The drive out to California was relatively tame, considering how much driving we endured. The mere act of driving through mountains is kind of exceptional for a bunch of Minnesotans, so I guess I’ll mention that. In my opinion, driving 30+ hours virtually nonstop in a Dodge Caravan with 200,000 miles on it is also noteworthy. We stopped by Logan, Utah, in order to visit Eric’s friend Allen. Driving through the
snow-covered mountains of Utah was worrisome at times, but the most exciting incident that occurred on that portion of the drive was when we saw two moose. Actually, that was pretty bangarang, because moose are BOMB. Yes.When we got to Palo Alto, Eric, Dave, and I crashed in the hotel room in which Carrie’s family was staying. Luckily, it was a dog-friendly hotel, so the dogs were able to come inside with us. We took a lengthy nap, and we ate a decent breakfast delivered by Carrie and her kin. Mesquite and I briefly shared an elevator with one of the hotel’s cleaning staff, who was apparently terrified of big dogs. I’d never heard a grown person whimper before!
Having added Carrie to our party, we decided to enjoy California for a bit longer before starting the drive to Arizona. We jaunted over to San Gregorio Beach, greatly enjoying the weather and the landscape on the way. Dogs were not allowed on the beach, so we ambled around the hills a bit before sticking the canids back in the car
so we hominids could walk around the beach. Yes, the windows were rolled down a safe amount and they had water. Anyway, we found it entertaining how clothed the Californians were compared to us. Some locals were completely covered, including jackets and Ugg boots – Minnesotans consider this appropriate garb for December, when it’s about ten degrees outside. Meanwhile, we were hopping around in t-shirts and shorts (or, in my case, spandex capris). While hopping around the beach we found a sick cormorant and told the park management about it. We pretty much headed straight to Arizona after finishing our visit to San Gregorio. Much of our driving occurred during the night and was uneventful, though we did have one run-in with the police around Los Angeles. We accidentally – well, obviously we wouldn’t do this on purpose – cut off a state trooper on the freeway. He pulled us over, of course, but didn’t give us a ticket apparently because it would take too long. Luckily for us, he was late for dinner.
We pulled into Carefree, Arizona, around 09:00 on Monday, March 15. A much-needed breakfast consisted of bagels, omelettes, and coffee from the C4 (Cave Creek Coffee Company). The café provided us the last slivers of civilization we’d encounter for many days, for after we finished breakfast we drove right out to the ranger station for the Tonto National Forest. Or at least we tried to drive there directly; it actually took us about half an hour to find it. I guess we didn’t expect find the station outside of the forest itself. Upon visiting the station we learned that the Mazatzal Wilderness area, where we had originally planned to hike, was basically inaccessible. In order to enter Mazatzal, we would have had to cross Tango Creek, which at the time had waters moving at speeds impassable by Dodge Caravan. So we decided to hike trails branching from the Bronco Trail Head, which was only a ten minute drive into the forest. This turned out to be a good decision for our group. We had shorter distances to hike and more water sources around the Bronco trails than we would have in Mazatzal. Both good things, since only Eric and Carrie had a decent amount of hiking experience and we also had our dogs with us.
Our first day was short since we didn’t get started until about 12:00. We hiked about four miles over hilly terrain and moderately rocky trails. We paused frequently for the dogs to rest; coming directly from Minnesota, they weren’t yet acclimated to the warmth of desert. A sizeable pond provided us with a nice spot for a long break halfway through our hike. For me, an Arizona noob, it was a pleasant surprise to find a pond in the desert. Mesquite and I waded around while Rocky valiantly tried – and failed – to resist Eric’s attempts to get him into the water. Bringing dogs along can add a lot of hassle to a hiking trip, but the pups are so entertaining that they more than make up for the extra accommodations they need.
