March 23-25, 2019 - Where have I been?
Well it has been a few days since I posted and there are two reasons:
1) Been laying low at Roosevelt Lake; and
2) No cell service.
We left our plugged in existence in the Indian Casino parking lot on Saturday morning (3/23) and headed out to Roosevelt Lake. This is an area between Tucson and Phoenix -- to the north. The lake is a reservoir formed by Roosevelt Dam which was built in 1920 or so. At the time it was the largest stone dam ever built. This was accomplished by block and tackle and overhead cables swinging indigenous dressed stone blocks into place to form a wall. Yesterday we explored the dam and here are a few pictures.
In this picture, if you look close enough, you can see the original blocks at the bottom of the wall. Amazing!
We were thinking about taking the Apache Trail from the Dam down the canyon to Phoenix but after further investigation in our trailerless truck, decided it would be unwise. We met a guy and his wife who had just traversed the 35 mile dirt road coming the opposite way. He was visibly shaken. Looked like he needed a drink. He told us that it was not for the faint of heart and he qualified this by saying he was not afraid of heights -- by the way, he was a pilot. Of course he was from Iowa. Apparently President Teddy Roosevelt did, in fact, traverse this dirt road and proclaimed it one of the most beautiful places he had ever seen -- you should have seen the picture of the automobile in which he made the journey. Gutsy the guy was.
There used to be a town called Roosevelt but now it is drowned by about 70' of water.
The area is beautiful and full of recreational opportunities. But there are not too many people visiting there. We were kind of blown away by the lack of campers in this wonderful campground, considering the huge population bases within a few hours. The camping is primitive, and I can see that could be a problem during the summer here, but right now the weather is perfect and isn't this Spring Break? There are bathrooms with running water and (we found out later) parts of the massive campgrounds actually have showers. The fishing and boating opportunities were fantastic. We just couldn't figure out why there weren't more folks here. We stayed two nights, with our Senior passes, it cost a total of $12.
The good thing about being in a national forest park is that you can do your laundry. Which we took care of today.
After visiting the dam on Sunday, we ventured further along to find lunch and ended up in a town called "Tonto Basin," affectionally called "Punkin Center." Lunch was un-remarkable but I did find a post office from which to mail my postcards and letters.
Today, Monday March 25, we broke camp around 10 am and headed towards Wickenberg. We decided to take google's word for it and took the scenic drive. It was definitely worth it. We saw again another side of the Grand Canyon State and only had to touch on the big city areas to get out in the wilderness again.
We found another BLM camp area a bit northwest of Wickenberg near Congress, AZ and after a somewhat excruciating approach, we managed to find a spot level enough to pass muster. Free, BTW
I talked Russ into going to Wickenberg to see the Museum tomorrow. See how that works
1) Been laying low at Roosevelt Lake; and
2) No cell service.
We left our plugged in existence in the Indian Casino parking lot on Saturday morning (3/23) and headed out to Roosevelt Lake. This is an area between Tucson and Phoenix -- to the north. The lake is a reservoir formed by Roosevelt Dam which was built in 1920 or so. At the time it was the largest stone dam ever built. This was accomplished by block and tackle and overhead cables swinging indigenous dressed stone blocks into place to form a wall. Yesterday we explored the dam and here are a few pictures.
 |
| The updated dam |
 |
| The Dam from the Lake side |
We were thinking about taking the Apache Trail from the Dam down the canyon to Phoenix but after further investigation in our trailerless truck, decided it would be unwise. We met a guy and his wife who had just traversed the 35 mile dirt road coming the opposite way. He was visibly shaken. Looked like he needed a drink. He told us that it was not for the faint of heart and he qualified this by saying he was not afraid of heights -- by the way, he was a pilot. Of course he was from Iowa. Apparently President Teddy Roosevelt did, in fact, traverse this dirt road and proclaimed it one of the most beautiful places he had ever seen -- you should have seen the picture of the automobile in which he made the journey. Gutsy the guy was.
There used to be a town called Roosevelt but now it is drowned by about 70' of water.
The area is beautiful and full of recreational opportunities. But there are not too many people visiting there. We were kind of blown away by the lack of campers in this wonderful campground, considering the huge population bases within a few hours. The camping is primitive, and I can see that could be a problem during the summer here, but right now the weather is perfect and isn't this Spring Break? There are bathrooms with running water and (we found out later) parts of the massive campgrounds actually have showers. The fishing and boating opportunities were fantastic. We just couldn't figure out why there weren't more folks here. We stayed two nights, with our Senior passes, it cost a total of $12.
 |
| our campsite |
 |
| a portion of the huge lake |
The good thing about being in a national forest park is that you can do your laundry. Which we took care of today.
After visiting the dam on Sunday, we ventured further along to find lunch and ended up in a town called "Tonto Basin," affectionally called "Punkin Center." Lunch was un-remarkable but I did find a post office from which to mail my postcards and letters.
Today, Monday March 25, we broke camp around 10 am and headed towards Wickenberg. We decided to take google's word for it and took the scenic drive. It was definitely worth it. We saw again another side of the Grand Canyon State and only had to touch on the big city areas to get out in the wilderness again.
We found another BLM camp area a bit northwest of Wickenberg near Congress, AZ and after a somewhat excruciating approach, we managed to find a spot level enough to pass muster. Free, BTW
I talked Russ into going to Wickenberg to see the Museum tomorrow. See how that works
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