It took about 30 minutes to get there. Would have taken 20, but gps decided to take me in the wrong direction. I never have been good with directions, but now that I use GPS it's like my brain has completely shut off. I'll be driving one way and thinking "I should be going down that street", but I dont listen because GPS tells me to keep going. Anyway, I drove into the park and had no idea where to go. It's much like Thatcher park; unmanned gate house and parking lots everywhere.
I decided to find the only spot with shade and park there. Man, it was nice. 75 degrees and blue skies. The weather is always perfect out here. Not that I dont miss the dreary, cloudy, rainy and snowy weather that slowly but surely eats the soul of every New Yorker, but I don't. Not even a little bit.
Ran into some Coyotes. There was two of them and they were awesome! I've never been so close to something that could rip my face off. I tried to follow them, but they were too Wiley for me. Get it? HAHA an HA! They were watching, no mocking me, the whole time. The closest I could get was about 50 feet. At that point the one, turned around and stared at me as if to warn me. Or maybe he was laughing at my futile attempts to keep up. I took this as my cue to take off. Next time I will catch you mr. coyote. Next time.
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| Mmmm rusty beans |
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| Really green plants growing out of a rock? Where the hell do they get water from? |
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| Random Cave. I forgot my headlamp so I skipped it. Next time. If I can find it again. |
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| This says "Tyler is an asshole and should not be given sharpies." |
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| Fonix and surround towns. Urban sprawl at its finest |
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| That wall of rocks was about 80 feet tall. Must have been built by giants |
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| Tell your grandpa to stop leaving his beer cans everywhere! |
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| Dammit Gramps! You were warned! To the home with you! |
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| Desert plant known as the 8 fingered hand. A relative to the conifer family known to have a completely made up name. |
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| Damage, or cut this down and it JAIL for you! (Unless you are a Native) |
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| I heard that these holes were from Tarantula nests. Looks more like killer birds to me. Not sure. Someone google it. |
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| If you were like 300 years old you'd look a little beat up too! |
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| Right above my finger is where the top of my head would be if I was standing next to the cactus. Now, I'm like 6 ft tall, so this cactus is easily 9-10 feet tall. |
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| Desert snail. Or something. |
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| Cool rock formation with UFO is the background. |
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| I have no idea what this is. Looked like some sort of nest, but it also looked like an old plant. |
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| Climbed that too. |
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| Some sort of really cool looking plant. |
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| Sweet handhold. |
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| Or not (this is a dramatic recreation of actual events. I grabbed it, it came lose, and I fell off the mountain and died. OK, all true but the falling off the mountain part. I almost did, but my catlike reflexes saved the day) |
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| Little baby barrel cactus. Probably 50 years old. |
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| Little fetus cactus. |
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| Up until I got here all the rocks were boulders with round shapes. These were all flat. Maybe my resident geologist JZ can explain this? |
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| Now, this was a site to be seen. Usually a solitary creature, the SouthWestern Radio-Cell tower only forms into large herds as seen here during mating season. Truly, an amazing site. Richard Attienborough has nothing on me. |
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| Millipede exoskeleton. Gross. |
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| Desert Daisy's |
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| In the West, we get the moon and the sun at the same time. This phenomenon has NEVER happened in NY. Ever. |
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| This is where the water flows when the desert gets its yearly thunderstorm. Would make a killer slide! |
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| Water flows and moves those rocks. They're probably 100 pounds a piece. Would make a KILLER water slide! |
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| Big rocks tossed down a hill by water. May leave a mark. |
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| Another question for geologist JZ. How does this form? |
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| Those big giants rocks turned into little baby pebbles which felt like coarse sand. This was at the bottom of the water slide. |
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| Kind of bright over here. |
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| I ran up this, thinking that all the rocks were close together. |
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| Turns out I was wrong. Flew off the edge. That could have turned out badly. |
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| Neatest cactus I saw all day |
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| Random Mountain house thing |
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| They drove to the top. Doesn't count (said the mighty mountain climber) Although I did get some funny looks right before I took off down the side. |
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| This was part of the trial that I ran down. It was like the end of 7 Sisters, which is the greatest end to any race I've ever run. Rocks everywhere! Plus, here, there was sand all over to make it nice and slippery and hair-pin turns to make it perfect! I took video, but I cant get it to upload correctly. |
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| Although pavement is awful, this meant I was almost done and seeing as though I havent ran in a few months, I needed to be done. |
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| 934ft down |
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| Hmmm, Grand Canyon is way smaller than it looks on TV. |
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| Werewolf Print |
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| Coyote's hiding from me |
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| There they are! I zoomed in and well, things got blurry. |
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| Ran up that. It was like the gravel pits from back east. Every step knocked rocks and sand loose. |
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| All. My. Friends. Drive Low Riders. These weren't lowered that much, but they all had really nice rim$ and were playing some funky mexican music. I |
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| Another day, another mountain discovered and conquered. |
