From the Blackhills to the Badlands to Boston

After leaving the Little Big Horn Battlefield area, we stopped in Fishspear, SD for the night which is just at the edge of the Blackhills of South Dakota. One of the towns in the area I wanted to visit was Deadwood. Custer had some impact on this town as it was members of his troops who discovered gold in the area which eventually led to the rise of Deadwood, the influx of white miners into the Blackhills and the elimination of the local Indians.
I loved the HBO series called Deadwood which also has been eliminated.
Besides gold, Deadwood is famous for being the place where Wild Bill Hickok was murdered by Jack McCall. Wild Bill was playing poker and holding Aces and Eights when he was shot in the back (of the head). As Deadwood was a territory at the time and there was no real law, a quick trial ensued. McCall was acquited claiming revenge for the death of a brother. The verdict was later overturned and he was eventually hanged for the murder. Calamity Jane is buried next to Wild Bill.

Next on the Badlands tour was the Crazy Horse Memorial near Custer, SD. This is mammoth rock sculpture of Crazy Horse on a horse pointing to his land/people. It has a long way to go to be completed. The work began more than 60 years ago by Korczak Ziolkowski who was from Boston. The face was completed in 1998.



As there is no known photo of Crazy Horse, the image is meant to represent all Indian Warriors. He will be pointing to the land of his people. When asked "where is your land?", Crazy Horse said "my land is where my dead lie buried." The image on the left is the model and the right shows the progress. I don't think I'll live to see it completed.

Not far from Crazy Horse is Mount Rushmore, another place I've always wanted to see. It is pretty impressive but smaller than one might expect. In fact, all of the presidents can fit into Crazy Horse's hair on the Crazy Horse Memorial. Maybe we can add another head someday.

Next we headed for Wall SD for lunch, which gets its notoriety from Wall Drug, a 4 square block, one story emporium. Picture all the tourist shops from any tourist town all crammed into one building. Seems to be a destination spot for some people. I don't get it. But it is near Badlands National Park, so we took the Badlands loop road to get one last use of our lifetime, senior National Park pass. What a surprise. This place was amazing. The landscape really was from another world. The area had been a sea, then a jungle then a desert. Very little vegitation and rock formations that looked like dripping sand castles. Even though we had a 6 hour ride to Sioux Falls ahead of us, we kept stopping at each overlook. Here are a couple of shots.


Then there is the obligatory rainbow shot. This one is a double. You can just see the colors of a second rainbow to the right.

Well, folks, that will about do it for this particular tour. By the time some of you read this we will be home. The whole 3+ months has been an unbelievable time for us and I'm glad some of you didn't mind me sharing it with you. I was reluctant to do a blog, but I got into it and enjoyed it myself. I look at it like a reverse answering machine, you can get messages from me without having to actually talk to me. See you all soon. By the way, I will have a showing of any paintings I did from this trip in a gallery in Norwood in October. I'll keep you all posted.

Little Big Horn Battlefield National Park

Today's history lesson concerns the Little Big Horn Battle, formerly know as Custer's Last Stand. The lesson started when we saw a sign for the Little Big Horn Battlefield Trading Post with logos for Exxon and KFC. Judy said, "I didn't know Colonel Sanders was at the battle of Little Big Horn." We needed to brush up a bit on our history.
I love these things where one never really knows what happened like the Alamo, Little Big Horn, the 17 minute gap in the Watergate tape. I prefer to just go with the myth or legend. But archeologists have done a lot of work in identifying what troops were in what location and how the battle evolved. For example, they can tell from shell casings they found whether they were Indian of soldier shells, whether the soldiers were in an organized line or chaotic retreat and they can associate casings with a particular rifle to know where a soldier travelled on the battle field. It is really fascinating what they are discovering. A good book that includes a lot of the forensic analysis of the battle is "Son of the Morning Star" by Evan S. Connell. A bit dry but fascinating.

I've always wanted to visit this place and try to relive the battle. We bought an auto-tour cd at the visitor center which was really worth it. The park is laid out pretty well with a loop that brings you to where Reno made the initial attack to where Reno and Benteen tried to find Custer and finally to "Custer Hill" where 200+ members of the 7th Cavalry met their demise. It is pretty desolate but there are many hills and "coulees", which I think are like drainage gulches, that led to the Little Big Horn river. You can see that a lot of the action would have been hidden from view because of the rolling terrain.

Here are a few photos of key areas in the area.

This is the view of the Little Big Horn river from a knoll on the battlefield. The Indian camp would have been just beyond the trees. Custer had sent General Reno to attack the Indian encampment. Reno's men were repulsed and this is the view that he would have had as the Indians attacked and attacked his retreating troops. Those are the Big Horn mountains way off in the distance.

This pictures shows the markers where soldiers fell when trying to rejoin Custer and the remaining troops on what is now Custer Hill. You can see the monument in the top left. Custer had split up his troops and a group of them were trying to regroup, but to no avail. Some made it to join Custer, but, you know the rest of the story...PS, I love the Big Sky you get in the west.

In the 90's, the park was renamed from Custer's Battlefield to Little Big Horn Battlefield and a memorial was set up to honor the native Americans who died in the battle. They were just trying to defend their way of life. I guess they didn't get the memo about Manifest Destiny. It is a beautiful monument. There are names of all the Indians who are known to have died there. They are listed by the tribe they belonged to along with Indian drawings of parts of the battle.

The national park is in the Crow Reservation and there are some horse ranches interspersed throughout the battlefield. It is really cool to see the horses grazing freely throughout the park.

Also, the place was very quiet, partly because there weren't many people there. The only sound we could hear came from a variety of song birds. There were no trees to be found but the birds were hidden in the long grass so we couldn't see where the sounds came from.

I really enjoyed this stop on our return home.

For more information on the Little Big Horn Battlefied, click here

Lewis and Clark Trail

When we left Yellowstone Park, I found myself driving north then west. This didn't seem like the right direction to get home. But, we were trying to experience a little bit of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. I've always been amazed at the courage and determination it took to venture into an unknown land with very little knowledge of where one was heading. However, we did feel a bit like Lewis and Clark as we weren't sure where we were heading or where we would find food. We were starving, hadn't eaten in a couple of hours, and had no idea where the nearest MacDonald's was. And yet, we persevered and did what any good explorer and adventurer would do to find food, we settled on Pizza Hut.

So, we visited a few places along their route. First, Great Falls, Mt is a place of importance for them. They were following the Missouri and had to take a few forks in the road so they weren't always sure they were on the right path. But when then hit the falls, which the Indians had told them about, they knew they had taken the correct course. What they didn't count on was 5 sets of falls that forced an 18 mile portage of all their boats and gear. Here are a couple of shots of falls (there are dams there now but they have kept the integrity of the falls)



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The next spot we stopped at was Three Forks where we find the headwaters of the Missouri. In the photo at the right, the Madison River is on my right, the Jefferson River is behind me to form the Missouri on my left. They named the rivers, which previously had not been named, after the president and secretary of state. There wasn't much there but it was still great to stand in that spot

The last stop on this Lewis and Clark 101 tour is a place called Pompey's Pillar. It is a large rock formation along the Yellowstone River which Clark spotted on the return trip and named it after Sacagawea's son, Jean Baptiste Charboneau. Clark had nicknamed him Pomp which might be Shoshone for "little chief". This is the only spot on Lewis and Clark trail that has existing physical evidence of their presence at the spot. Clark carved his name into the rock with the date. See below, left.


OK, that concludes the lecture portion of this blog. But a great book on the subject is Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose. Some of you may have read it. I know Kim has.

Yellowstone National Park

Although the weather has been pretty poor here, Yellowstone park is really outstanding. Some of the main roads are still closed and most of the roads leading to trails are closed due to snow. At the high elevations there are several feet of snow. At the lower elevations, there is very little snow. We experieneced all kinds of weather. Here are just a few photos of what one can see here.

Objects in Mirror are Closer than they appear! A little rain can bring some beautiful scenery. These thermal hot spots are all over the park. This is "Roaring Mountain". Bison grazing in the snow... How about a herd of elk grazing? Looks like they were planted there.

Did you know there was a "Grand Canyon" of Yellowstone? These are the falls. So, we are at the ranger station at Old Faithful, and the next eruption is going to be at 4:11, give or take 10 minutes. So, at 4:10, I started my video and this is what I got. BTW, it was blowing snow and we were freezing. Too bad the sky was the same color as Old Faithful.

