Labor Day Monumental Excursion

Having gone for a two-mile run around the neighborhood yesterday morning and successfully survived that ordeal, I tossed my digital camera into my car and put it in gear pointed to the east. My route took me through the mining town of Bisbee and out across the flat almost to Douglas, then north on Arizona 191 where I came to the turn-off for the Chiricahua National Monument. I hadn't been to the monument in nine years so I decided to spend a couple hours up there doing my "bear went over the mountain...to see what he could see" routine. I saw quite a bit.

While the rock formations are grand and awe-inspiring and the visitors center is well stocked with interpretive displays of geology and wildlife and books, the most interesting thing to me was the campground. Two things in particular stood out to me. First, the 55-gallon drums painted black with a hole cut in the side near the top and labeled in white paint: ASHES ONLY. These are for campfire ashes to help in preventing forest fires. Second were footlocker sized red metal boxes labeled "FOOD CONTAINER". This must be to keep food away from the local animals which include bears, mountain lions, javelinas (wild boars), birds, rodents, etc. I like both of these ideas for containers and wonder if they are in use in Montana, as well. If not, it might be a good idea for campgrounds in Montana to implement such features to assist campers in having a safe and fun time.

For it being Labor Day afternoon there were not many people at the monument which has a roadway that winds up into the canyons and has three main parking lots with overlooks and hiking trails. That is, it wasn't crowded but then most people had to work the next day (today) so they wouldn't be camping anymore and would have been headed home. I encountered four families/groups of people and two of the four were in bad moods...that is, the parents and their kids were having verbal battles in the hot sun after huffing and puffing up and down the trails. Even I got dehydrated. Though I drank a lot of water the sun really did a number on me and I got a nasty headache. But at least I didn't fight with my parents and if I have any children, I sure don't know about them.

On the way through the rest of my afternoon roadtrip route, I saw the highway literally moving! So I pulled to the roadside and discovered it was literally thousands of caterpillars going from one side of the highway to the other. It was quite a migration to say the least! Not all make it across as car tires have a way of mashing caterpillars.

The other interesting part of my trip was that I was retracing (from Pinery Road all the way to Benson) a portion of the clockwise route of William Least Heat Moon's journey around the USA which he documented in the best seller BLUE HIGHWAYS published in the early 1980s. I'm reading the book right now and it looks like the sort of book I would write: jump in a vehicle with limited money, a camera, and a notebook and tape recorder...head out across the nation...via mainly non-interstate highways...and write a book about it. Think a publisher would go for it? I wonder how many of these blogs are being done in that fashion...by roadtrippers? I'll check into it. It could fund my retirement.

Want to come with me?

Note: From a caterpillar's point of view, the highways might all be blue!