Wednesday morning 24 February - A long and very winding road

I woke up at 5 and blogged until I noticed that the sky was becoming several shades of pink. Lovely. it was around 7 and no one was up yet so I finished off yesterdays blog.

When I got that done, I went and checked to see if Will was up and he was so we chatted until Tony came down. It seems that Tony is not feeling that well. Might be the water. We had a lovely breakfast and decided to go to Roosevelt lake which is about a two hour drive from here. We would lunch there and then maybe hit the mining ghost town on the way back. Uncle Ron and aunt Mary had a luncheon date with some friends so it was the ideal opportunity to go.

We headed off and Will and Tony reminisced about thier trip out to Mary and Ron's on Monday. We saw a gambels Quail run across the road right in front of us. They are so cute. we stopped off at the gate and got a new pass and we were on our way. It only took about 10 minutes to get to the ghost town and so we thought it shouldn't take that long to get to Roosevelt lake either.

The scenery was very desert and with the Superstition mountains right there it was spectacular . As we drove a round the mountain it became more rugged and jagged.

We entered Tonto national forest at around mile 203 and there was a sign that said Roosevelt lake was 38 miles.

Did you know that Tonto means stupid or silly in spanish and that Kimo Sabe in native means peeker?

So the lone ranger was insulting Tonto every time he talked to him and Tonto was giving it back.

The road was nice, if a little narrow, but the shoulders were not that big. Shades of Saskatchewan there. The road also started to change into a very windy, twisty, hilly thing and it started to go up.

There where narrow valleys, would they be called canyons, gullys, gulches or what here? The road narrowed with no shoulders and was fast becoming shades of Irelands roads.

I sure hope that Tony got to see some of the scenery on those hairpin 20 mile an hour roads because it was great. Cactus and grasses, hills and giant rocks in the hillsides. there was this pale green growth that was on lots of the rocks. I thought it might be lichen but did not get a good look at it . there were lots of shades of green but not a vibrant green, more muted shades of green.

It was lovely. The roads even though they were so narrow were in pretty good shape. We came to a viewpoint and stopped. Canyon Lake. It was gorgeous. It was at this point that I realized the car plates were from Illinois? I guess rental cars are from all over and slowly work their way back home? Will was loving the scenery, for that matter we all were.

There was a boat tour on the lake that we could go on if we wanted to, but we thought, no, we would like to see Roosevelt lake and dam.

We carried on across the one lane bridge and the marina and picnicking spots. We carried on over the next one lane bridge and entered a real long and very winding road. The speed limit was 20 MPH for a reason.

I kept taking pictures out of the car window at the valleys and hills. It really was beautiful country.

I can certainly understand now how people could get lost in this desert.

If you don't have a frame of reference you could easily mistake one cactus for another and it was really treacherous country. After we had gone about another 15 minutes we went across a one lane bridge and got to mile 207. There was a sign that said Roosevelt lake 38 miles.

Now wait a gall darn minute.

We had been driving for 4 miles and hadn't gotten any closer to the lake? The road became even more curvy if you could believe that. We now knew why the drive up to Roosevelt Lake would take two hours. you could only go 20 miles and hour at top speed.

Although I did catch tony going 25 or 30 sometimes. Being the good back seat driver that I am though I did bring it to his attention.

When we came to Tortilla Flat we had to stop as the road was flooded. The water was coming right over the road and even though the car could have probably handled it easily there was a sign saying Do not enter when flooding because it would probably hurt the road from the weight of cars on it and one could never be sure that there was not more water coming down the wash.

So fate had decided that we were not going to go to Roosevelt lake today.