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After returning from our wonderful
honeymoon, it took us
several days to get back into the swing of things. There were a lot of things
to do once we got back into town, for example, there was the issue of having
my name changed to Heather Verley, which meant standing in lines at the Social
Security office, Motor Vehicles, and both Bank One and Wells Fargo Bank. Then,
there was all of the unpacking - which didn't get done for another week - not
to mention that there was still some unfinished wedding business. It wasn't
until that following Thursday, July 29, that John and I finally got around to
opening our wedding gifts.
We decided to make a party out of our gift opening, so we invited our friends
and family over to the Verleys' house that evening. Nacole (my best friend and
bridesmaid and the person who introduced me to John) showed up, as did John's
cousin Melissa, who brought a date with her. We ate leftover wedding cake,
drank wine (a first for Nacole, considering that she never touches the
stuff!), and went swimming. Then, we got down to the important stuff:
presents! While Nacole played secretary and Erika played photographer, John
and I opened our gifts. We received lots of neat new toys, including a hiking
stick for John and a Leatherman Super Tool for me.
One of our favorite gifts came from Nacole. Ironically, I had been looking for
the same gift for John's birthday last year but was unable to find one! She
bought us a picnic backpack - a backpack with pouches for carrying food (comes
equipped with hot and cold packs) and another for carrying a wine bottle and
with all of the necessities for picnicking: plates, silverware, cheese-slicer
and cutting board, corkscrew, napkins, and yes, even a checkered tablecloth!
There were also two elastic straps in which we could carry our plastic wine
glasses.
Needless to say, we made plans to use our new toys that following Saturday, so
that we could try it out and so that we could celebrate our two-week
anniversary by having a romantic picnic in the Woodchute Wilderness Area, on
Mingus Mountain near Jerome. The plan was to hike the
Woodchute Trail #102 for
a couple of miles or until we found a nice spot to have our picnic and, of
course, to christen a new wilderness area.
Before embarking on our adventure, we went to the grocery store, where we
bought sandwich fixings, macaroni salad, and a bottle of 1994 Robert Mondavi
Sauvignon Blanc for our picnic. We also stopped at Popular to buy a small ice
chest to pack all of our beverages for the road trip. Then we began our long
journey towards Mingus Mountain.
Okay, so Mingus Mountain is not that far away. Normally, it takes the average
driver about two hours to drive to Jerome from Phoenix. However, we made the
mistake of taking my car on the trip, the same car which had been overheating
all week. We thought that we had fixed the problem, but as we approached the
exit for the Carefree Highway, along I-17, the car temperature was already at
two hundred and twenty degrees - and we hadn't even begun to climb the
mountain! We pulled off of the highway so that John could take a look under
the hood. When he realized that there wasn't anything leaking, he suggested
that we continue on.
We did so, but as we climbed the mountain, the car's temperature grew hotter
and hotter, forcing us to run the heater so that we could suck the heat off of
the engine. Finally, when we reached Cordes Junction, John suggested that we
stop for a while and let the car cool down.
At that point, things were looking grim for our picnic. We could have easily
gone somewhere else to have our picnic, but we knew that it just wouldn't be
the same, not without the "wilderness experience". But if we continued on our
journey, we would run the risk of overheating the car and getting ourselves
stranded (like that would ever happen to us!).
The decision was made, and once the car had cooled down, we continued on our
way to Mingus Mountain on SR 69. Though the car was still running hot, we
managed to get it up the mountain to the Potato Patch Trailhead, the start of
the Woodchute Trail #102. Equipped with our new toys, John and I hit the trail
and began hiking towards the wilderness boundary, a half a mile away.
According to the trail description, the Woodchute Trail is a moderate trail
that descends about 2,000 feet over 6.5 miles (about thirteen miles
roundtrip). It begins in a ponderosa pine forest and parallels SR 89A as it
follows the ridgeline of Mingus Mountain - meaning that there is a lot of road
noise! (The road noise takes away from the wilderness experience.) Our plan
did not entail hiking the entire length of the trail. Instead, we hiked in
about 1.5 miles; as we hiked, we searched for a nice spot to have our picnic.
We found a lovely, secluded spot about a mile past the wilderness boundary, on
a spur trail that looked to be the remnants of an old jeep road that leads to
the fence line on top of the hill. The jeep road is now hidden by shrubs and
dried leaves, making it difficult to spot if you're not looking for it. We
hiked it to the top and set up our picnic under the shade of an old ponderosa
pine tree, on top of the checkered tablecloth.
And, of course, that lovely tablecloth easily doubled as a blanket (as we so
fondly pointed out to Nacole that following Monday)! Once again, we were naked
in the woods, making "wood - chute"!
After our relaxing picnic and hike, John and I headed home, taking SR 89A
through Jerome and Cottonwood before connecting with I-17. I was reminded of
our first road trip, when we had our picnic on a rock in Sedona last May. That
was our first trip through Jerome together, and we had stopped to eat ice
cream at the local Thrifty. I smiled and looked at my wedding band, thinking
how far John and I had come in that time, how many adventures we had had, and
how many more are still waiting for us... |