Re-Surfacing

Well, it was a busy last week with packing, cleaning and trying to get a few more paintings off the ground. So, I haven't been too good at the blogging. . Anyway, we took one last off-road adventure with Bill and Sarah to one of our favorite loops through cattle ranches, up into some little canyons near Sycamore Canyon and back over to the Red Rocks near the Hunanki ruins. It was a great day and I took many photos of things I had already photograhed. Just so many photo-ops. We finally got to see a reasonable sized snake in our travels. We think it is a gopher snake and Judy saw a few Javelinas before we left Sedona on Monday morning. We left Northview Rd at 7:45 with a destination of Moab, Utah. We wanted to explore Arches National Park and do some more Jeep'N before settling down. We arrived in time to spend a number of hours touring the park and visiting some of the many natural arches. What incredible scenery.

The next day, we took the Jeep over the Gemini Bridges trail. This was a relatively easy trail but we took a few side trips to play a bit on the slick rock. Remebering I had about 3000 miles to cover, I didn't do anything drastic, just a little fun. Here is a photo of the Gmeini Bridges. From there we stopped at a few interesting sites in Canyonlands National Park before taking the Shafer Rd trail back to Moab. Here is the Mesa Arch in Canyonlands NP. The trip down from the very top of the mesa was pretty scary. The swithbacks were very tight and VERY steep. It was the most nervous I had been on any trail, but once through that first 30 minutes of terror, the scenery was absolutely breath-taking. Here is brief video of the landscape after dropping down from the top of Shafer Rd.

We tried to get up early to head for Yellowstone today. It was a long drive. We crossed Utah from south to north, then a bit of Idaho, Wyoming and stopped in Montana. We passed through parts of Yellowstone on our way to our lodging in Gardiner, Montana. Parts of the park are still closed. I never thought of that. The bad news is we can't go all over the park, the good news is that there are very few people here. We almost have it to ourselves. Have seen lots of wild life already and some beautiful rainbows. This is the first thing we saw upon entering the park. Then this guy appeared. There are elk and bison everywhere.

Pastel Session

When Judy's cousin Bonnie and husband John were here recently, Bonnie and I tried to get out painting one day. Bonnie is an accomplished watercolorist and wanted to try her hand at some plein air red rocks. But, alas, we were having too much fun touring to squeeze that in.
So, instead, Bonnie and I sat down for an indoor pastel session. She had never tried them before and was anxious to do so. We picked a photo of a subject that wasn't too complicated to draw and both did "studies" of the same location on 5x5 pastel paper. As she had never used pastels and I had already done 3, I was the master. Actually, I just took her through the process that Kim took me through to create a quick piece and frame it (thanks, Kim). It was very rewarding to complete something and see the results in a frame. Of course, we could have worked them to death and then not been happy at all with the results.
Here they are. Quite a difference in styles. It is always fun to have several people work on the same scene and see the results. Guess who did which one.

New Photos

Here are some new photos you might find interesting. No real blog, just photos.

Is this where designs for Navajo rugs come from?

Mike Noble had to get in some exercise in Monument Valley

Pam and Judy help me get over a major hump on the Broken Arrow trail.

This view of the Little Colorado River Gorge was impressive.
Here is the first view of the Grand Canyon from Desert View.

Bonnie needs some help getting the close-up shot in the Canyon.

Close up view of the Grand Canyon (sorry about the wind noise in the video)

Road to "Nowhere". The back road to Jerome from Williams, AZ.

Turkey Butt(e)

Friday, we went out with Bill and Sarah on a search for the fire lookout at a place called Turkey Butte. According to our topo maps, this location would give a good overlook of one of the many canyons in the area. To get there, one had to go north to Flagstaff and then come south on backroads. So, we headed to Flag, took route 66 west for a few miles and then went down Woody Mountain road in search of the lookout towers. The first part of the way was on a maintained dirt road. The secondary roads were described as "unmaintained, upaved roads". None of the roads posed a problem for the Jeep or even any SUV. The only problem was when the road turned into a washboard and the Jeep would bounce sideways.


We found the access road to the fire lookout tower at Turkey Butte. It was gated, so we had a quarter mile hike up a steep grade to the tower. At 7500 feet, the air was a bit rare and we were sucking wind. On the way up, we came across an intersting discovery. More on that below. Once at the tower, we were treated to a great view across Sycamore Canyon as well as a view of the Sedona area all the way to Jerome. It was very clear and we could see for miles.
As the travelling was easier than expected, we set out in search of more vistas. Along the trail, we spotted an opening to the right and pulled over and walked to a cliff. What a great surprise. A panaramic view over a rocky ledge toward Sedona. See the photo on the left. We then continued to East Buzzard Point for another terrific view across the canyon to (for those who know the area) Hardings Point and Oak Creek Canyon in the distance. See photo on the right.

We did see a lot of wild life while on this trip. Here are some of the more dangerous critters you could come across.

Speaking of critters, we saw a lot of mule deer, elk and wild turkeys. Some of the mule deer were quite large and one male only had one antler. It really was a place where the "deer and the antelope play". Except for one deer. Above, I mentioned something interesting on the climb to the Turkey Butte lookout tower. On the path up, I noticed in the distance what looked like very white branches sticking up. As we got closer they looked more and more like ribs. Seeing the fur spread all over and the skull and verterbra, we quickly deduced that, sure enough, it was bones. Probably a deer, but it was hard to tell. Most of the body parts were missing. A CSI agent would probably say they were carried away by coyotes. Not sure what attacked the deer, but it was pretty good size as the deer seemed pretty large. The bones were picked clean but the fur looked relatively fresh, so we don't know how long ago the attack took place. Double click on the photo to see the skull and the ribs at the top right.


We kept our eye out for more animals on the drive back. We saw lots of tracks on the road we were on, so we were searching the forest for that one-antlered deer. Judy had spotted most of the animals, so when she told me to stop the Jeep and back up, I figured she saw some more deer. When I didn't see any, I thought she was looking for rocks. But, look below to see what she found along the trail. Not sure what we will do with it, but it makes an interesting souvenir.

Plein Air Painting Postponed

Today, I was supposed to meet local artist Dawn Sutherland to paint at one of the area's many spectacular locations. Dawn is a founding member of the Arizona Plein Air Painters Association. I had met her at the Sedona Art Center and she invited me to go along with her on some painting excursions. She has a gallery in the old high school in Jerome and recently won top awards at the Sedona Art Center and at APAP shows and plein air painting competitions. This is the second time we were supposed to meet, but the weather has been a problem. Today it was overcast and cool, so we bagged it. (The rocks are much better with sunlight and shadows. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.) The artists I've met have been very friendly and welcoming. I was looking forward to painting with Dawn. Oh well, next year.

So, I decided to finish off a painting of one of our friends that we met a few weeks ago on one of our Jeep trips through a local ranch. I also finally broke out the pastels that I bought before coming to Sedona and took a crack at one of the iconic rock formations of the area, Cathedral Rock. Just to prove that I am actually doing something besides abusing my Jeep, here are my latest works.


The pastel is mounted in an Ikea frame (thanks for the idea, Kim) and is about 4 3/4 inches square. Pretty small. I'll try to tackle another one today while I feel inspired. As for my friend, I'll let that one percolate a bit to see if it needs anything before I claim victory.

Southern Utah

On Saturday, we planned to go to Monument Valley in southern Utah with Mike and Pam. The day began auspiciously when we heard that snow was forecast for Flagstaff. We left Sedona in a drizzle but by the time we got half way through Oak Creek Canyon, the rain turned to snow and almost white out conditions at the high point in the canyon. We were driving in the clouds. Once we got past Flag, though conditions improved.
We drove through the Sunset Crater loop again and the Nobles were equally impressed with the mile long field of lava that looked as fresh and craggy today as it must have looked 1100 years ago when the volcano erupted. That is a fascinating place.

But the goal was to get to Monument Valley in the early afternoon so we could take their 17 mile self-guided tour. So we carried on.
We got to the new Navajo hotel called The View . It was aptly named as the view was stupendous. However, it is a new hotel and not quite ready for prime time. The food wasn't great, the service was slow, but the staff was very nice and friendly. All that can be accepted when you take a look at the view from our room in the photo on the right

We drove the Jeep on the loop. The previous time we were here with the Bronchuks, we took a guided tour with a Navajo. This time we did our own tour. The weather changed a lot while we were there. From the restaurant you have a view of the valley from horizon to horizon and can see all different types of weather. A band of snow move in and dropped a white cover on one formation while others nearby were in the sun. Really amazing. Here are just a couple of photos to show what I mean.


