Sunday, December 25/2016 - Saturday, December 31/2016

Booko out for a run

This week started out with Christmas Day and ended with New Year's Eve.  It has been a busy week.  Christmas Day was quiet around here as it was just John, Kay and I here.  I cooked a Rib Eye roast in the oven and it turned out remarkably well.  It was delicious and tender.
Booko has settled over the week and we have found out a few things about him.  He is very nervous around cans....like beer cans!!  He is very hesitant to come near anyone with a beer can in their hands.  Not sure what that is all about but hopefully he will get over that in the near future.  Beer cans around here are quite common!!
He has met both of the cats and seems to not be bothered by them.  He has made no effort what so ever to chase them so that is a very good thing.  Moglie has been totally ignoring him and has actually stopped coming over for his daily visits.  I think Mogs is mad at us!!  Corinna, on the other hand, joins us by the fire each evening but remains rather wary of Booko and refuses to get too close to him.  Hopefully they will forge a bit of a friendship.  Time will tell!!

Hassayampa river after the rains

It has been raining off and on all week and the river has been running.   We took a trip down into the river bed to the canyon to see what the water run had done.   The ground was quite wet and there was still a few areas that had water and needed to be avoided.  We took Booko with us and let him out for a good run.  His feet have been sore since he arrived so I am sure the cool sand felt good.  He ran for a bit then got back into the Jeep for the trip into the canyon.

River claims another victim 

As we travelled along the wash, we came across a side by side that was stuck in the sand.  Man, he was in good and looked like it would be a bit of a chore to get out.  No one was around when we went by the first time, but on the way home, there were two trucks out there and the quad had been pulled out of the its watery trap!!  We later heard that the quad was brand new (only about 6 hours on it) and when they kids pulled it out of the sand, they somehow managed to rip the front end off it!!  Shit Oh Dear.....One should never underestimate the power of sand, water and Mother Nature!!

Really stuck!!

Lots of water in the canyon

There was plenty of water in the canyon and one must always be aware of "quicksand".  The ever present danger hovers silently. waiting for unsuspecting side by sides or Jeeps!!  John attempted to travel down the canyon a bit further than he should have and I must say that it is a good thing that the jeep is short as we had to make a really quick "360" as we were starting to sink and there were NO TREES in the canyon to winch to if we were to sink like the side by side we had passed earlier!!  I had to call on Jesus, Mary and Joseph to help us out of the situation and I think I may have called on Buddah, Allah and the Gitchi Manitou as well!!  Holy Buckets....... way too much stress for me!!

Old Cottonwood tree

Booko and John

Booko trying out his new seat

This week John constructing a seat for Booko in the side by side.  Hopefully he will be riding "shotgun" when we go for a ride.  Hogan loved to ride and we couldn't keep Cooper out of the damn thing so hopefully Booko gets used to the idea and joins us on our trips.
John finished the seat and took Booko for an inaugural run.  He was not impressed, I'm thinking as John had to hold onto the leash to keep him from jumping out.  Again, we wonder what his life was like before he came to us.  Maybe he had bad memories to deal with!!

He likes his fires

Heading out to ride the Wickenburg mountain loop

We managed to get a quad ride in this week.  We did the Wickenburg Mountain Loop and Booko did come with us.  Initially, John had to use the leash and tie him to the oh shit handle (especially when he was on the highway) but by the end of the 50 mile trip, Booko was much more at ease and actually was lying down on his custom made seat and snoozing!!  Maybe he will be a quadding dog after all.

Chillin in the Arizona sun on Wickenburg Mtn.

Lots of sand since the recent rains

Beverage

The trip was awesome and it was good to get out into the back country again.  There is something about seeing the many majestic saguaro cactus standing along the trail.  There are so many years of growth on each of these stately cacti that it is mind boggling.  We actually go through a stand of saguaro that can only be described as a saguaro forest.  The big cacti cover the hills and it is beautiful.
We made our way along the miles of trail and found ourselves back in the Hassayampa River where we travelled under the train bridge and the highway bridge and accessed San Domingo wash.  This took us to the China Wall where we were surprised to see that there was no water running down it. This is the first time there has not been any water on the wall.
We then headed back to the windmill and started out final leg of the trail.   This would eventually spit us out on the highway about a quarter of a mile from home.  We noted that the  trail was now officially "marked".  There were numbered fiberglas signs along the way and we all noted that the trail actually followed our flags so that was rather interesting.  The markers stopped when the public land stopped and we continued into our "home" wash.  We were less that half a mile from home when we came to an abrupt dead end!!  WHAT.....  Someone had taken a bull dozer and had dozed a wall of brush across the trail stopping all progress.  We got off the machines and took a little walk to see what was the issue.   Well, apparently someone has started some sort of commercial enterprise in our wash and has bulldozed the trail into oblivion.  They even removed the access road into the wash.  Well.....that is just too ugly.   We had travelled 50 miles, and were only a stone's throw away from home and at a dead end!!!   John scouted the area and found a way around the wall of brush and then we ended up climbing a bit of a cliff to access the "old road".   We were then faced with not one, but two locked gates!!  Holy Buckets....these people really did not want quads or anything else in this wash!!   Fortunately, there was enough room beside the locked gates and the hill for both our quads to get past and THAT was a very good thing as we were ready to call it a day.  It was time for a campfire and a few more adult beverages!!

Another great day

It was a great week and the weather has been good.  It is bitterly cold back home and again we are reminded just how blessed we are to be able to come here each winter.
New Year's Eve wound round out the week.  We had a fire (as usual) and sat around for the evening.  Ray joined us around the fire and started shooting off fireworks around 10:00 as he knew that he would probably not be awake for midnight. Hells Bells, Marie may not be awake for midnight either!!
We found out that Booko was not too happy with the noise so we ended up putting him in the house for a while.
Midnight rolled around and the fireworks were ignited.  Happy New Year and Goodnight!!  LIfe is Good!!

Can I come up?