francisco Peaks Webcam), the Grand Canyon, Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument, Wupatki National Monument, and Walnut Canyon National Monument. The area is rich with Native American archaeological sites, and the natural beauty of northern Arizona’s high desert environments, including ponderosa pine forests and areas of pinyon pine. Flagstaff is home to Northern Arizona University and the Museum of Northern Arizona, where studies of local Indian traditions and history are extensive and well respected. The city has grown tremendously over the last ten years, and sprawls past it’s original main street area and train station.

Flagstaff can be reached by car, train, or plane. US Airways serves a small Flagstaff airport and runs flights back and forth from Phoenix International Airport. The overnight Amtrak train from Los Angeles Union Station to Flagstaff is an interesting way to go, if you can sleep. Or, it’s about an eight hour drive from Ventura, California through Barstow, California, Victorville, California, and Kingman, Arizona.

Temperatures in Flagstaff can be moderate. Summertime highs are in the 80′s, winter in the 40′s, and spring and fall in the 60′s and 70′s. The area experiences some summer rain when thunderstorms move through, and precipitation can be a couple of inches throughout the year. Overall, it’s generally dry and comfortable.

WUPATKI NATIONAL MONUMENT:

Wupatki National Monument

Wupatki National Monument is 39 miles from the City of Flagstaff. This place includes five prehistoric pueblos dated around the 1100′s. The Pueblos require a couple of hours to view them all because you will need to drive between them. Note that to protect the fragile archaeological sites, the National Park Service does not allow hiking off designated trails. Each Pueblo has a short trail that is a half mile long, or less, leading around the site. The most impressive is Wupatki Pueblo. A half-mile-long, flat, paved trail leads visitors around this site, the largest pueblo in the area. Additionally, a Monument Visitor’s Center with rangers, a few educational displays, restrooms, and a bookstore is situated near Wupatki Pueblo. Wupatki National Monument

I highly recommend reading the book, Letters from Wupatki, written by Courtney Reeder Jones. This book is a collection of letters written by young Courtney, beginning in 1938, when she and her new husband came to Wupatki as the first NPS caretakers. Letters from Wupatki

I visited Wupatki National Monument with my father in 1977. Here is snapshot of us in front of the Wupatki Pueblo.

Wupatki Pueblo, 1977

On a return visit with my father in 2010:

Wupatki Ruins

Wupatki Ruins

Wupatki National Monument

Collared Lizard, Arizona Reptile

Wupatki Ruins

WALNUT CANYON NATIONAL MONUMENT:

Walnut Canyon is 7 miles from the City of Flagstaff.

More than 700 years ago, people inhabited the cliffsides of Walnut Canyon. Cliff dwellings can be viewed up close via a one mile round trip trail with a 185 foot decent down stairs, and back up again. This trail is paved and circumnavigates the “island.” The Island Trail allows visitors to view 25 dwellings up close and see some across the canyon in the cliffs.

The Rim Trail does not descend into the canyon, but provides a couple of overlooks to view cliff dwellings across the canyon, and a pithouse and pueblo set away from the canyon rim. The Rim Trail is paved, flat, and .7 miles long.

There are some longer, Ranger-led hikes offered in summer months. Check this link for those descriptions: Guided Hikes

Also, at Walnut Canyon National Monument, you will find a NPS Visitor’s Center with rangers, educational displays, a bookstore, and restrooms. Walnut Canyon National Monument

Walnut Canyon National Monument, Island Trail

Walnut Canyon, Island Trail around the Ruins

Walnut Canyon National Monument, Island Trail

Walnut Canyon, Dwelling Ruins in the Hillsides, Island Trail

GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK:

Grand Canyon National Park. Photo: National Park Service http://www.nps.gov/archive/grca/photos/index.htm

The Grand Canyon is 81 miles from the city of Flagstaff. This spectacular National Park is a sight to see. The Canyon is 277 river miles (446km) long, up to 18 miles (29km) wide, and a mile (1.6km) deep. (nps.gov/grca) It is most common to view the Grand Canyon from the road at the South Rim, but there are other ways to see it.

For example, the Colorado River runs through the Grand Canyon and can be rafted. Below is a NPS video showing the Canyon and what it’s like to raft the Colorado. If you are an experienced boater, private trips may be taken after obtaining a permit and a long wait, but for most people, outfitters serve the public and guide people down the river on a regular basis.

Hiking and backpacking trips are another common way to experience the Canyon, but require proper preparation and equipment.

