Quicksand!

Posted on February 16, 2009 by Maria Langer

I went looking for quicksand yesterday afternoon — and found it.

Quicksand is quite common along the Hassayampa River in Wickenburg. The river runs mostly underground, in the sandy river bed. It comes to the surface in rocky areas, like around Box Canyon and south of town. It also flows on the surface when there’s a lot of water — like during or after a heavy rain.

It had rained earlier in the week and there was snow on the Bradshaw Mountains, where the Hassayampa has its source. The river was running too big to drive in. So we took Scenic Loop around to one of the few dirt roads that winds down to the river. We parked on a hill and hiked down to walk along the river’s edge.

One of the places quicksand likes to form is at the base of large rocks or cliffs that end in the water. The water flows downstream, hits these rocks, and makes a kind of eddy before it turns one way or the other and continues downstream. Where it makes the eddy, the sand gets soft. Very soft. There’s lots of water under it, so even though the sand looks firm on the surface, when you step into it, you’ll sink in.

I was exploring one of these areas on foot with my video camera on a monopod/walking stick. I was getting to the point where the sand was just a little soft and I stretched out my left foot to feel the next step ahead. It seemed firm enough, so I shifted my weight onto it. Bad move. I sunk in past my ankle. Thrown off balance, I put my walking stick down nearby. It also sunk in. Before I could fall forward into it, I threw myself backwards, landing on my butt in the soft, wet sand.

Quicksand For a moment, I considered panicking. Then I realized how dumb that was and inched backwards on my butt, pulling my feet and walking stick with me. After a few moves, I was on firm enough sand to get back on my feet.

Right after my incident, Jack the Dog wandered into the same spot, chasing a bee. He reacted quickly and managed to get out without assistance — he’s been in quicksand before — but it was interesting to see the sand shift and recover its innocent appearance after he’d escaped.

The photo here was taken when we got home. My left foot is still wet and sandy; my right foot is dry and clean. Sorry — no photos of my sandy, wet butt.

Quicksand is a serious thing along the river and not to be taken lightly. If a vehicle drives into it, it can quickly be sucked down to the point where it can’t be pulled out.

As for the dry quicksand of television and movies — I don’t think it exists. This stuff is wet and clingy and sticks with you until you change your clothes.

A Vulture Peak Hike

Posted on February 12, 2009 by Maria Langer

Another trip up the mountain.

On Sunday, Mike’s cousin and his girlfriend were in town from Seattle. They were bummed out because of the weather — it was rainy with low clouds — but we desert-dwellers were thrilled. We’ve had quite a bit of rain this winter and the desert is lush and green — or as lush as a desert can be, anyway. Every time it rains, we think about how much greener the grass between the cacti will get and how incredible the spring flowers will be in another month or so.

They wanted to do something and we wanted to do something outdoors. So we geared up with hiking boots and jackets and water bottles, packed ourselves into my Jeep with Jack the Dog, and drove out to the Vulture Peak Trailhead, which is about 7 or 8 road miles from our house.

Vulture Peak is the tallest mountain in Wickenburg and, indeed, the tallest peak in the immediate vicinity. It’s the remains of a volcano and has an odd shape that gives it a completely different look depending on what direction you’re viewing it from. From our house, it looks like a tall knob. But from the main trailhead parking lot, it looks like a wide rocky butte.

It was still raining when we drove through the main trailhead parking lot and continued on the 4WD road to the trailhead at the foot of the mountain. To get there, we had to drive down a very steep, very eroded embankment. I’m too cowardly to drive down places like that, so I climbed out and Mike climbed in behind the wheel. He threw it into 4 low and crawled down the hill, letting one wheel and then another hang in the air while the rest of the wheels did all the work. At the bottom, I climbed back in behind the wheel and we continued on the way.

My Jeep, Packed to the Gills.

