On The Road to Chiricahua

February’s Amazon Associates income was a bit over $200 this month!! Can you imagine what a difference that makes in the life of someone who’s income is $1200 a month?  It’s HUGE!  You guys are the BEST; thank you so much for remembering to use my Amazon link!

I have big news; Deb, a camping friend from Gulf Shores, AL is on her way out here! Unless I drive her completely nuts, she’ll be following me around for the next 7 months, from AZ to Utah, Colorado and Wyoming, and then up to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for the summer!  I know my friends who were worried about me being all alone can now breathe a sign of relief.

So I got off my duff and finally moved from Sedona. I didn’t even like that site all that well, it was so terribly dusty! But I think inertia set in and I would have stayed there forever if Deb wasn’t arriving soon. I am backtracking and meeting her at Chiricahua National Monument tomorrow; hoping to snag one of the really nice creekside boondocking sites just outside the park.  When I first got to AZ I was actually on the backside of Chiricahua at Sunny Flat CG but didn’t make it to the actual National Monument. Sunny Flat still remains the most beautiful campsite of the trip so far.  I’m hoping the little one lane dirt road over the mountain is ice-free now and I can show Deb my favorite campground. If it’s not passable, then it’s about 100 miles by road!

I drove about 6 hours today, through the Tonto National Forest, up & over some mountain passes, through the piney woods and then into the hilly saguaro cactus terrain, and then down into the valley with lots of irrigated farmland. Went past Roosevelt Lake and the shoreline camping looked awesome! I stopped in at the visitor’s center to get info on the new Tonto Pass rates. Camping used to cost $3 a night for seniors but now there’s no discount at all and the rates went up to $8 a night! The only discount is on the annual Tonto Discovery Pass, it’s $60 for seniors instead of the usual $80. That does entitle you camp free at the shoreline sites, but not in any of the campgrounds. (I’d want a shoreline site anyway). Just not sure I’d get my money’s worth out of it.  The pass is good for shoreline camping on three different lakes though (Apache, Bartlett & Roosevelt) so I’ll have to do more research to see if any of those are higher elevations that would have cool enough weather for me.  Deb also hates heat!

I am camped for the night (didn’t even unhook the camper) on some BLM land about 8 miles south of Safford, AZ. It is 1.1 miles from Hwy. 191 on Haekel Rd. The entrance is in the middle of a big curve in the road; the road goes left and the road to the boondocking site goes right. Haekel Road is paved, so I won’t be eating any dust tonight! I’m the only camper here but there are hundreds of cow-pies all over the place so we might get some bovine company later on! If so, I hope they’ll be nice and friendly.

I didn’t take any photos along the way today but here’s the view from our camper door.