I just about filled my camera with shots from Monument Valley, but I won't bore you with all of them (now!).
We had my Utah Off-Road book with us and found a couple of trails nearby that looked interesting. So, after a quick trip back through Monument Valley in the morning we set off to find the John's Canyon trail about 25 miles north. We found the trail easily enough. There is not much out in this part of the country. The dirt road led over a flat mesa where the only other occupants were the cattle grazing. I have a ton more cattle photos now. The book said we would enter the Glen Canyon recreaction park but all we could see was the mesa we were on and cliffs leading up to higher mesas. Until we went around the corner of one of the cliffs and we all let out a collective, simultaneous "WOW!". To our left appeared Glen Canyon, below us. What a sight. The road led right along the cliff at many points that made the ride interesting. Here are just a couple of shots of the canyon. Notice the rear view mirror in the one on the left...


The book also said there were petroglyphs to be found along the route, so we made it our goal to find them. We succeeded and found the etchings on boulders that could be more than 1000 years old. Just laying out in the wilderness.

On the way to actually enter into John's Canyon, we rounded a blind corner and found a herd of a dozen or so cattle in front of us on the road. We crept up on them to kind of egg them on to move out of the way. As there was no place for them to go, up or down, they just walked along the road stopping to look back at us and then continuing until they found a place where they could get off the road. I wasn't sure if one of them might turn and charge us, but we made it safely by.
John's Canyon was also spectacular, as we came in on the canyon floor and looked up at the walls. It went on for miles. We headed back for our next adventure.

We needed gas, so we stopped at a station to fill up and we ate our Easter Dinner at the Shell Food Mart in Mexican Hat, Utah. We enjoyed rice cakes, crackers, peanut butter and some banana bread.

Our last tour, and the last entry in this post, was The Valley of the Gods. This area is north or Monument Valley and just about its equal in beauty. The loop through the valley is an upaved road that is pretty suitable for passenger cars. There are lots of named formations. At different times we had the impression that we were looking at ancient Roman ruins or parts of a cathedral. Parts of Planet of the Apes were filmed there. It was really stunning.

Chihuly at the Desert Botanical Garden

On Thursday, we picked up Mike and Pam Noble at Sky Harbor airport. We decided to take advantage of the trip to Phoenix to take in the Chihuly exhibit at the Phoenix Desert Botanical Garden. This was a fascinating exhibit. Chihuly, a native of Washington state who studied and taught at RISD, has exhibited all over the world. He recently had an exhibit at RISD.

His work is interspersed with the native tree, wild flowers and cacti. The place is very interesting on its own, but was really spectacular with the blown glass. We went late in the afternoon, so there was a lot of good lights and shadows on the glass. They are lit up at night which must really be something. Here are a few photos.

Today we start a forced march of tourism with Mike and Pam. They are only here for a few days so we will cram in as much as humanly possible.

Sycamore Pass Road

Looking for some more back road adventure, Judy and I decided to try some of the "difficult" trails leading toward a place called Sycamore Canyon. The main access to the canyon is from the north. But that would mean going west from Flagstaff, then south. We thought we would take the short cut.

We took the first dirt road we found once we got off the highway and it lead us through a cattle ranch where we were getting up close and personal with a lot of hefty beasts. They seemed to be pretty used to humans. They just turned their heads toward us, stared at us and continued munching away at the sparse grass. We took lots of pictures and I've started a portrait of one of my favorites. Maybe she'll buy it. I think it is a she. It had udders, but also horns. So I guess females have horns on this breed.


We kept going further and further off the beaten path. There were spectacular long range vistas as well as some flowering cactus we came upon.



The trail took us part way up Sugarloaf Mountain. We circled around the back of the mountain and could see a trail winding steeply up the hill, when we ran into a metal gate that blocked the trail. I think we had gone far enough anyway. I needed an excuse to turn back. See Judy scoping out the trail.

The next day, we decided to go again and take Ian McEwan, a friend of Woody and Margaret Flowers, with us. He is here with his wife, Connie, who is on a plein air painting trip. Ian seemed to really enjoy the ride. He is retired from the GM truck division so he was used to rough riding. We drove to a great spot just below the gate. Then we tried to cut across the landscape going through ranches until we could get to a trail that runs along the red rocks, giving Ian a closer look at the formations. At one point we were a bit lost/confused on one of the connecting dirt roads when we saw a UPS truck and asked directions. Yes, a UPS truck was out there deliverying to the ranches. We finally found one of the smaller trails and dove back into the outback and made it through Outlaw Trail and back in time for Margaritas and a great dinner with the painters. It was a very enjoyable afternoon.

Demo at Sedona Art Center

Today, we attended a demo at the SAC given by Jerome artist, Cody Delong I had seen him doing his "plein air" thing during the Plein Air Festival in October and met him the other night at the Sedona Art Center opening for the Arizona Plein Air Artists show. He won best in show, by the way.

Anyway, Cody was doing a 16x20 recreation of a study he had done recently. It was of a winding creek with a small waterfall. The scene had a lot in it. Underwater red rocks, bushes and small trees, bigger rocks on the shore and a background bank with a wooded area beyond that. For this type of work, Cody's approach is to tackle the focal point first. But, to begin with, he uses a charcoal to sketch in the drawing. He took an old paint brush and drilled out the ferrule (?) and inserted a piece of charcoal. That way he could draw as if he was painting. On location, he might use a pencil while in the studio he uses the charcoal.

After roughly sketching in the drawing, he started by laying in the color and value of what he was seeing beneath the water. He did not want to paint the top surface until he had the correct feeling for what was beneath the surface. This started with a warm green in the background, then a cooler green and then a warmer red-ish color for the foreground where one could see the rocks under water. He laid in a dark area which would be at the base of the little falls. He wiped out some of the red area with a paper towel to make the underwater rocks. He'd go back later to add more detail. He feels that by laying blues over the green water gives more interest to the creek instead of starting with blue and adding highlights. It definitely worked.

As he added the blue to the water, he used directional strokes in the foreground to indicate movement in the water. Some of these would be his final stokes. Economy of brushstokes?



He then went to the background and put in a mid-tone gray on top of which he added darks for tree trunks and lights for some of the foliage. He added the river bank in front of the trees and was able to drag wet into wet. He works top to bottom so that he can drag the new layer into what is already there. He is meticulous and takes his time with his painting. He wasn't going to finish the whole canvas, but we got the point. See the photo for how he was approaching his work.



Cody uses a pochade box from Openbox.com . Actually, it is the panel and pallette holder. This attaches to a normal camera tripod. For a panel, he uses a Pintura panel that he primes with liquin and light ochre. He also uses a light coat of liquin to varnish his work when it is dry.

He can fit everything he needs into his backpack as he hikes into the back woods of Arizona in search of something that stikes him that he can put to canvas.

Sedona Wildlife

After going on a bird watch recently and seeing some hummingbirds and seeing some at Taliesin West in Phoenix, we decided to pick up a hummingbird feeder at the local hardware store. I made up a mixture and hung it on a nail on the deck. When a few weeks went by and I hadn't seen any activity, I was about to return it as a faulty feeder. When lo and behold a couple of Anna hummingbirds (at least that is what I think they are) started to show up. There are a pair of them now and they dart in an out during the day. They hit the feeder then buzz off to hide in an apple tree then come back for more. Today, I stood by the feeder and waited for a few minutes til I heard the hum, then looked up and snapped this picture. Pretty Cool, huh! Double click on the photo to blow it up.

Another fascinating landscape

Last week we took another drive northeast of Flagstaff with Jacques and Claire. We planned on visiting Sunset Crator and the Wupatki Ruins. We packed up a lunch and made sure we had our Senior National Park pass and took off. This pass is the only thing great about getting old, so far. It costs $10 and it gets us, plus 3 people and a car, into any national park FOREVER. The only snag is that if we lose the pass we have to go to the place where we got it to replace it for free. That would be Scranton, PA. I don't think so. I'll pay the $5 to avoid Scranton.

Anyway, we stopped at the visitor center and got a map and headed to the first scenic view. As we drove along, out of nowhere, we noticed a huge, long pile of what looked like torn up highway from the Big Dig. It was a thousand year old lava field from the volcanos that existed in the area. The lava rock still looked very jagged and rough. A park ranger said it is because there is so little topsoil and rain that there isn't much erosion of it, if any.

