We stayed last night at City of Rocks State park. An interesting place. It is a mini-Joshua Tree National Park. A few acres of boulders in the middle of the desert. You can see them in the distance in the next three photos.
We go to state parks when we need water and showers. And this one was close to the Gila National Forest, where we planned to spend several days.
The drive the next morning was only about 70 miles, but it took us two hours. Another winding pass over some mountains, necessitating driving in first gear at several points. I really don't like this type of driving. Makes me a bit anxious.
But it surely was beautiful.
In some parts of the road the rocks were so close that I was afraid we might hit them with the camper.
We located a campground that seemed close to a lot of hikes and also close to the cliff dwellings-- the lower area of the Forks Campground. It is very primitive--has pit toilets and nothing else, including trash cans or required payment. You sort of camp where you want to, so, perhaps foolishly (and we will find out in a few days), we chose a spot by the river that necessitated a rough ride down a steep road. This part of the campground is not open to trailers and is not recommended for rigs over 20 feet (we are 21 feet). I hope that when it is time to drive out that I can negotiate the rocks and holes and not have to find some guy with a 4 x 4 to pull us out.
We will see. That's part of the adventure I guess.
After we removed the camper we drove to the visitor's center for the cliff dwellings and got information on the area and hikes. Since it was later than we usually get started, we chose what appeared to be an easy 4.5 mile hike called the Stock Bypass Loop.
And it was easy, at least until I was attacked by a couple of German Shepard Mixes while crossing a stream.
The hike was different than what we had seen in the past couple of weeks. It was, once again, more of a desert, dry. But we were enjoying it.
Can you see Vicky along the side of the hill?
Can you see me?
We found, to our surprise, that we had to do a couple of stream crossings.
I did not have on the appropriate footwear, but was inching over the stream when all a sudden I was attacked by two large dogs. I was balanced on two rocks so couldn't use my poles to push them away, but they were nipping at my leg, growling, and baring their teeth. I was yelling at them, to no avail, I jumped to the other side, and they turned and came at me again, growling and snapping at me.
The owner was not in sight. By this time I had my bear spray out and the next time one came at me he got a blast right in his face. Stopped him dead. By this time, up the trail, we could see the owners, running toward us, each with a leash. The dogs were not under their verbal control. The one poor dog that got it in the face was in the stream, presumably trying to wash the spray off.
And the owners got an earful from me. Dogs are supposed to be leashed on trails.
Where we hike there are usually bears and mountain lions. There are warnings at just about every trail head about them. We both carry bear spray in the very unlikely event that we will encounter one of these wild animals and can't avoid it by backing slowly away (which I did the one time I encountered a bear on a trail, and which is the recommended course of action).
But instead, I am forced to use the very powerful bear spray on an ill mannered dog who was not controlled adequately by its owner. The dog was just doing what it was bred and taught to do, and I feel bad about hurting it. It was the owner who frankly deserved to be sitting in the river washing out his eyes. But if I had been a young child crossing that stream I could have lost my composure and perhaps fallen or perhaps started running which would have engaged these two dogs' pack hunting instincts.
I filled out an incident report at the ranger station.
Generators and dogs on hiking trails--my two biggest problems with camping.
We are excited about staying here, and hiking in this area for a few days. We hope it will be fun, but it doesn't need to be as exciting as it was today.
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