The rain — a steady drizzle — let up when we reached the second trailhead. I parked and we tumbled out. My Jeep is a 4-seat Wrangler and it was packed to the gills with the four of us and a 55-lb dog. Good thing I had the doors and back windows off to give us breathing room.

Above us, the clouds were moving briskly from south to north. It was about 10 AM and the sun was trying hard to break through the low clouds. It looked promising. We started up the trail toward the saddle.

I’ve written extensively about Vulture Peak for wickenburg-az.com. That piece, originally written in 1999, is accompanied by the tiny photos the Web site supported back then. One of my goals on this trip was to take some better photos to share on the site, and possibly include in my Photo Gallery. So I had my Nikon D80 with me, as well as two lenses: my 16-85mm zoom and my 10.5mm fisheye.

My companions quickly got a lead on me up the steep trail. I’m miserably out of shape these days, but I never did do well on uphill climbs. Sure, I can do downhill on a trail all day long without lagging, but point me up a hill and be prepared to wait. I’ll get there — eventually — but I need a lot of rest stops along the way.

A view from the start of my hike.

I took the opportunity to shoot some photos as I hiked. The brightening desert was all around me and, as I walked, the sun poked out and cast its bright, warm light here and there. And then there was the novelty of wet rocks and drops of water on the cacti. And puddles. Do you know how seldom we see puddles out in the desert? That day, they were all over the place.

Soon I was alone on the trail, huffing and puffing as I hiked upwards. The trail is probably rated as intermediate difficulty from the second trailhead, where we started, to the saddle. (It’s probably rated easy from the first trailhead to the second; a nice 1-1/2 mile stroll on a narrow pathway through the desert.) It’s not a long walk, but it’s steep. After an initially easy straight climb, it zig-zags up the mountain on a series of narrow switchbacks neatly carved into the terrain.

On Vulture Peak Trail.

I was upset to see that some hikers had inconsiderately cut corners, creating “shortcuts” of crumbling rock trails. I was also bothered by the sight of uprooted penstemon — one of the few wildflowers already in bloom — tossed aside on the trail. Who would tear wildflowers out by the root? And why? Apparently there are people out there with far less appreciation for the desert than we have. Perhaps they should have stayed home in front of their TVs and video games and left the plant life alone to grow and multiply.

Within an hour, I was near the saddle where the trail opens up to a wide area offering views in two directions. On one side, to the north, is the rocky peak of the mountain. On the other side, to the south, is a series of secondary peaks that reach up to the sky with jagged, tooth-like edges. I fully expected to be alone there, too. The summit was a short but difficult steep climb away and I assumed Mike and his companions would have made the climb by then. But they were there, waiting for me. Our out-of-town visitors had been spooked by the hand-over-hand portion of the climb and had decided the saddle was far enough up the mountain. That’s unfortunate because the view from up there is 360° and, on such a clear, crisp day, would have been breathtaking.

View from near the top of the Vulture Peak trail.

I rested up, snapping photos with my camera. I soon realized that exposures would be a problem and used bracketing to ensure I’d get at least one shot out of three that was properly exposed. (What did we do before we had digital cameras? Waste film? Waste time in a darkroom? Waste photo paper on crappy shots half the time?)

We hiked around a bit in the saddle area, then went to explore the areas around the secondary peaks. I’d never hiked up that way. It wasn’t much of a hike, but there were no real trails. We each made our way separately. Occasionally, I’d hear the voices of my companions or see Jack the Dog scampering around the base of a rocky mound.

Looking southeast between secondary peaks.

I climbed up to a point between two rocks and was instantly struck by the view of the line of peaks with the sun full on their wet rocks. I snapped a picture quickly, sorry that I had my fisheye lens on the camera. I switched lenses as the sun hid behind a speeding cloud again. I remained rooted in that space until the sun returned and I could snap a few more shots. Mike joined me and we watched the ever-changing show of light and shadow on the rocks, cacti, and flat desert terrain beyond.

