One week after our geocaching adventure on Apache Maid Mountain, we were heading back to the area to celebrate John's birthday with a weekend of camping, hiking, four-wheeling, and geocaching. 

Although there were a number of places we could have gone instead, we were fated to return to the Stoneman Lake area in order to move our rejected geocache (which we had placed the week before) to a new location.  John suggested that, as long as we were returning to Apache Maid Mountain, we could do a short hike down into Wet Beaver Canyon so that he could show Mary and me a portion of the Wet Beaver Loop that he had done with Danny seven years ago. 

Our plans set and our gear packed, John and Mary and I left early in the morning on Saturday, September 29, for a repeat of our journey to Apache Maid Mountain.  This time, however, we made sure that we had all of the geocaches for that area loaded into the GPS - after all, we didn't want to force a third trip to the area!

On the way to Stoneman Lake Road, we stopped two times along I-17 to geocache; one of our stops involved a short hike to the top of a knoll, just off of Badger Springs Road.  We stopped one more time after exiting the highway on Stoneman Lake Road; after turning onto FR 229, we found that there was an interesting geocache along the way.  To grab it, we had to do a short, quarter-mile hike up a ridgeline.  We found it buried in a pile of rocks on the edge of the ridge. 

Before setting up camp, we decided to take care of business first and get our geocache moved to a new spot.  We drove up to the top of Apache Maid Mountain and retrieved our little treasure from the pile of rocks in which we had hidden it.  (While we were there, of course, we grabbed the geocache that was already up there!)  Then, we started back down the road and looked for a better place to hide it.

A quarter of a mile down the road, we found THE perfect place for our cache.  It was at a scenic overlook, from which we had the most amazing panorama of the valley below Apache Maid Mountain.  We could see everything from there, including Wet Beaver Canyon and...Waldroup Place and Waldroup Tank, too!

The overlook came to a rocky point, below which there was a steep drop.  John decided to hide the cache in those rocks, on the face of the cliff.  As he climbed down to place the cache, he thought of the perfect name for it: Wall-Drop Overlook, a pun of Waldroup!  Clever!

After descending from the mountain, we began looking for a place to set up camp.  At the junction of FR 620 and FR 229, we took the unmarked Jeep road and scoped out several possible sites, but none of them were any good.  After driving around for half an hour in the meadows, we returned to the junction and picked a different road to search.  That road took us into the tall pines, where there were many nice campsites to choose from.  We parked the 4Runner at one of the larger sites and unloaded our camping gear.

Once we had our campsite set up, we kicked back and relaxed.  It was a little late in the day to start hiking; and, as busy as we have been, it was nice to be able to just sit and do nothing for a while.

Later that afternoon - after we had napped, played ball, and rested - we got into the 4Runner and went out for a drive.  We spent an hour exploring the backroads near Waldroup Place, just to kill time before dinner.  (After all, we couldn't be expected to sit still all afternoon!)  When we returned from our jaunt, we prepared dinner: chicken, veggies, noodles, and a bottle of wine to celebrate John's birthday.  For dessert, we made S'mores by the campfire while we relaxed.

Around 8:00 p.m., we all turned in, one-by-one.  Mary went first, as it was her normal bedtime; John followed about fifteen minutes later.  I lasted until about 8:30.

The night was anything but peaceful; it was just plain noisy.  First of all, we were awakened by a low-flying aircraft that sounded like a military tank as it passed overhead.  Then, Mary awoke periodically and got scared of the dark (which is not like her at all).  After several outbursts, we finally let her sleep with her lantern on, just so that we could get some sleep!  Eventually, the noises finally subsided, and we were able to get a couple of hours of sleep.

The next morning, we awoke with first light around 6:00 a.m. and slowly started our day.  (After the lack of sleep, it was hard to get moving!)  Mary woke up an hour later and was just as slow.  Once we had some breakfast (and coffee for me), we finally started moving.

Our first order of business that morning was John's birthday.  It was very important that we give him his gifts early, before going hiking, because Mary had bought a new hiking hat for John.  He had lost his old fedora several months ago, while we were backpacking in West Clear Creek.  He had set the hat down to look for a campsite but never bothered to pick it back up again.  By the time he realized his mistake, the hat was gone.  Since he had not yet replaced his hat, we decided to buy him one for his birthday; we bought him a dark brown crushable felt hat from REI.  He loved it and couldn't wait to wear it on our hike that morning.

Around 9:00 a.m., we left camp to go on our day hike into Wet Beaver Canyon (via Waldroup Canyon).  Once again, we drove the 4Runner past the junction of forest roads 620 and 229 and onto the Jeep trail.  After passing by Waldroup Place, we continued through the meadow to the place where the road dead-ended, at the Wet Beaver Wilderness boundary.  We parked the 4Runner nearby and geared up to begin our hike.

Our descent into the canyon started out with some easy boulder-hopping to maneuver down the first of the seven dry waterfalls.  Mary enjoyed bouldering, as we learned several years ago; so for her, this was a piece of cake.  (She is definitely her father's child!)

The next waterfall required some route finding.  Since it had been more than seven years since John had last been there, he had a difficult time remembering which way to go to avoid the waterfall; the route that we did take didn't look right to him, but it worked nonetheless.

As we worked our way downstream, we started getting deeper and deeper into the narrow canyon.  The boulders became larger, and some scrambling was required to get around them.  It wasn't too difficult...yet.

Then we came to the third dry waterfall, which was a sheer, twenty foot drop.  I couldn't help but laugh, thinking, "How the heck did he get down there with a full backpack on?"

To maneuver around this waterfall, we found a treacherous route to the left; it wasn't a fun route - not for me, anyway - but it worked.  Getting back up that waterfall, though, was going to be a challenge!

We stopped for a break at the top of the fourth waterfall, not too far away.  That was when John suggested that we turn around and head back up the canyon.  It was already 10:30, so the 11:00 meltdown was just around the corner; and, on top of that, we didn't bring anything with us for lunch (just snacks). 

Once we were rested, we started back up the canyon again, which meant that we had to now climb up that third waterfall again. Indeed, it was a bit of a challenge; we used the same route that had taken us around the falls, and it was just a treacherous going back up again as it was coming down.  After reaching the top, though, we knew that the worst was behind us.

In order to avoid the first two waterfalls, John suggested a short-cut.  We came to a place where we were able to climb easily out of the canyon.  When we reached the top, we hiked cross-country across the meadow, using the GPS to guide us towards the 4Runner.  It took us only ten minutes to find our way back - the short-cut probably shaved fifteen minutes off of our return!

When we returned to our campsite, we quickly had lunch; then, we started packing up to go home.  It had been a good weekend, but it was time to start fighting the usual Sunday afternoon I-17 traffic jam - plus, we had more geocaching to do!

We stopped in Camp Verde to look for two geocaches.  The first one involved a short drive up a 4WD road; the second, a hike up an embankment to find what turned out to be the largest geocache we have ever found!  The cache was a large Rubbermaid bin, and inside, it housed other geocaches!  The intention was to allow geocachers to trade caching containers. 

As we left Camp Verde to continue on our way home, Mary fell asleep; so with that, we decided to call it quits for geocaching for the day.  Instead, we drove home, non-stop.

And with that, our adventurous weekend had come to and end...

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