Monday also brought some interesting sights, including a cougar paw print, a mystery skeleton (bear or mule deer?), lizards, ravens, and large flocks of quail. Though I saw dozens of tiny lizards throughout the trip, on Monday I saw what I'm pretty sure was a large Clark's Spiny Lizard. That night we camped in a place that came to be called “The Valley of Eternal Winter.” It was pleasant enough, at first: campfire, a creek nearby, soft ground that was nice for sleeping. We did, in fact, sleep very well, until about 06:00 when we all nearly froze to death. Our 
inexperience with desert camping had led us to believe that a valley, sheltered from the sun for much of the day, would be a comfortable place to camp. We were so cold Tuesday morning that we didn’t start hiking until the sun hit our campsite at 10:00, even though we started crawling out of our tents just a bit after 07:00. Now I know what reptiles feel like every day.Tuesday eventually became a warm and enjoyable day. We hiked about seven miles over very hilly and rocky terrain that made travel difficult but granted us some spectacular vistas. At the end of the day we again found ourselves camping next to a creek in a valley, but this valley was much wider and warmer than the last. It was here where we realized that the “forest” part of “Tonto National Forest” referred not to trees, but to saguaro cacti. They were about as thick as I can imagine cacti can be, and until Friday they remained a common sight, unlike trees. A large portion of the cactus population we encountered were likely over 50 years old. And at least one of them looked like Beaker, the Muppet.
For me, the memories of Wednesday have become kind of fuzzy. This is because Wednesday is when Mesquite Licked the Toad. I do remember that Carrie got a cactus spine stuck in her leg and that we traveled through a lot of hills and cacti and over a lot of rocks and streams. About halfway through the day our trail began following a sizeable wash up a hill, and in this wash rested a Colorado River Toad. Mesquite saw the toad had picked it up in her mouth, and had spat it out before I had even seen the critter. About an hour later she became disoriented, wandering off the trail and stumbling over rocks (both are very out of character for Mesquite). I put her at heel and guided her through the rest of the day's hike. When we reached camp around 16:00 she fell asleep and continued sleeping until the following morning. When she woke she had a slightly swollen, discolored tongue and was exuding a truly
disgusting amount of foam from her mouth. Small amounts of skin began sloughing off her tongue, and her breath STANK. Fortunately, she kept eating and drinking normally throughout her ordeal. Unfortunately, off-trail shortcuts weren't really an option for us. Short of calling in a helicopter rescue, the quickest way out of the wilderness was the way we were already planning to hike. So, on Thursday I took her pack and put it in mine. She still had to walk, but at least she wasn't carrying any weight.We covered about 9 miles on Thursday. Mesquite was functional but obviously still sick; she spent most of the day at my side, instead of pulling me in the canicross-based setup we usually use. Despite my constant fear that my dog would keel over, it was a very enjoyable day. The hiking continued to be beautiful. We saw lots of tiny lizards, some more quail, and a Zone-Tailed Hawk which followed us, calling, for about a half mile. About midday our trail began to follow a stream, and that's when things started to get really interesting. First, we encountered another one of those infernal toads,
though luckily no dog-toad contact occurred. Second, we somehow lost the trail. Generally, we weren't too worried about this, though I was a bit concerned about putting Mesquite through extra, unnecessary miles. We had a GPS with us, and we knew that the trail intersected the stream about a half-mile from where we lost it. We weren't concerned about getting completely lost, so we decided to simply hike along the waterway until we found the trail. After about 15 minutes of venturing along the creek bed (which was rapidly turning into a small canyon) we heard a MOO. Further investigation led to the discovery of a group of four semi-feral cattle: one calf, two yearlings, and their very angry mother. Arizona has open-range laws, allowing ranchers to turn their cattle loose in areas like Tonto to graze for the