Here is the link to all of the NPS online information for the Park: Grand Canyon National Park

If you’re looking for a new place to explore, within a day’s drive of Ventura or Los Angeles, consider the Flagstaff area. The human history, natural history, and outdoor adventures are unique and plentiful.

Have an outdoor adventure you’d like to share? Email us! customerservice@realcheapsports.com

Determined Juniper Trees

These scraggly trees are common on rocky ridges. Where there is a fracture in the rock, the roots of the trees will reach deep enough to access just enough water to survive. One-seed junipers have the capacity to speed up or slow down their growth depending on water availability. It is also common for part of a tree to die back, allowing the rest of the tree to survive. Though their growth is slow, sometimes only 4 to 6 inches in a decade, they may live for hundreds of years.

Native Americans used the juniper for medicine, gum, dye, food (the berries) and fuel. They also made shoes from the woody fibers. Herbalists still use the plant for a variety of remedies.

These trees are hanging off the rocky top of Walnut Canyon in northern Arizona.

Orange Lichen

These splotches, formally known as lichens, grow on rocks. They can be any number of colors – yellow, orange, gray, green, blue, black. And they can grow in the most inhospitable places in the world. This colony of orange lichen is from Walnut Canyon National Park in northern Arizona.

Lichens are actually colonies of two different organisms co-existing and working together: algae which lives in filaments built by fungi. They use photosynthesis for nourishment.

Some lichen grow only a few millimeters in a century, so these lichens may be thousands and thousands of years old.

Yellow, Orange and Gray Lichen

For me, lichens are the kind of thing that brings out experimentation when I’m photographing. Do I capture the texture, the design, the mix of colors?  Well, having fun is a big part of taking photos for me. And this stuff was amazingly fun to shoot. I like lichen.

If you’re looking for the winner of the book drawing, go here.

So I think I still have too much to cover in one post, so I’ll just do what I can and finish the rest another day.

Sunday after Walnut Canyon we decided to visit the Arboretum at Flagstaff, which we had never heard of before. Apparently it’s been around since the 80′s, but that’s about the same time that we moved to So Cal, so explains why we weren’t familiar with it.

Anyway, it was a lovely place for a stroll as you can see from the photos, but was a bit frustrating because the map that they gave us didn’t match the signs that were on the grounds which made it difficult to navigate around. We decided that the person or people who designed the map and signs obviously didn’t understand the meaning of “attention to detail”…oh well, it was a nice cool summer day and we enjoyed our time there. The squirrel was in the process of hiding some acorns at the bottom of that tree, which was fun and it had been a long time since I’d seen a robin. They were so common in Ohio, but definitely not in Phoenix.

In our next post we’ll head to Meteor Crater and

take a drive down Route 66 thru Winslow.

Don’t forget to scroll down to my post about the book giveaway and add your comment to get in the drawing. I’ll announce the winner on Tuesday night.

So, on to the next report…after the kids headed east and west, Terry and I checked into our hotel, then decided to head out to a place that we hadn’t been since the kids were young. Walnut Canyon, a great place to go in the summer to get out of the Phoenix heat and enjoy the cool and green of the north country.

Walnut Canyon is filled with Indian ruins and caves in the rocks that you can actually walk in and imagine what it would have been like to live in these dwellings hundreds of years ago.

Unfortunately, when we arrived we were surprised to discover that two separate rock falls had damaged the main trail at Walnut Canyon National Monument last December, 2007, depositing a 49-ton boulder, several other large rocks, and 100 additional tons of debris on the most popular Island Trail.The slide demolished concrete stairs, handrails, and a bench.The trail was immediately closed to the public, and park staff began assessing the cleanup process.According to reports, the project has proved more complicated than it first appeared, and the trail will remain closed through at least September of this year. If you plan to go up there sometime, I’d recommend calling first to see if the trail is open, since it serves as the only access to the cliff dwellings (the most interesting part).

Posted here are some pics of some of the wildlife that we saw. If you click to enlarge

the 4th photo you can see at least 3 different dwellings in the sides of the canyon. You can see in a couple of the other photos what the dwellings look like from closer up.

In the 6th photo from the top, you should be able to see the large bird (hawk?) flying on the right side of the picture. It was really cool to see these birds soaring below us, when we stood at the overlook.

Even though we couldn’t walk down to the dwellings, we still had a nice time. As you can see the clouds were a bit ominous and we heard some thunder and got sprinkled on a little, but we look forward to that around here. It’s a nice change of pace.

Next we visited the Flagstaff Arboretum…