Rattlesnakes! Rattlesnakes! Rattlesnakes!

We camped for a few days this past week. We did something relatively unusual for us--we camped in a spot where we had previously camped.

But it was close to home, and we could get a cell signal (something we needed for the current Covid-19 crisis).  And we knew we would have good hiking, even if we had hiked the area quite a bit.

The biggest news about this trip was the number of (VERY LARGE) rattlesnakes we ran into on our hikes.  After we spotted them, we dug out our snake gaiters and used them.

We could tell they were practicing social distancing like we were because they insisted we stay 6 feet away from them.  We gladly obliged:

 

We need Audie Murphy

Audie Murphy was the most decorated soldier in WWII.  What he did was nothing short of amazing, and unbelievable.  If you didn’t know about it, Google him.  He was a 19-year-old boy.  He didn’t get his Medal of Honor like the murderers at Wounded Knee did.  He was practically a one man army protecting his squad at the risk of certain death.

After the war he became a movie actor.  He was never a top star.  Mostly he was a B movie western actor.

But he had this gentle, sweet manor about him that, all of these years later, we find appealing, and comforting.

He spent his post war years suffering from PTSD, and died young in an airplane accident.  We read once that next to Kennedy’s, his grave is a the most frequently visited site at Arlington.

We have tried watching current movies to get us through these times, and finally said “We need a 50s Western with Audie Murphy.”  So two nights ago we watched Walk the Proud Land, a story about an Apache Indian Reservation Agent, based on a true story.  Audie Murphy, all 5 foot 6 inches of him, carried the story about a man who tried to help the Apaches and who treated them with dignity.

And last night we watched Kansas Raiders, a highly “creative” story about Quantrill’s Raiders.  Audie Murphy plays, of all people, Jesse James, as a member if the Raiders who was horrified at Quantrill’s brutality.  He was the most gentle and kind Jesse James you could imagine.  The producers just couldn’t cast Murphy as the killer Jesse James really was.  Stupid movie, but once again he was just nice to watch.

He was also, to be fair, in some much better Westerns—Night Passage, The Unforgiven, etc.  Then there was the movie about his war experiences—To Hell and Back.  It was first class, but what he did was actually, true to form for him, understated in the movie.

When Medal of Honor recipients had their graves redecorated with fancier emblems, Murphy's family requested his not be.  They said he would have wanted the simpler, more low-key design.

We need heroes like him right now.  It is too bad he isn’t President.

Self-quarantine: Life goes on. We celebrate knowing each other 9 years

As we always do to celebrate anniversaries, we had fondue.  Don't know why we started that tradition.

This was the anniversary of when we first met, at a dance.

I walked up behind her and said:  "Can I have a dance?"

 

I had danced a few years more than she had, but I threw several new moves at her, in a gentle way.  She caught all of them.

After the dance, she said (and this is recorded in history as the first thing she ever said to me);

"I'm on the right foot!"

Self-quarantine

Both of us had the fortune of working in data-driven professions:  Vicky in law enforcement and me in Psychology.

This history does not allow us to form our own opinions about matters based upon how we "feel" about them, or upon how any political figure or celebrity "feels" about them.

The data from the 1918 flu are clear:  communities that restricted movement and connections among people suffered far fewer cases.

So we have decided to go into self-quarantine.

Starting earlier this week, we have adopted the following policies:

1.  We go to no public places

2.  We go outside only to walk, hike or cycle

3.  We touch nothing outside our home

4.  We wash our hands frequently (the evidence is that washing hands is much more effective than using hand sanitizer......and good soap is still readily available)

5.  Last week we stocked up on food.

6.  Anything else we need comes from Amazon deliveries.

7.  Any mail or Amazon deliveries are handled as if they are contaminated, although we trust the USPS and Amazon as much as we trust ourselves to be careful.  So, we let packages and mail sit for awhile before opening them, and then we open them outside, put the trash into our can, and then wash our hands.

Last week we purchased food.  We stocked up, but aren't doing the thing of buying so much that other people won't have enough.  We bought food we know we will use.

Because of our experience camping we have the advantage of knowing we can live for long periods of time without contact with anyone.  At times we have camped in one spot for two weeks and been fine.  We are basically just doing that except in our own home.