winter months. The ranchers gather them up again in the spring. These particular cattle were blocking our way up the stream, so Eric went to dislodge them from their resting spot while Carrie, Dave, and I tried to make ourselves and the dogs look like small, non-threatening things against one side of the canyon. It is very difficult to make an Elkhound and an Akita shut up while irritated semi-wild cows run past; we did not succeed. Though Carrie received some serious bruises and scratches from holding a super-excited Rocky, I'm glad we had the dogs with us. Their barking likely contributed to the mama cow's decision to leave us alone instead of crushing one of us against the rocks as she ran past. With the bovine obstacle removed, we continued up the stream only to find our way blocked by a twenty-foot waterfall. So, not only were the cattle basically feral, they were also trapped between a waterfall and a group of hikers. I'm sure the cows felt threatened in that situation, but we were definitely the ones in danger! Anyway, we turned around and started hiking back to where we knew the trail was located, only to find the crossing we had been looking for right at the location where we had heard the first MOO. We followed the trail out of the canyon and found ourselves on the same trail that the cattle had taken! We ran into them occasionally for the next two hours until finally losing them late in the
afternoon. We camped on soil covered by small rocks and tiny flowers that stained EVERYTHING purple. We heard the howling of a distant pack of coyotes before turning in, and during the night a mystery creature explored our camp, but both of these incidents only caused our dogs to bark and growl a bit - nothing more, thank goodness!Friday's hiking was cake. Though we woke at 07:00 under the shadows of threatening rain clouds, we never saw a drop of precipitation. Mesquite was feeling better and returned to performing part of her usual hiking duties - pulling me. Everyone in the group was feeling good that day, so we virtually flew through the last four miles back to the trail head. We chatted with some other travelers in the Bronco Trail Head parking lot while we repacked Lucy (the minivan). These other travelers were native Arizonians doing some horseback riding in the area. They were familiar with Colorado River Toads and, to my great relief, informed us that Mesquite would probably pull through. Nevertheless, I did check in by phone with a vet in Phoenix: Deer Creek Animal Hospital. They were really a great help, even though I never set foot in their clinic!
We stopped once more at the Cave Creek Coffee Company to have breakfast, and were on the road again by 11:30 Friday morning. Alexis, Carrie's friend who happened to also
be visiting Arizona, allowed us to take showers at her parents' place. For this she gets 1,000,000 karma points. After getting rid of our stench, we started on the long drive back to Minnesota. The drive back was fairly dull, save for two events. First, we were waylaid in Santa Fe for a few hours due to a "blizzard" which closed both I-25 and I-40. Now, a blizzard by the standards used in New Mexico is not a blizzard by Minnesotan standards. I'm not even sure there's a procedure for closing freeways in Minnesota, because weather that would prompt a freeway closing here would be so terrible that people would literally be unable to leave their homes. It would be the type of blizzard that Laura Ignalls Wilder wrote about: the kind where you need a rope to find your way back to the house from the barn. The weather around Santa Fe was not this bad. However, nobody bought the argument that we presented - "It's okay, we're from Minnesota!" - so we napped in a Wal-Mart parking lot for a couple hours until they opened the roads again.The weather in Santa Fe caused us to be late for a rendezvous in Denver, but despite our tardiness we were still able to meet up with The Famously Esteemed Matt Swenson in Denver, Colorado. My ninja skills must be more highly developed than his, because I was able to locate The Famously Esteemed Matt Swenson despite his attempts to conceal himself amongst parked cars. I should continue to call him The Famously Esteemed Matt Swenson because I know it will cause him to shake his head in annoyance if and when he reads this, but it's too much work. I keep having to reread it when I go back and edit. Anyway, Matt joined our road-weary crew for lunch at Proto's Pizza. The pizza was delicious and the service was fantastic. Eric gave our server a 20% tip, which I've only known him to do maybe two other times EVER, and also means that I should probably mention the restaurant.
We said goodbye to Matt after lunch and got back on the road. We basically drove nonstop from Denver to Stillwater, where we took a break at Carrie's house before saying goodbye to her. Then it was back to Duluth. There may still be snow in Santa Fe, but almost none to be found here. It's so nice here that I feel I should go do something outside. Maybe I'll go for a hike!
One final note: the entire collection of photos I took on this trip are available for viewing here.
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