At Sunset Crater, we parked and took a 1 mile walk through a lava field. There are many volcanos in this part of Arizona. There are several explanations for why there are so many in this area. You'll have to read the guide book to get the explanation, but it has something to do with the fissures between the Colorado Plateau and the Basin and Range Province to the south. Got that? There are also different types of volcanos which are also explained in the guide. Speaking of which, the guide can be borrowed and returned or bought for $1. Pretty good deal. The San Francisco Peaks,seen in the background of the photo above, are the remnants one type of volcano. They are about 12,500 feet high now but were probably over 16,000 feet before erupting.

There is very little vegetation in the ashes from the lava. But what there is has adapted to survive. In this photo, you can maybe see the roots of a Ponderosa Pine that has toppled over. The trees face challenges of finding enough soil to root in and in capturing enough water as it drains out of the soil. They do this by spiraling the grain so it can bring enough water to all the branches and leaves evenly. It makes them more flexible but also reduces their strength. So, the are susceptible to toppling due to wind and soil erosion.

From here we drove out of the lava field and ash covered hills into a part of the "Painted Desert". It was an amazing site to see the grey ash end abruptly and see the multi-colored layers of rock in the distance. This is where the Wupatki Ruins are. They are one of a number of ruins located in this area. It appears that this area was built and occupied after the eruption of the volcanos. Maybe the eruption drew people to the area. Wupatki was settled by the ancestors of the Hopi and had 100 rooms, some for collecting scarce water, some for storage, some for community activities. They lived by farming and trading. There was no irrigation system so they may have carried water in some of the many pots found at the site. Archeologists think that upwards of 2000 people lived within a days walk of the ruins. Evidently, this ruin is more typical of the homes of the time as compared with the cliff-dwellings of the Sedona area.

Jerome Junkers

Just in case some of you are wondering if I am doing any painting at all, here are a couple that I did in the old gold mine/junk yard in Jerome. The place is full of stuff like this which I enjoy painting. These two were next to each other and I may do one with both. I had to cram myself between a few other junks to set up my easel and by the time I was finishing up, a sand storm blew up and nearly knocked everything over. Another one of the plights of plein air painting.

A Unique Discovery

It's been a few days since the last post. We've been busy with company, touring, painting, snoozing, eating, etc.

However, today, we "discovered" something really unusual and impressive. Our friends, the Sullivans, told us about the spot where the Little Colorado River flows over some falls on its way to join the Colorado and go on to the Grand Canyon. We had to find our way from Winona, east of Flagstaff, off of I-40, to the Navajo Reservation. Bill and Sarah had given us directions to follow like "turn left where there is no marker, go 8.5 miles and turn left again between two piles of basalt." The landscape was absolutely barren. I had figured if someone needed to use "facilities", they could go behind a tree, as usual. But there was not a tree nor blade of grass in sight. I was wondering when we would come to the falls as the land was totally flat and we could see no indication of any water. Finally we found the path between the two piles and I drove down the path in 4WD as it was quite bumpy. We saw what looked like a litte viewing area in the distance and headed for that.

When we got there and got out of the Jeep, we were presented with this awesome sight of tons of muddy Little Colorado water pouring over the rocks and making a hard right heading to join the Colorado. We had no idea what to expect and it was truly an amazing sight. The wind was fierce, but we manged to get out of the Jeep without having the doors blown off and took a bunch of pictures.
This is something that only lasts for several weeks before this section dries up. So, we feel fortunate that we were able to catch it in this small window.

Did I mention the wind? I thought the finish on the Jeep was going to get blown off and we didn't dare get too close to the edge of the canyon as the wind was blowing us off balance. We kept our distance. Here are a couple more photos of the area. One of the falls and maybe you can make out the sand storm in the other.

Ancient Graffitti

Back to tourism. My boss from our days in Paris, Jacques, and his wife Claire are visiting us. Some mutual friends from Chicago, Syd and Mitzie Eisen, have also come to Sedona to see Jacques and Claire.

We decided to visit one of the best sites for petroglyphs in all of Arizona. The petroglyphs are rock carvings made by the natives up to 1200 years ago. This place is in an old abandoned ranch, called the V-V (Vee bar Vee) ranch. All that is left of the ranch is a chimney from the house. A short walk along a Sycamore lined trail leads to a wall of petroglyphs. A guide there explained the significance of many of the carvings as well as explained how the natives had created a solar clock to mark the seasons. The wall is just a few degrees off of due north. There are a couple of rocks that conveniently stick out from a crevass on the wall which causes light and shadow to appear on the wall when the sun hits it right.

The natives carved images on the wall when the sun hit at times of the year to indicate the season they were in. For example, when the sun hit a certain spot on the wall, it was the season to plant the corn. So, they put a symbol for planting corn on the wall. Then they would know when to plant the corn the next season. Here is the symbol for planting corn. It looks like fish bones. Can you find it in the larger image? There are many other symbols that represent animals, festivals etc.







Next we stopped at Monezuma's Well which is close by. This is a huge sink hole that contains a constant level of water at a constant temperature and a constant outflow of thousands of gallons per minute. They are not sure how it works. The white people who first stumbled on it thought they were in Mexico so they named it after Montezuma. The water has a high concetration of CO2 so there are no fish in it. The life cycle in the well seems to be plankton, algae, insects and leeches. Yikes, no skinning dipping at night here. They natives used the water to irrigate their crops and lived around the well or in cliff dwellings in the wall of the well. This was a very interesting surprise.

Full Disclosure/Self Exposure

In the interest of self-exposure, I feel obliged to post these semi-candid photos that our friend, Sarah Sullivan, took of Judy and me at the Tucson rodeo. I say "semi-candid" as Judy seems to be aware that the phot is being taken and I am either reacting to a guy getting thrown by a bucking bronco or have just sat on a prickly pear cactus someone slipped onto my seat.

This photo shows the depths that some companies will go to entice customers. Yes, guys, you too can get a gal like this if only you'd dip a little bit of Copenhagen chewing tobacco. Makes me almost want to stuff a pinch between my cheek and gums.

Over the last few days...

I guess you all figured out that we went to Vegas last week. Our friends, the Kobeys, who live across the street from us, were visiting and we decided to make a quick trip to Vegas and take in a show. We got a great rate at the Belaggio Hotel and got tickets for Cirque Du Soleil, "O". The show was an unbelievable display of technology, athleticism, grace, strength, creativity, you name it. It was terrific. This was the second one we have seen and they both were great. On the way to and back, we passed over the Hoover Dam. What a sight and the scenery around it is other-worldly. We may go back to take a tour of the dam.

We got back to Sedona by 4pm. David did his best to take 18 minutes off of the GPS systems's estimated time of arrival. Nice job, David. While Judy, Lynn and David went to the trendy shopping area called, Tlaquepaque, I went to the Sedona Art Center. It was First Night for galleries in Sedona, so I stopped into their gallery. I met a woman who heads up a plein air painting group and she invited me to join them on thursday. I was already commited to go back to Jerome with Michael Johnson and Bill Cramer, who won the best in show at the gallery. Check out his web site at http://www.billcramerpaintings.com/ . After I left the gallery, I picked up the 3 stragglers who were at a real nice gallery where Dustin Payne, a western sculpturer, was in residence for the month. He is 26 years old and already a very accomplished sculptor, like his dad. http://www.dustinpayne.com/ . What a nice kid. He was on a rodeo scholarship to college. His event was the team roping.

Saturday, I stayed back to paint/noodle while the other guys went to Jerome for the afternoon. They had a great time and so did I.

On sunday, we decided to take one last Jeep ride and then go on a hike. I took the Kobeys to the Broken Arrow trail. They, especially, Lynn, loved it. It is a pretty grueling trail in places and has some great vistas to soak in the scenery. Here is a photo of Lynn on the "stairs" that you have to come down to exit the trail. I bottomed out a couple of times here as I really couldn't see over the hood to pick my way down.

Lynn took this photo of the Jeep after climbing over some slick rock to get to the top of this little hill. It was a tight squeeze around the top to go out the "trail" on the left. A little further from this spot, I actually had to get out of the Jeep to walk over the rocks to find where the trail went.

Our last hike of the week was to Devil's Bridge. It is a fantastic rock formation not far from a main hiking trail. It got to be a fairly difficult climb to get the top but it was worth it. The trip down was a bit tricky too. Sliding on your butt was helpful at times. This is a popular place so there were lots of people coming and going. Definitely a good way to end up the week.

Where in the World.....?