At our feet were geode-like rocks with crystals. I’m sure someone with a knowledge of geology would find them very interesting. Mike picked up a small piece of crystal to show our companions, who had already started back down the trail.

The Trailhead at the Foot of Vulture Peak.

The hike down was much quicker for me — as it usually is — and we were back at the Jeep within 30 minutes. I paused to take a photo of the peak from the trailhead. This wide angle shot throws things out of perspective a bit, but it gives you an idea of the terrain and destination. The “saddle” is the area in the “V” of the mountain, where that big, puffy cloud is. The main peak is the one on the left; the secondary peaks, which are shorter, are to the right.

We drove back to the main trailhead and I successfully steered the Jeep up the steep, eroded road. (Somehow, up isn’t nearly as scary as down.) The parking area was just as empty as when we’d arrived. Evidently we were the only people who would experience the incredible beauty of this desert mountain right after a winter rain.

Chickenless

Posted on February 1, 2009 by Maria Langer

We give away our chickens.

I’ve had chickens on and off for the past 8 or so years. We had them for fresh eggs; we never ate the chickens.

My first batch was 8 little chicks I raised from 2-days old. They spent the first eight weeks or so in our garage, under a heat lamp. We visited with them and played with them. On warm days, when I was working in the yard, I brought them out to scratch in the dirt. They had names.

We added a chicken coop to a shed near our horse corral and put them in it when it got warm enough. During the day, we’d leave the coop door open and the chickens would come out and scratch around in the dirt and horse poop.

Then one day, three of them were gone.

It was coyotes, of course. They’d discovered the chickens, which were easy prey. Coyotes grab their prey and make off with them. One year, with another batch of chickens, I actually saw a coyote running off with a chicken in its mouth.

No more days on the loose.

A friend and I built a fenced-in yard for them with a ramp from the coop into the yard. That kept the coyotes out — they didn’t seem to want to work at digging under the fence to get at the chickens.

But it didn’t stop the neighbor’s dogs. One Thanksgiving day, the doorbell rang and my neighbors brood of children were standing there. “Our dogs are eating your chickens,” they announced. We ran down to the coop to find the dogs in the yard, chasing the chickens around. They hadn’t gotten any of the chickens yet and they ran off before we could grab them.

We put electric wire around the base of the yard’s fence. The neighborhood dogs got to meet that wire one-by-one and didn’t come back.

Meanwhile, we were going through batches of chickens. They don’t live forever, you know. Sometimes they’d simply disappear. We put bird netting over the top of the yard — no small task, since a few trees grow in there. When we got down to just one chicken, we’d give it away. A few months later, we’d start again with chicks. But I never got too attached to them, since I knew what would eventually happen.

Araucana Rooster We also started getting roosters, hoping they’d work with the chickens to keep the flock going. We did have one hen get broody and hatch two chicks. She wasn’t a good mom. The other chickens soon killed the babies.

Last time this year, I took delivery of over a dozen chicks. I raised them and set them up in the coop/yard as I do every year. They started producing eggs in the late spring, not long after I went away for my summer job. My husband was soon giving away 3 dozen eggs a week. When I got home in the fall, they were still at it.

But then they started disappearing again. We couldn’t figure out how. Were they getting out, to be killed by dogs or coyotes? Or was something getting in? We checked the coop and yard regularly. We adjusted the bird netting. Each week, we’d lose one or two birds.

We were down to seven when we realized that it could be hawks getting in at the very top of the coop. There was an opening there about 6 inches tall, just under the roof. Small birds used this access way to get into the coop and eat scratch. Mike and I closed it up with chicken wire.

Two more birds disappeared. Now it had to be hawks coming in through the yard. There was no way we could completely cover the yard with bird netting — the trees in there were just too big and bushy. So I cut off access to the yard, limiting the chickens to an 8 x 8 coop that was open on three sides.

That’s when the chickens stopped laying eggs.

