Joshua Tree National Park

Just before leaving Stanton the cactus really started blooming in earnest. Here’s a picture of the prickly pear flowers, a weird combination of yellow and peach that would look terrible in home décor. Also, I just caught a few saguaro cactus beginning to bloom – it looked like they had a bad case of acne when the buds appeared on their tops, then poof, out pops a beautiful white flower! Joshua Tree National Park flowers were just beginning to fade when we arrived. This hummingbird was so fast that I was really surprised to catch it with my camera – it was attacking the bright red ocotillo flowers. Our most hated cactus, the jumping cholla, actually bloomed with delicate little green flowers, which the ranger said didn’t even produce new plants. The big surprise with Joshua Tree National Park was the rocks. I had no idea they were such a presence here. Take a look at the wall of rocks behind the Joshua trees with all the flowers in the foreground. These trees take on fantastic shapes, like the one wrapped around Ron’s pickup. We camped right among all these rocks, which everyone was happily climbing, including me to take this picture! Skull Rock sort of looks like a skull, there is an awesome hike right from our campsite to it with interpretive signs for the plants along the way. I love the beavertail cactus, the flowers are so delicate and pink! for such a prickly thing. Ron and I took a ranger-led hike to the 49 Palms Oasis, where one of the group took our picture together. The orchid there was so fragile, there in the wicked dry desert heat, the only thing that supports it is water! These two lizards seemed to say, “Honey, let’s hang out together on the rocks this afternoon!” as were lots of other lizards catching the sun’s rays. Some of the flowers were turning to seed, like these green globs. The rocks were just glowing at sunset, and their shapes were fantastic. I am amazed how a round rock like the one in this picture can balance in this spot. What an amazing place!

Ron found GOLD!

Not much new, except for the very exciting fact that Ron finally found his first little gold nuggets with his Minelab metal detector! We are camped by Stanton, AZ. It was hot and windy, so windy that it was hard to stand up. Ron decided to change headphones and tweaked his machine a little in the process, and then ta-da, he found the beautiful little nugget that looks like gold is just poured around the host quartz rock! He was very excited, as that represented a milestone and a lot of hard work! The next morning he had breakfast, walked 25 feet out the camper door, put his detector on some rocks and got another hit! The little nugget with a black eye was just sitting there on top of the ground, waiting for someone to capture it! After working the area a little, he called me over to listen to another target he had nearby, and I used the White detector on it and dug up the 3rd little nugget. When I cleaned it, a piece broke off, thus the 4th little nugget. So he has finally found gold here in Arizona, a happy day! I also fulfilled one of my goals for this trip – I finally saw javelinas, a pig-type animal of the desert. When I saw them, they took off faster than I could get the camera out. But I did get the back end and tail of one – he zoomed up the hill and put his head into the tree, using the “I can’t see you so you can’t see me” camouflage technique. I think they are cute, although bigger than I thought – the ones I saw were barnyard pig-sized. I also took this beetle’s picture – such awesome colors he has! The prickly pear (beavertail) cactus is just starting to bloom. I can’t wait for them to have flowers arranged all along their edges! And the moonflower smells just like a lily, so beautiful!

Eureka!

Stanton, Arizona, is a ghost town that seems to center around hobby gold mining. It is about 30 miles north of Wickenburg (which is about 30 miles northwest of Phoenix). People are bustling about on ATVs, pickups or jeeps on the rough roads, swinging metal detectors or throwing dirt into a dry washer. The cow in this picture seems content enough, but when we first arrived there wasn’t enough grass so the cows were throwing their heads into the air, trying to swallow the prickly pear cactus, spines and all! Here is a picture of the demolished cactus. I hiked to this cross erected on the top of one of Rich Hill’s shoulders, supposedly by the Spanish conquistadors, as one of our neighbors told me. However, it turned out to have steel cables holding it up and white peeling paint, which makes me think it is 1930’s or 1950’s vintage. We stayed by Octave, actually a flat area with a lot of junk left from the residents of the 1880’s, but no buildings left. One of the barrel cactus started blooming before we left, a bright red with yellow stamens that almost looked plastic! White daisy-like plants are everywhere, just covered with blossoms. Next we decided to check out the gold claims in the Black Canyon, straight north of Phoenix about 30 miles. Of course, this big Gila Monster lives right by our trailer, along with a not-so-friendly rattlesnake that I met about ¼ mile away. The area is filled with mines and flowers – here’s a view. Ron and I took on a very rugged ride on the ATV; this stretch really was a challenge, but we made it (we ended up getting off and I pushed while Ron walked alongside and ran the accelerator). I don’t know what this white flower is, but it was so pretty down by the stream in the desert! So yesterday I decided to dig in the bedrock crevices by the stream, and lo and behold, my first good-sized nugget! Here I am with my gold and here it is – very flat! I am excited, it was so fun to see it appear as I panned the material away from it. Finally – gold!

March in the desert

March found us traveling from the Little San Domingo Wash by Wickenburg to Quartzsite, and then back to Stanton, north of Wickenburg. Our new friends, Bob and Blanche, are from Oregon and were camped by us at Stanton then Wickenburg. Bob is very lucky as he suffered lung blood clots when they arrived at Wickenburg, but because they were close to the hospital in Sun City he was able to get immediate treatment and is doing well now. The metal detector club in Quartzsite had a coin shoot while we were there. We all stood around a football field and started looking for 8,100 coins at the sound of the horn. Ron and I won a gold nugget and found about 100 coins between the two of us. What a hoot! Bob and Blanche had fun, too, as Bob found more coins than all of us and also won a big nugget! The next day we went to Yuma to shop and stopped over to Algodones, Mexico – thought you might enjoy seeing the prices of meds there. Of course, flowers were blooming in Quartzsite, too – here are a few pictures of them. Back here at Rich Hill by Stanton there are different flowers blooming than in either San Domingo Wash or Quartzsite. Ron found a horned toad while metal detecting. And of course, I had to take a picture of cat claw – this stuff is almost as wicked as jumping cholla, the thorns are razor sharp and curved; Ron says it feels like putting your hand into a basket of newborn kittens who are all stirred up and yowling. He certainly has the scars to show for it!

Little San Domingo Wash

Southeast of Wickenburg is a gold district named San Domingo. We have been camped in the desert by the wash, watching spring arrive. Everywhere you look, there are Mexican poppies – Ron took my picture as I sat in them! The Gila Monster slowly waddled his way through the wash, allowing me to follow him with the camera. His little scales look like smooth beads. Although he is poisonous, he is SLOW and only if I stuck my hand in his mouth would he be able to get me. The other night a wild burro stood outside the camper and brayed, ruining my beauty sleep (and scaring me to death!) They must have really impressed the desert dwellers, because someone made a silhouette of a burro out of sheet metal and stuck it on a high hill. I decided to hike up to it to investigate – it had lots of graffiti dated back to 1975 and plenty of shotgun holes. Actually, it rather looks like a moose to me. Our camper is in the background. Here are a few more flower pictures. I looked up their names – the white one is desert chicory, blue one is a desert lupine, the yellow is called fiddleneck, the red is owl clover, and the pink is fairy duster. Yesterday I climbed up to a mine area which was just covered with poppies and purple flowers – here is a picture from the top. I could see to Wickenburg, a dust devil on the plains far to the west, and even 50 miles to Phoenix skyscrapers. An amazing place!