We hope everyone will practice social distancing to the extent that they can.  Giving up recreation and social activities is something everyone can do, but stopping work isn't something everyone can do.

What we see where we live is that some people take that idea seriously and others believe that it is "hysteria."

We feel it is doing our part so that those families that depend upon family members continuing to work will be safer, and they can still work.

We feel very helpless, but this makes us feel we are doing something, small as it is, not just for ourselves but also for everyone.

One thing we didn't need to stock up on:  Wine.  We already had enough!

Camping in the Littlehorn Mountains desert wilderness: Beauty and mystery in Mystery Valley

We went camping in the Littlehorn Mountains east of KOFA Wildlife Refuge.  It was a real test of our Rat (Toyota 4Runner) and Quail (Teardrop camper that follows behind).  Some of the roads were steep, rough, and narrow. 

We had an hour and a half of off-road travel, on roads where we saw only one other vehicle all of the time we were there (a Jeep....plus a few OHVs).

Everything performed admirably.

We got some more "desert pin stripes" on both the Rat and the Quail.  The sleeping quarters for the Quail are very narrow, barely larger than a twin bed (not a typo--not even close to a double bed size).  But if we had chosen a unit a foot wider then there are some places where we simply shouldn't try to take it. 

We needed to use 4-wheel drive to get in and out of the area.  The 4Runner was also a terrific choice.  It will go almost anywhere an OHV can go, but is a real car--one you can drive to the grocery store and look good in it (well, sans the pin stripes, I guess).

Here is our campsite.  It was beautiful.  As we said, almost nobody around.  A few OHVs is all, so in the 3-4 days we were there we were interrupted maybe 5 minutes total by other people driving their OHVs out on the "main road" (ha ha--it was a dirt/rock trail at best).  

Just what we seek.

We took three very nice hikes.

We saw a lot of wildlife, including Bighorn Sheep (barely can see them in this photo, but we could see them through our binoculars).  We hoped they didn't feel insecure that they were living in the "Little"horn Mountains.  We shouted to them:  "YOU HAVE BIG HORNS!! HONEST!"

Lots of lizards, including a Horned Toad (what Dan knew as a Horny Toad as a child in Oklahoma):

This was the type of reptile that Kevin Corcoran traded to Chuck Connors (i.e., later the Rifleman) for Old Yeller.



A three-foot rattler we almost stepped on!

It coiled up, ready to strike if we didn't take it seriously (which we, uh, did):

Later we identified it as a Western Diamondback.

We found an old mine, which is not unusual for our hikes.  What is not typical is that two of the ore carts were left behind.  There is a lot of valuable material in these carts.  Somebody must have had to leave in a hurry, but why no one else has taken them in the past 100 years we will never know.

We had delicious meals:

We don't do the peanut butter and jelly thing.  We eat well.....thanks to Vicky's skill.

But, HEY!  I have skills too, like filling the Toyota with gas:

and pounding down our tin cans for the trash.  



We had beautiful sunrises:

One of our hikes was particularly interesting, and beautiful....and mysterious.  We found a road on our GPS and decided to follow it.  It was clear, right away, that nobody had been on this road for many many years, not even OHVs. The grass had grown over it:







It is almost always the case that where there is a road, even an old one, there is a reason for it at the end.  So we traveled about two miles on it to find the end.

In doing so, we found that the road had been washed out in many places.  Even hiking (instead of driving) we had difficulty at times finding a way of crossing where it had been washed out.

We traveled through an absolutely beautiful valley, with mountains on either side.  The road kept going until we got close to the peak in the above photo.

Then?   Nothing!  It just ended.

And it ended at a very large dry fall:

And above this dry fall was a jumble of rocks.  Nothing visible.

Why was this road even here?  Usually what we find is at least one thing indicating civilization---some old wood, rusted cans, etc.  But at the end of this road?  Nothing.  Many hundreds of man-hours to build a road, for no reason we could even imagine. 

Even toward the top it was clear that large boulders had been moved to create the road.  See the wall to Vicky's left?  That took a lot of work.  Why?

This is sometimes what we find going our own way in the desert:  Mysteries.

Because of its beauty and mystery we decided we needed a name for it, since it has been one of our favorite of our 700+ hikes.

We named it "Mystery Valley."  

Who were the people who were here?  What did they experience?

Why was this road here?

The answers are left to our imaginations.