It’s also when we started spending a lot more time in Phoenix. Although the chickens can be on their own for up to a week — they have automatic water and their hanging feeder can hold a week or two worth of food (depending on the number of chickens, of course) — it was silly to have to worry about them when they weren’t doing their job. I couldn’t open up the yard again; I’d just start losing them again. So I did the next best thing: I gave them away to a friend who also has chickens.

She lives in Wenden in farm country. Her chickens run lose in her back yard and seem very happy and healthy. Yes, she occasionally does pick one out for a good chicken dinner, but that’s life. I figured that my four hens and one rooster might go back to work for her — especially if they got an inkling of what might happen if they didn’t.

So now we’re chickenless.

On Volunteering

Posted on January 25, 2009 by Maria Langer

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Twenty hours this weekend.

This weekend, I spent a total of about 20 hours as a volunteer on the annual Land of the Sun Endurance Ride in Wickenburg, AZ. This was my fifth or sixth year as a volunteer — I’ve lost count — and it’s one of the feel-good things I do for my community.

The event, which is sponsored by the Wickenburg Horsemen’s Association, depends upon volunteers to be a success. There are countless jobs to be done, from marking and grooming the 50 miles of horse trails to marking numbers on the butts of horses. There are folks who handle registration paperwork for this AERC-sanctioned event, folks who order t-shirts and sweatshirts and prizes, folks who handle special requests and complaints. There are folks who buy or prepare the food for attendees, put it out on long tables, and clean up after every meal. There are folks who put out hay and bran and carrots for the horses, folks who fill the water troughs at vet checks, and folks who stand ready with clipboards while paid veterinarians call out horse vital signs. There are folks who check off the numbers of riders as they leave and as they return, and folks who track down riders who haven’t come in yet. There are folks who pick up injured — or just plain tired — riders and horses who are dropping out of the event, using trucks and horse trailers. And there are even folks just hanging around every 3 or 4 miles out on the desert trails, handing out water bottles to riders as they pass. These are just some of the jobs. There are doubtlessly many others I don’t even know about.

What I like about volunteering at the endurance ride is that I’m truly needed and appreciated as a volunteer. I come in and do my job(s). I’m not micromanaged or criticized. And I really get a charge out of the thanks I get from participants just for doing what I’m supposed to.

Each year I generally perform two or three tasks:

Make my famous (around here, anyway) vegetarian bean soup. A bunch of volunteers make soup, stew, or chili, but I seem to be the only one who makes a vegetarian dish. It’s actually gotten a few people to think I’m a vegetarian. I’m not. But I recognize that many of the riders are. And when the weather is less than perfect, it’s nice to be able to have a hot and hearty meal on the hour-long break between 25-mile ride segments or at the end of the 25-mile ride. This year, the weather was pretty good and I took home 1/3 crock pot of soup. I’ll freeze it and enjoy it the rest of the winter.
Use large crayon-like markers to write horse entry numbers on the butt ends of horses. It’s not usually a difficult task — most horses have been through this more times than I have and have no problem with strangers marking up their butts. But a few horses are real dancers that make the job difficult. And every once in a while, I’ll encounter a kicker. Their riders get the crayon to mark them. I usually do this from 2 to 6 PM the day before the race.
Record the numbers and times of 50-mile riders who return to the main base after their first 25-miles. I do this with another one or two volunteers. My job is usually to write the entry number and time on a blue ticket that I hand to each 50-miler as he or she crosses the 25-mile finish. The rider then takes care of his or her horse and visits a vet to be pulsed down. (There are lots of vets on this ride; no horse is allowed to leave a vet check if it can’t meet certain health requirements.) I usually work with someone who sits at a table and records this same information on a master sheet and another person a bit up the road who uses a radio to tell us who is on the way.

