Recovered from our rained-out game after a good night's sleep, this morning we got packed up, loaded the camper back onto the truck, and headed out for the next phase of our trip.
Today we are scheduled to have lunch with a very dear friend who has been a mentor to me (Laurie) for all of the 20+ years I was active in the business of intercultural communication. George Renwick is a China expert, who has been a highly respected member of the field for at least 40 years. He has traveled to China on assignments from one to four years every year since 1982(!) and spends most of his time these days doing high-level executive briefings for US and European corporations involved in China. Art had never met him, so since we were going to be passing right through his home base on our way to Sedona, I contacted him a few weeks ago to see if he would be in town. Miraculously, he said he would be.
George suggested we meet at El Pedregal, a beautiful collection of shops, galleries and restaurants located right at the foot of a huge pile of boulders on the edge of the town of Carefree. We had a wonderful lunch there out on the patio (where Pepé was welcome), surrounded by artwork, a fountain, and a myriad of birds. Homemade bread made for the most incredible sandwiches, and after camping and eating at minimal restaurants over the last week, the fresh salad was delicious. We caught up with George, exchanged many great stories, and suddenly three hours had passed.... We bid our farewells, promised to keep in touch, and headed up the road to Sedona.
The drive to Sedona from Carefree is spectacular and a climb from about 2,400 feet to 4,400 feet. In addition to the change in soil color, the vegetation changes dramatically as you climb these 2,000 feet. We went from desert, to a high plains grassy landscape, then into conifers mixed with cactus before we began to see the red rocks that signify Sedona.
As George explained to us at lunch, the Saguaro cactus is a highly adapted, incredibly innovative creature. They thrive only within a very limited range of elevation (600-3,600 feet) and only in places that have a particular range of temperatures and rainfall. This part of Arizona is one of those lucky places. Also, you can guesstimate how old a Saguaro is by its height and the number of "arms" that it has. Saguaros are very slow growing and typically grow only a foot each ten years of its life. They won't grow an arm (or a branch) until they reach about 70 years of age. We also learned about how they collect water and survive in this climate, the laws restricting the destruction of Saguaros or transplanting of them without a permit in this State, and the root system they have that makes it generally easy to move them, despite their formidable thorns. We had no idea.... But it gave us a huge appreciation for this valiant plant, as well as the Ocatillo and Barrel cacti, and a few of the bird species that inhabit this difficult landscape. I think George's appreciation for the desert has infected me to some extent and I am determined to learn more and see more of this territory that my mom has so long appreciated, originating probably from her days when she lived in Moab, Utah during grad school. But I'll have to ask her about that.
Once you turn off of I-17 onto Highway 179, things become magical here. Suddenly, we were surrounded by these towering red rocks, striated with white and pink layers as your eyes work their way down to where the vegetation of lush green begins. We have been to Monument Valley, which is magnificent as well. What distinguished these rocks from those was the lushness of the landscape surrounding the hills. It wasn't sand up to the rocks, but green and then red. We hit it at sundown, so I don't think our pictures are as great as they could have been, but hopefully we'll do a better job capturing the idea on our way on to Flagstaff. At the same time, the low sunlight hitting these rocks on the east side of the valley was spectacular.We found our campground in Sedona just after 6:00 p.m. En route must have been 30 very nice galleries leading up to the bridge that separates us from the town of Sedona, across Oak Creek. Rancho Sedona is a relatively small campground right on the banks of Oak Creek. We were fortunate to get a site on the water so we can hear the creek flowing. The creek is lined with what we think are sycamore trees which are white and incredibly dramatic against the red rock scenery in the background. They are also home to at least a dozen blue herons, that we see flying over us all day and evening. If you've never seen a blue heron in flight, you don't know what you're missing. They are huge and incredibly graceful. Until they try to land on a branch in a sycamore tree. It's hilarious watching them go from ballerina to klutz, trying to get their footing on a tiny little branch.
Anyway, this campground is great and we are going to extend for another day if we can. They were full when we pulled in after-hours tonight and claimed our fortunately reserved site. And the most amazing thing happened when it got dark: across the creek, there was suddenly a two-level city over there glowing through the sycamore trees. We hadn't crossed the bridge into Sedona tonight because we got here so late, and the town is essentially invisible during the day. But at night, the lights came on and we could see all this activity over there. It was pretty neat.
We defrosted the pork chops we brought from home (miraculously still frozen solid after three days of testing the propane function on our camper refrigerator while in the motel in Scottsdale!) and made another amazing meal in our camper. Tonight I even baked biscuits in our oven, which I only tried once on our USA road trip two summers ago. They were absolutely perfect!Tomorrow we will try to extend our stay here and explore the area a bit before moving on.
Night for now!
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