La Fiesta de los Vaqueros - aka Tucson Rodeo

We had an interesting weekend. We drove to Tucson to take in the Tucson Rodeo. It was the 84th time for this terrific event. It is held in a rodeo grounds that holds about 14000 people. It is the largest outdoor rodeo. There is a pretty nice carnival atmosphere with all kinds of food and clothing for sale. Of course, we had to buy hats (to protect ourselves from the sun.) There were plenty of events like the bucking bronco, right. A pair of announcers kept a running dialog of what was about to happen, what was happening and what just happened to keep things interesting. The riding skills of the people is truly amazing and the strength to hold on to either the horse or an ornery bull is incredible. I must admit, I didn't quite get the scoring system but most people did seem to understand what was going on. They even booed some of the results.

While, the bucking broncos and bulls were something, we especially like the team roping where one guy lassoed the head of a bull and the other guy lassoed both the rear feet of the bull (the same bull). About half of the teams succeeded in this. Pretty impressive. ( I forgot to mention, the bull was running at the time.) Even more so was the women's barrell racing. The control these women had over their horses and the way the horses reacted to their direction made me want to take up horseback riding.

Our neighbors, the Kobeys, arrived in Sedona on Monday afternoon. They left Boston a day early in anticipation of the storm. Good move on their part. When they arrived, we went out for a little ride and took in the setting sun over the red rocks. Today we took a leisurely hike, ate lunch in Fay Canyon and then went for a "joy ride".

Tomorrow, I am going back to Jerome to do some more painting. I got an email from Michael Johnson letting me know that he and Peter were going back to Jerome and asked if I wanted to tag along. I jumped at the chance. Not sure what I will do, but there are plenty of choices. I have worked some more on the two I started last week and feel pretty good about them.

Plein Air Painting

Plein air painting has its plusses and minuses. Getting something from real life is always better than trying to recreate something from a photo. But we all know there are problems associated with painting outdoors. There is the wind blowing over your easel and your canvas lands in the dirt. There's chasing the shadows or the tide. There's dealing with people and traffic. There's trying to paint with the sun in your eyes or directly on your pallette or canvas. Etc, etc. I added another one today when we went to Midgley Bridge to paint, falling into a canyon. Check out the photo. To get a good view of the bridge, I had to set up fairly close to the edge of the cliff. I was not dangerously close, but I didn't have much room to back up to check out my progress. I did get a queezy feeling in my gut if I got too close to the edge. I was trying to block things in as quickly as possible as the shadows change quickly on the rocks and I wanted to get away from the edge.

Jerome had its own set of problems. Jerome is a former mining town not far from Sedona. It has tons of great locations to set up and paint. There are also tons of people, lots of traffic passing through and, depending where you set up, lots of dog poop. Here is a photo of "downtown" Jerome and the quick underpainting I did. Using the reference photo I should be able to finish this one. I was mainly working on perspective and can see a few changes that need to be made. I started another one (while waiting for Peter to finish his 4x4 foot canvas) that is off to a pretty good beginning.

I plan on returning soon to paint more buildings plus there is an old "gold mine"/junk yard where you can find lots of abandoned old cars, trucks, buses, etc to paint. I'm looking forward to that.

Another day another ruin...

On Wednesday, we decided to check out another one of the many ruins in the area. It is called Honanki. It is another site occupied by the Sinaqua Indians about 1100 years ago. It is not in the same condition as the site of Palatki and it does not have a guided tour, but in some ways it is more interesting. There are perhaps a dozen remnants of homes nestled under the overhang of the cliff walls. You can walk along a short trail to go from home to home. There are also many pictographs that are hundreds of years old, as well. The trail up to the ruins was not as steep as Palatki as it winds through the brush and over and behind boulders to end up at the cliff dwellings. There is a very pleasant walk back to the parking lot.


Judy said that when I quickly agreed to go to Honanki, something else must have been up. In one of my off-road guides, I read that there was a Jeep trail next to the outhouses at the ruin. The person at the information booth said it was a well marked, relatively easy trail if one had enough clearance. That's all I had to hear.

This trail led up and down through the rolling hills around the red rocks. It had enough excitement to get the blood flowing and some unbelievable 360 degree views of the area. It led through some cattle ranches so there were plenty of cattle sitings. The guide said there would be some difficult sections and, once again, we thought we had gone through the difficult stretches when we actually hadn't. This photos shows what looks to be a difficult section, but actually was a breeze.

As we got further along this trail, we finally came to the more difficult part. The trail led over a large boulder and down into a dried creek bed. On the other side of the creek bed we could see a pile of rubble leading up a hill, but no real discernable trail. The rocks were pretty large but there was enough room to snake our way up the hill to find the dirt path.

This was a fun trail as there were great views, some easy parts and some difficult parts. Despite what the person at the information booth said, we saw no trail markers anywhere. We just kept taking lefts at all the forks in the road and made it back to civilization intact.

As mentioned, there were lots of cows out there. There were barbed wire fences that kept them on the ranch and the cattle crossings on the roads kept them from roaming down any streets. They seemed used to people and just stared at us and then slowly walked into the brush. What do you think these two are thinking?

Painting the town.

The past few days, I joined Michael Chesley Johnson and a couple of his students in painting some of the beautiful landscape in the area. This week, Rob and Peter, both from Canada are participating in Michael's mentoring workshop. I will join them on a day to day basis. Rob and Peter are both oil painters. Rob is from Winnipeg and Peter is from Newfoundland. They were glad to get out of the "great white north" and into the comfortable Arizona weather. It is beautiful here now.

On Monday, we set up in a field at the base of Bear Mountain. We had a number of different vistas to choose from. Look in any direction and there was something to paint. We all were relatively close to each other so that Michael could visit us from time to time to offer his critique and/or suggestions. That was very helpful. Here are Rob and Peter set up at the base of the mountain.

On Tuesday, we decided to spend some time at Red Rock Crossing, where the icon red rock formation known as Cathedral Rock can be viewed. I'm sure some of you have seen pictures of this formation before. Normally, the creek that runs by it is fairly calm, but melting snow in Oak Creek Canyon has caused the creek to rise quite a bit. Here's Rob with one of his large canvases at the edge of the creek. You can see the rapids in the water. The rocks were backlit in the morning so one had to block in the shadows quickly so as not to chase the sun. In the afternoon, especially late afternoon, these rocks are flooded with light.


Michael paints with us. We can either watch him while he gets in his under painting (he allows about 30 minutes for that phase) or we can paint ourselves. As Michael gets to each phase of his painting, he will take a break to visit each of us to check on our progress. This is very helpful in getting us to the next phase too. We have enough time to just about finish a painting or, at least, get it to the point where we should let it sit for a bit. At Cathedral Rock, Peter was working on such a big canvas that the rest of us had time to start on a second painting. Here are a couple of rough photos of my work so far.














Tomorrow we will go to the town of Jerome, an old mining town hung off the side of the Mingus Mountains about 2o miles away. There should be great opportunities there. I'm really looking forward to it.

Broken Arrow Trail

Saturday morning we decided to take the Jeep out on another adventure. One of the most scenic trails in all of Az, according to our Off Road book, is the Broken Arrow trail that leads to a place called Chicken Point. We had been there before on a hike and had seen the Pink Jeep tours driving over the red rocks so we decided to give it a try. The first thing you run into is a wall of rocks at the very beginning of the trail. This is meant to discourage people in their rental cars from getting in over their heads. Once you get over that obstacle, you soon find yourself on a huge slab of red rock. We got out of the Jeep as we had the place to ourselves for a few minutes and we strolled around.

From this spot, there are great views into the canyon and then panoramic views across to the red rocks around Sedona. We were there in the morning, so the sun was shining on the formations towards Sedona and the rocks in the canyon were back lit with lots of nice shadows.


The guide books rate this trail a 7 of 10, mainly because of a very steep, ledgy slickrock hill. The trail itself is one-way and this stairway is near the end. You pass this end of the loop when the trail becomes one-way. You are advised to walk up part of the stairway to determine if you want to continue or not, because you will need to exit the trail by that stairway. Onward we plunged.

A bit further there is a side trail to a large sink hole called Devil's Dining Room. There is another such sink hole in town called the Devil's Kitchen. The sink holes are caused by water leeching thousands of feet down into the soil and finally eroding a layer of limestone deep under ground. Once the limestone leeches away, there is an empty space that needs to be filled. (Nature abhors a vacuum). The ceiling of that hole collapses, then the ceiling of the hole above collapses, and so on and so on until the last ceiling near the crust of the earth collapes causing the sink hole. Got that? This one is about 100 feet deep and you can see all the many layers that make up the red rock formations.