This year, I did all three tasks. I also stuck around to record the 25-milers finish and the 50-miler finish. When I left at 6:30 PM — which was well after sunset — all of the riders had returned except one. She’d refused a lift from a horse trailer and had insisted on finishing the race in the dark. She was riding with the “drag riders” — folks whose volunteer job was to ride portions of the trail, remove marking ribbons, pick up lost items, and make sure no one was left behind. A vet and three volunteers were left to wait for her; everyone else had gone to the award dinner in town.

Endurance Riders It was a long day for me. I started at 6:30 AM, in the dark, to help put out breakfast and tidy up the departure area after the 50-milers left at 7 AM and the 25-milers left at 8 AM. I also set up a few feed stations with hay and carrots not far from the huge water trough there. I noticed a definite scarcity of volunteers — surely there were more at the rodeo grounds in previous years. The woman who was supposed to help me record the incoming riders never showed up, so a spare volunteer was put to the task. And although I’d told Nancy, who runs the whole shebang, that I’d record the in-times for all riders rather than just the first loop for the 50-milers, I stupidly didn’t realize that I’d have to record the 50-milers again after their second loop. That’s why my day was so long. It wasn’t a big deal — and it was certainly made quite pleasant by the few hours I spent chatting with one of the other volunteers as we called in arriving horses — but it was a very long day for me. I’m not accustomed to being on my feet that long.

One of the things the other volunteer and I discussed was the shortage of volunteers at the rodeo grounds. It seems that each year, there’s a group of core volunteers who show up to perform their tasks. Then there are a number of “volunteers” who show up to watch the goings-on at the rodeo grounds and help themselves to breakfast or lunch before disappearing. These same people often have their hand out for the dinner coupon that volunteers get so they can join in the evening’s festivities after the event. And many of them are sure to walk away with a volunteer t-shirt or sweatshirt.

While I certainly don’t expect association members to volunteer 12-hour days for the event, I don’t see why more of them couldn’t give 3 or 4 hours of their time. The timing in, which I do every year (except the one year I was sick), is usually done in shifts; this year, the same three people worked the finish line from the first arrival at 9:40 AM to nearly the last arrival at 5:30 PM. I really feel bad for the spare volunteer who had to fill in for the woman who didn’t show up — surely she got more than she bargained for. There were likely other volunteer stations that could have benefitted from multiple shifts of volunteers. Where were these people? The event is sponsored by the association. Any net proceeds from the event go to the organization. They all benefit from the hard work of a handful of people.

I’m sure this isn’t an uncommon thing in clubs and other groups. It’s just unfortunate that the weight of an entire organization has to be borne by a small portion of its members.

And, truth be told, some of us aren’t even members anymore.

Anyway, the event was a huge success, judging from the comments of riders I spoke to as they crossed the finish line. The trails were well marked and it was a beautiful day for riding. Of the 136 original entries, only about 12 were pulled due to horse or rider problems. It seemed as if the event went off without a hitch, which is great for Nancy.

I do want to take the opportunity here to complement and congratulate Nancy for another job well done. Nancy is a local business owner with her own responsibilities, yet she takes on the task of managing this ride every year. I can’t imagine the stress of it all. She does an amazing job and it’s a real honor and pleasure to do my part to help her out.

And yes, I’ll be back to make soup, mark butts, and time in riders next January.

Decorating with MY Art

Posted on January 15, 2009 by Maria Langer

Because everyone — even me — has some artistic ability.

One of the things that’s challenging me lately is the collection of blank walls at our Phoenix apartment (code-named “Rear Window”). It’s a challenge because I’m determined to decorate them with artwork — which I’ve never been very good at doing.

Why We Don’t Hang Art

I should explain. Our first house, in New Jersey, was made of reinforced poured concrete. Built in 1926, it was one of several in town that was formed with reinforcement mesh, concrete forms, and poured concrete. The walls, floors, and ceilings were all poured concrete. To say our house was solid is an understatement. It will survive earthquakes, floods, and nuclear explosions.