We left the Devil's Dining Room and ventured further up the trail. Soon we encountered a 4WD club called Flagstaff4Wheelers and decided to follow them. They seemed to be up to no good. We were the last of a parade of 13 Jeeps that made their way to Chicken Point where we were treated to a great view towards the Village of Oak Creek. From there we tagged along as they went to "play" before they were to head out for another trail.





As the trail was One-way, I had to follow them.

The first playground was up a slickrock, around the very top of a rock called, The Roundabout, and then to the exercise of climbing the rock in the photo on the right. Believe it or not, I made it up this rock with relative ease. I just put it in 4L and let it crawl. I had to goose it a bit a couple of times to get over the first few boulders, but once I had all 4 wheels on the big boulder, it went smoothly. The path I took was a bit different than the guy in the photo. I went up the light grey path where the two guys are taking pictures.

These guys were mostly young and crazy, except for their leader who was not young but was crazy. He wasn't satisfied with his playing until he just about got wedged in a groove between two boulders. He got out of this without a tow. Needless to say, I didn't try this particular stunt.

More Ramblings...

Some more things I just want to remember for myself...
We are starting to get into a bit of a routine. I am trying to do some painting in the morning and then, when the sun comes up over canyon walls, we will take our lunch and go for a hike.
I think I am finished with my view of Sugarloaf Mountain, on the left. I blocked in the painting from the same spot as Michael's pastel, below, and took a reference photo for the shadows, etc. I modified the original a bit and tried to follow the lights and darks from the photo. I'd say I'm done, at least for now. I'll let it percolate a bit and see if it needs anything else later.

I've got a couple of other paintings that are near done and I started another one yesterday morning.



But, yesterday, we decided to check out Palatki ruins. These are ruins that are built into the canyon walls and date from 900 years ago. They were inhabited by the Sinaqua (spanish for "without water") for a couple hundred years. There are lots of these ruins, in various condition, around the area. There are also pictographs that have been carbon dated to be 12,000 years old. I think I heard that correctly. It is a bit of a climb to get to the ruins, see photo.

But, once you get there, it is worth it. The docent was full of great information. He is a retired tennis court installer from Prescott and now works for the forest service as a guide. Most of what you see is the original walls of the home. They have repaired a few things but not much. The stones are held together with mud. The homes were completely sheltered by the overlay of the canyon so they never got wet. Otherwise, the "mortar" would have become mud again and the homes would have crumbled.


Tuesday afternoon, we decided to check out Fay Canyon. In some guide books it is noted as a "personal favorite" so it was worth checking out. They were right. It is an easy hike through a canyon that opens up a bit so you can see both sides. There are beautiful views around every bend in the trail. The trail winds through the canyon for about 1 1/4 miles until it reaches the end in a box canyon. At least, it looked like the end as there were huge blocks of rock that had fallen from the cliff walls blocking the way. At that point we turned around and took in the sites from the opposite direction.

When we left Fay Canyon, we had plenty of sunlight and time on our hands so we (I) decided to take one of the paths that lead off the dirt road for an adventure. We have a Forest Service map and a hand made map from one of the off-road places. So, we found a trail marked as FR152A (Forest Road 152A) and decided to give it a try. The forest service map rates the roads as Easy, Moderate, Difficult, Extreme. This trail started as Difficult and then became Extreme. But, when in Rome...

The first part was pretty difficult. We passed through open areas with lots of cows as well as ruts, rocks and arroyos. There were lots of dried up river beds we had to go down into and climb out of. After a while of struggling along this trail we took a break to enjoy the scenery.

The hand made map had a narrative telling when the Extreme part would begin.(Extreme definition from Forest Service map, "Not advisable for novice drivers. Maximum ground clearance, four-wheel drive, low gears required. Jacks and winches may be needed.") The difficult part ("Warning! Use at own risk", from the off-road map) began after an old cattle pen and loading ramp leftover from old cowboy movies that were filmed here. We hadn't seen the pen but figured we must have missed it somewhere along the way while concentrating on the driving. But, no, all of a sudden we came to the pen. We thought, What? That wasn't the hard part we just went through? Judy suggested we turn back but I didn't want to go over what we had just done, so we forged ahead. This part was much more difficult than the previous section. The first major obstacle to climb was a hill with huge boulders in the middle of the trail. The thing to think about in off-roading is making sure you can clear anything, so you try to get your wheels on high points so the under carriage clears the rocks. I drove up the side of the path with the left wheels on the slant of the path and the right wheels on the rocks. It was the first time I thought we might roll the Jeep. But, we recovered and made it to the next challenge.

There were many such challenges and I didn't think it could get any worse until we hit a very steep downhill into a riverbed. The map comment said, "..drops into "the gulch". Take a moment on each side of the gulch to appreciate what you are about to do and/or what you just did by driving through it." I'll add that this off road outfit rents the dune-buggy type 4 wheel drive vehicles. So, we took a second to appreciate what we were about to do. I thought this had to be "the gulch". But, wait.

Anyway we "serpentined" our way down the slope and started up the other side when I saw a Jeep from Pink Jeep in my rear view mirror. I felt better knowing that if we had any problems, another Jeep might pass by within a day or so. We had water and trail mix. I pulled off the path and let the Pink Jeep pass me. I thought I could profit by taking the same route, but they have bigger tires and more clearance than my Jeep so they don't have to be as picky abut the path. I kept it in sight so I could beep my horn for help if something happened. It was only 50 yds ahead of me when it stopped and then it dropped out of sight, bouncing from side to side as it disappeared from view. I got to the top of the hill and saw it picking its way down a slope that must have been 60 degrees with a equeal climb out on the other side. I had to follow as I was getting a bit nervous about being abandoned out there.

Once again, I made my way down the slope with Judy calling out the navigation over the boulders. There wasn't much room to maneuver as there was a wall on the left and a cliff on the right. I didn't think we would get hung up as it was so steep that I thought, even if I hit bottom, the momentum would carry me downhill. We only bottomed out a couple of times. Needless to say we made it. This was the famous "Gulch" from the map. I stopped to take one quick photo of the gulch before chasing down the Pink Jeep. I didn't want to stop for too long and lose sight of any potential resuce vehicle.

We caught up to the Pink Jeep as they took a break at the top of a trail to take in the panoramic view. We stopped for minute to catch our breath and then took off to finish the trail. The remainder was still difficult, but compared to the Gulch it was a piece of cake. When we got to the end, I pried my hands from the Steering wheel and Judy said, "I'm ready for a cappuccino." We both said that we need to take that trail again before we leave.

On the way back to Sedona, we took some photos of the big western sky. This is an expansive view we don't get to see too much in New England.

Notes from the back of an envelope...

Judy has been hankerin' for DQ since we hit the road a few weeks ago. Believe it or not, there is one on the windy road to Flagstaff in Oak Creek Canyon. So we decided to try a hike in a place called the West Fork to earn a sundae at DQ. The road climbs out of Sedona so the altitude is much higher than here so there is much more snow. The picture on the left gives you an idea of the scenery in the canyon. Double click on it to get the full effect. We didn't make it too far as there are a lot of creek crossings over logs and stones that are covered with ice and snow. We'll try it later in the season when it dries out a bit. There is a Zane Grey book about this canyon, The Call of the Canyon.

People have been asking what the house is like. We are pleased with it. Here are some pictures.

Here is the living room. We rearranged the furniture a bit to watch tv. Also, bought a cheap lamp for reading at night.

Here is the wonderful fireplace that we have used a couple of times. It adds a nice touch to the place. There are skylights above the beams with some overhead lighting, as well.

Here is a view of part of the kitchen and the dining area. Very bright and comfortable.

Here is my indoor studio. (Don't worry, Dave, everything is protected). I plan on being out more once the weather is more predictable.
We are in a nice, settled neighborhood. Very quiet. We can walk to most stores.
Dave Matthews, our landlord, has done an excellent job making his home comfortable for us. There is light pouring in from the many windows. There are french doors leading to back deck from the dining area and the master bedroom. All is well maintained and neat as a pin. The kitchen is well equipped so Judy is happy. Dave put in a DVR for us so we can tivo but I miss my big screen tv. Actually we are doing a lot of reading and planning on looking for a good jigsaw puzzle to start. Ah life is simple and good out here...Don't remind me about IRS or bills!

Weekend...

On Friday, Michael Johnson invited me to tag along with his workshop group as they were going to tackle Sugarloaf Mountain. Michael runs a "Mentoring" workshop where he paints with his students and offers help as needed. See his web page for more details. The students stay with Michael and they share meals together. So, there is time for critiques and general art discussion. There is also plenty of free time for them to enjoy the area on their own.

Michael was working in pastel that morning, so I mainly watched to see how he did things. He had a sheet of pastel paper taped to a panel with a sheet of glassene taped to it so it could cover his work. He used a 5x7 matte to trace on his sheet and then taped that off. We were looking at the shaded side of the mountain and the light was changing very quickly. He did a quick sketch to get the correct lights and darks and then had to work quickly to get things blocked in. Within an hour, he had a pretty complete work that he could finish in his studio or use as a study at a later date. (See Left)

After a while, I set up and blocked in a small oil painting which I am working on now.

He then demo'd the use of a pallette knife to do a small work. Ann Gorbett would have loved it. I did. It looked great. (See Right) He worked very quickly and layered in lots of paint. I promised myself I'd go out and pick up a pallette knife or two.


Thanks for including me, Michael.

Saturday morning, Judy and I decided to climb Sugarloaf. It is a fairly easy trail of only about a mile but it gets a little more difficult as you get towards the top. Judy got a phone call from her friend Lisa while on the trail. I tried to take a photo of how technology can keep up with us anywhere, but technology failed me. My camera battery was dead. I got that "I told you so." look from Judy as we both knew that I had a freshly charged backup battery on the table back at the ranch. Once you get to the top it is really worth it. I'll get some photos at a later date.

Later on Saturday, we drove to Camp Verde, about 40 miles away, for their Wine, Pecan and Antique festival. It was pretty folksy and I'm glad I went. It was held in the Community Center with local bands playing in some of the other town buildings. The admission got you into the antique fair and 6 "tastings" (plus a souvenir glass). We, mostly me, were able to taste a number of wines from Arizona. They weren't bad, but we didn't buy any. They were fairly expensive, $20-$35. Judy wanted to buy a pecan pie but we saw that they were being sold by the local super market, Bashas, so we took a pass. (We did manage to eat one slice, though)

But, Camp Verde is the site of a military camp dating from the 1870's. For $3 each, we toured the buildings and talked to one of the guides who gave us a demo of loading and firing a replica of a Civil War rifle. A "fast" soldier could load and fire 3 times in a minute. They had to rip open a cartridge with their teeth (teeth was one of the few requirements of soldiers), pour the powder down the barrel, jam the torn paper down and then put in the ball and finally, replace the firing pin to ignite it. He said they found a rifle at Gettysburg with 20 rounds jammed into the barrel.
They figured the soldier was too nervous and forgot to replace the firing pin. He just kept jamming more ammo in his rifle. The rifle would have exploded if he had fired it.

They also had some precision horsemanship drills performed by the Buffalo Soldiers brigade of Arizona. It was pretty impressive to get those horses to act in unison like that. All in all a pretty good couple of days.

Weather Reports

I've mentioned that the weather here has taken a turn for the worse, but that is relative. I snowed the other night but really wasn't much of a problem, although we heard today that school had been cancelled. Here is a picture of the rain in Sedona with some of the snow in the higher elevations.

While we were at the movies we got a couple of inches of wet snow. Saw Slumdog, go see it! Plus, if you buy a large popcorn, you take the bag home and get a free refill the next time. I'm there. But, I digress. The snow looked great in the morning. One thing that I found pretty interesting, which you may or may not, is how our dry arroyo filled up. Behind our house there is an arroyo that separates our neighborhood from the one behind us and is active when there is runnoff from Oak Creek. It has been dry since we got here. The other day, I looked in our back yard to the left and saw that there was water rushing through it. I quickly looked straight ahead and saw the beginning of the flood as it came through and saw the wave cut its way towards the right. So, we actually saw the "flashflood" as it began and made its way down the creek bed. It wasn't really much of a flood, but I thought it was cool to catch it happening. Not sure I described it well, but maybe you get the picture.

Anyway, when the sun does come out on the snowy red rocks, the sights are pretty mazing.

BTW, for you artists in the crowd, I added Michael Chesley Johnson's blog to this blog. There is a lot of good stuff about plein air painting.

Roast Javelina anyone?

Pulling into Bill's driveway the other day, I spotted some action in the bushes. I waited a minute a couple of families of javelinas/peccaries/sangliers/wild pigs came strutting out across the path. I guess they do a number on the foliage in the yard.

I read in wikepedia, so it must be true, that one way to tell the difference between these similar mammals is by examining their tusks. So, if you ever encounter one in the wild, just get it to say, "Ah!" and you determine where it came from.

Added a photo and video

I added a photo of some rock steps and a brief video to the Scouting out locations post below.

Secret Canyon

Yesterday afternoon, Judy and I went out with Bill and Sarah on another hike on a trail off of Dry Creek rd. It is called Secret Canyon. The first couple of miles on the trail are fairly easy so Judy had no problem. Bill and I went a bit further into the canyon before turning around and catching up with Judy and Sarah. Bill and I turned around near where the Dave Miller trail goes up to the top of one of the mesas. Dave was a local forest guy who disappeared on a hike a few years ago without a trace.

Anyway, I was looking for good spots for painting. There are plenty of good views but not always enough room to set up an easel or to step back to see the work in progress. Plus I was looking for places close to the thrailhead so I wouldn't have to walk too far with my gear. OK, I'm lazy.




We are expecting a few days of rain, so the Dry Creek rd may be impassable later on in the week. It is already in pretty bad shape. And the Dry Creek may have a lot of water in it too. We'll see. Here is another shot of the creek with some reflections.

Of course there are always places to get these great panoramic views. This was taken late in the afternoon.

Photos.....

BTW, you can click on the photos to see them in a larger size. The latest ones are pretty big, some of the earlier ones are smaller images.

Scouting out locations

Yesterday, my new set of pastels arrived. In case you don't know, the set is made up of a bunch of little chalky sticks. There are 80 different colors in the set. The trick is finding the right color to match what you are seeing. So, I got a little energy and decided to scout out some painting locations. One potential spot was on a trail off of Dry Creek rd. So we took the Jeep out for a ride in the late afternoon. I will be painting next week with Michael Johnson and this is one area he wanted to check out. There are a lot of great spots and plenty of places to pull the Jeep off the trail. Couldn't this picture be an ad for Jeep Wranglers? The book we have mentioned a side trail that was more difficult that led to an old cabin. So, when you see a fork in the road, take it. The first part was just a dirt road, then we hit Dry Creek, which wasn't dry, then had to go into 4WD low to rock crawl up the other side of the creek to an overlook where the cabin was. It was a blast. Only scraped bottom a couple of times. Here's a video of the climb. It doesn't really do it justice. But the picture below shows it's not always about the red rocks. We'll go back in the morning this week to check out the scenery in the early part of the day.

Finding the Indian ruin

On Thursday, Bill Sullivan and I went looking to find the trail to the old Indian ruin nestled in a cave up one of the mountains. We had been there before but the trail isn't easy to find. I wanted to go with him one more time so I could find the trail without him. I think some of you have seen the pictures of the remnants of the small adobe home before. It is really something. Most people respect the ruin and leave things intact. Sometimes people find little shards or arrow heads and just leave them on the bricks for others to see.



Anyway the trail up was more strenuous than I remembered or maybe we went at a faster pace than before. You have to follow a marked trail until a certain point when you look for an animal path ("where the old schoolhouse used to be"?) that is not that obvious. It is not marked at all. Once you work your way through the smallest hint of a path, you cross a dry creek and then find a trail that leads straight up over lots of slick rock. You have to be careful of cactus too. I slipped on a rock and banged my hand against a prickly pear and got about a dozen spines in the back of my hand. Most came out easily but a few needed a good tug. When we got to the top, it was well worth it. I love the picture, above, of the overhang we have to walk through. That's Bill walking along. You can see the dark spot in the distance where the cave is. Getting from the overhang to the actual cave is an ordeal too as you have to climb over/under manzanilla trees and roots and go hand over hand up a couple of rock faces. It makes coming down a challenge too. What a treat when you are there. Looking out over the valley is breathtaking.
We got back to Bill's place to have a beer and watch the sun set over the Fin. Those are the real colors.

Thought I'd post another picture from Schnebly Hill Rd.

On our first little road trip on Monday, we drove up Schnebly Hill rd in Sedona. It is only open halfway to its endpoint at this time of year, but we got some great views of the area anyway, see above. Schnebley was one of the original "founders" of Sedona and wanted to name the town after himself. The Postmaster said the name was too long so he named it after his wife, Sedona. Of course there had been many Indian tribes inhabiting the area for centuries before the Spanish and Americans showed up.