One of the problems of having a house like that is hanging pictures. A masonry nail (at the very least) was required to hang anything on the wall — whether it was a spice rack, framed poster, or paper calendar. As a result, we always thought twice or three times or more before hanging anything. We didn’t want to put unnecessary holes in the walls — holes we might later regret putting there.

So we hung very few items on the walls.

We lived there eleven years. The hesitancy of hanging anything on the walls became part of our mentality. To this day, after twelve years in our current home, we’re still hesitant to hang anything on the walls.

But there’s no excuse not to hang art on these plain, pale colored walls in Phoenix. So we’re going to do it.

My Art

I’ve been an amateur photographer since my college days, although I stopped taking photos for a bunch of years and only got involved again about three years ago. Like so many people, I’ve discovered that digital photography makes photography more affordable, more convenient, and more fun. I make a conscious effort these days to go to interesting places and take interesting photos. And since it costs the same to shoot one photo as it does to shoot 20, I experiment a lot. And although I’ll never quit my “day job” (whatever that is) to become a professional photographer, I’ve collected enough good shots to feel proud of my efforts and want to show them off.

So I’ve decided to draw upon my portfolio of photos to decorate the walls at Rear Window. Why buy someone else’s photos when I can show off some of my own?

(My apologies to the professional photographers out there trying to sell your work. There is a market for it. That market just isn’t with me.)

I found some very basic frames that included bevel cut mats at Ikea. (Although Aaron Brothers is having their big 1¢ sale right now, getting a large mat cut would cost me about $95 and I’m not interested in spending more on a mat than the frame and enlarged photo combined.) The frame comes several colors, although I’ve chosen black. It’s also available in a wide variety of sizes, some of which have mat cutouts for multiple photos. So I have a lot of flexibility here to hang all kinds of photos in a number of sizes.

To get things started, I ordered enlargements of two of my favorite photos made last year:

North to the Future was taken in Alaska in March 2008 at Girdwood Airport, a small dirt strip (snowcovered that day) about 40 miles south of Anchorage. I’d been flying the day before as a passenger on three incredible helicopter flights but did not have my camera aboard. (Don’t ask.) The next day, I had my camera handy and snapped this photo on my way into Alpine Air’s office at the airport. The clouds were caught up in the snow-covered mountains all around the airport, the sky was an amazing blue beyond it, and the bright red and yellow of the airplane really called out to me. The title of this photo comes from Alaska’s state motto. The photo was entered into a photo contest but did not win.
Lake Powell from Romana Mesa was shot in August 2008. I’d made the 2-hour drive from Page, AZ around the northwest end of the lake to the top of Romana Mesa in Mike’s pickup truck. Suffering with a bad back and concerned that I wouldn’t get back to Page before it got dark, I didn’t stay long or spend much time exploring. But the late afternoon light was great and there were just enough clouds in the sky to make it interesting. I took about 80 shots on that little excursion and this is one of my favorites.

I ordered 20 x 30 enlargements of each of these. They should be arriving by mail any day now. Later today, I’ll head down to Ikea to pick up the frames. This weekend, I’ll put them all together.

I’ll hang them at Rear Window the next time I’m in Phoenix. The airplane photo will be perfect centered over our new red sofa. The Lake Powell photo will go over the fireplace — until I can find the giant clock with Arabic numerals (not Roman numerals!) that I really want there. Then I’ll likely shift it to one of the walls in the dining room.

If I like the way they look, I’ll choose more photos and have them printed in other sizes. I’ll buy other frames. Little by little, I’ll cover the walls with souvenirs of our travels.

I’m really looking forward to this. It’ll be great to have these pictures reside somewhere other than on my hard drive.

Got photos you’re proud of? Don’t keep them cooped up on your computer’s hard disk. Make a place for them in your home. I guarantee you’ll be glad you did.

An Eclectic Mind

Web site and blog for Maria Langer, writer, video producer, jewelry artist, boat captain, and helicopter pilot. Blogging since 2003.

Category Archives: Days in My Life