On the way up the hill I noticed a hiker I thought I recognized walking his dog. Sure enough, it was Michael Johnson, an artist I had met at the Sedona Art festival in October. He and his wife, Trina, are in Sedona for a few months and he will be conducting a number of workshops. Check out his website (http://www.michaelchesleyjohnson.com/ ). I hope to get out painting with him from time to time.

Crown King to Prescott

Yesterday, we took a long ride through the mountains of Central AZ to visit a couple of old mining towns. We started at the Bumble Bee exit from the highway and drove 15 miles on bumpy dirt roads to the first town of Cleator (top). It was a mining town of the early 1900's. Jimmy Cleator was from Isle of Man and went to sea as a 12 year old and ended up in Arizona at 30. I love those stories of people setting out for some place unknown and settling in these ungodly places. He bought into the mine here, then when he and his partner split up, he got the town and named it after himself.

Then more dirt, rocky, dusty roads to Crown King, (bottom photo), another old mining town. On the way we could see the remnants of railroad trestles and drove through cutouts in the mountains where tracks used to be. This town has about 100 year round people, a general store and a saloon. There is a one-room school house from K-8th grade with a total of 6 students. 4 were home with the flu when we stopped by. Guess they don't have flu shots in Crown King. The woman who ran the General Store was from Worcester, MA. She had moved to Phoenix 12 years ago and used to camp nearby, so she moved to Crown King 6 years ago. Pretty isolated place. It took us 2 hours to drive the 26 miles from highway to get there.

After that we headed to the town of Prescott through the Bradshaw mountains. Lots of rocks and fallen limbs in the dirt road. When they say "Watch out for falling rocks"( which they don't)they are not kidding. We had to drive over/around lots of them. Then the "trail" goes into a pretty wooded area where we ran into lots of snow and ice on the road. It was fun blasting through the snow/ice/mud. We drove through Crooke's Canyon. Crooke was a famous General who was put in charge of subduing the Apache, Navajo, etc in the southwest after having served in the same capacity in the plains. I'll post some photos of that trail a bit later.

During the day we encountered a lot of altitude changes. At the beginning we were at about 3500 feet above see level (metric people will have to make the conversion) where Saguaro cactus can grow then we went higher where we find prickly pear cactus, aligator junipers and creosote trees then up to 6000+ feet where we encountered the snow and the ponderosa pines. It is very interesting to see the vegetation change with the altitude changes.

Settling in

Even tho we are in a relative paradise, normal life must go on. I had my 12000 mile checkup yesterday in Cottonwood. We've put 3096 miles on the Jeep since we left home. Did some shopping to stock up the fridge and waited for the Cable Guy. Problems with cable exist everywhere. The guy did show up on time but left before things were really working. He said it will take a little while for the program guide to show up. 4 hours and 2 phone calls later it still hasn't shown up. I gotta wait for the cable guy again.

We drove up to the Sedon airport which is on the mesa behind our place. See photo. One of the best views of the area. That's Coffee Pot rock just above my huge head.

Today, we plan on taking a ride on the Schnebley Hill trail which is only open halfway until spring. Tomorrow, it is supposed to be great weather so we will take a backroad tour of some old mining towns near Prescott. I'll take a few photos.

Just so you don't think it is beautiful here all the time, we expect rain/snow starting friday for a couple of days. If my pastels arrive by then I'll have something to do indoors.

BTW, that was a great Super Bowl game the other day. Pretty exciting considering we had no real rooting interest in the game. Lots of big plays and action. We didn't really see the commercials but I've seen another one of the eTrade baby talking about his golf game. Those are really clever.

Gotta unpack now.

Finally made it...

We we finally made it. As expected, we didn't sleep too well so we got up early and were on the road by 6:15. The sun coming up behind us was blinding in the rear view mirror. I had to wait til an approaching truck threw a shadow on the Jeep before I could see anything. I stayed in the right lane until I had better visibility. Lots of casinos along the road that do pretty well with all the trucks going through. Saw some really long trains too. Despite the fact that we are crossing on an interstate, the scenery is still pretty beautiful. Not something one can see too many other places.

We finally got to the cutoff for Oak Creek Canyon about 11:45 and then made it to our place by 12:15. It is better than the photos we had. It is in a little neighborhood with a dry arroyo behind it. There are some nice trees in the yard and it occured to me that we will see them blossom before we come home.

Well, off to Bill and Sarah's house for the Super Bowl. Seems funny to be going in to watch a game on such a bright sunny afternoon.

Judy has her Terrible Towel and I am rooting for Curt Warner.

Ciao

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Being new at this myself, I thought I would help others add a comment.
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Tumblin', tumblin' Tumbleweed

Well we made it across Oklahoma, Texas and New Mexico today. It was a long and windy trek. There were very strong cross winds that blew a lot of tumbleweeds into the grill. And all those trucks, fuggedaboudit...

We got off I-40 from time to time to see what rte 66 was like. Lots of rundown gas stations and motels. Plus there were tons of rusted out cars, trucks and tractors and the odd school bus. It's amazing how these vehicles are left to rot on the side of the road. We saw lots of horse farms and cattle ranches. There was a sort of olfactory Doppler affect as we could smell them before we saw them and after we passed them.

Tomorrow, finally off to Sedona. We picked up another hour heading west today, so chances are we'll be up early. If so, we'll get on the road at the crack of dawn and arrive in the early afternoon.

Penultimate Leg

No Andrew Jackson sightings so far today. Maybe I'll find a $20 bill in the parking lot. Googlemaps says we have 452 miles to Albuquerque today. 451 are on I-40. We cross all of Oklahoma, the top part of Texas and half of New Mexico. Should be a smooth ride.
If Obama wants to put some money into infrastructure, he could start with I-40, especially in Arkansas. What a mess. Maybe some of the potholes were due to the ice storm, don't know. But it could use some work. Lincoln's campaign platform was pushing infrastructure improvements too. Back then it was canals and railroads. Today it's the interstates and bridges. We are seeing a lot that could use some work.

This is weird...

One more coincidence. This morning in the breakfast room I picked up an old Newsweek from November 08. When I opened it I found a big article about Andrew Jackson and what affect his presidency has on current day politics. Other than being on a $20 bill, I never knew that much about him, now I can't stop seeing him everywhere... OK, enough about Old Hickory.

Walking in Memphis

Well, we made it to Memphis today. It was a long day as we did 636 miles. It would have been pretty tough in bad weather as a lot of the route went through the Great Smokey Mountains. Luckily, we had some good eats on the way. See photo.

On a coincidental note, our friend, Sandy, gave me the audio book, The American Lion, about the presidency of Andrew Jackson, which we have been listening to on the trip. He was born in Waxhaw, NC, the town NEXT to my sister's town and we passed by The Hermitage, Jackson's homestead in Nashville, today. It was closed. Pretty weird, eh?

Not so fast...

After wishing Jimmy Wilfong "good luck" with his exams, we left Scranton and headed to my sister's home in Charlotte, NC. We always have a good time with Curt and Terry and their family. We planned on one day in Charlotte, but this winter storm moving across the south has forced us to rethink things. We are staying here another day and will head west on thursday when the sun comes out again. Thanks for those phone calls of concern from our friends.

Off and Running, sort of....

Hi everyone,This is the first entry in my first blog. When we decided to take this trip to Sedona, the land of the Red Rocks, many people asked us to keep them informed of what was going on. So, at the insistence of some friends, I decided to create this blog for myself as well as anyone else who might be interested.

We started our trip on the 24th of January. We made it as far as Scranton PA where we are visiting our cousin who is a sophomore at the U of Scranton. His family from NJ joined us for a couple days in the land of Dunder-Mifflin Paper Co. That's all I have to say about Scranton. Coincidentally, we have already stayed at this Fairfield Inn one other time in the past on our way south. What are the odds of being in Scranton twice, let alone staying at the same hotel.

As for other news at the moment, Judy has had a sore ankle since she twisted it last summer, walking in sand. Well, she finally went to the doctor and had an X-ray and MRI. She has a longitudinal tear in a tendon in her ankle which will require surgery. It is the ankle on her "good" leg, so that one will be out of order for a few months once we decide when to have the surgery. That will be after we get back from Sedona. She should be able to hike on some of the trails she would have been able to hike on considering her bad left knee. Our cousin, here in Scranton, is studying to be a Physical Therapist. He may take Judy on as a sophomore project.

Well, that's for now. I'm going to see how this looks and what other options I have in this blog.