Messin' in MESA

ScottDate: July 2008

I was lucky enough to get to work with some people out in Mesa, AZ who had a similar love for the outdoors as myself. One of them was planning a week long backpacking trip at the same time I was heading out there for some work. Unfortunately for them, they had some cancellations on a backpacking/canyoning trip. Fortunately for me, I was able to join them for a shortened trip through a canyon in norther AZ. Ironically, this is the same area where all of the alien abductions occur and where a particularly famous one in which they based a movie on the event, "Fire in the Sky." Luckily for me, I have not seen the movie, but my two traveling companions had. They were not too happy to be reminded of the possibility of alien abduction, it's their own fault for bringing it up! The first night camping by the truck made for interesting interpretations of the massive humming of the mosquitoes, shrieking of owls, and drone of the hummingbirds. I slept great. Thanks to a friend for the use of his bivy sack. I'll have to pick one up, that was way cool.

This would represent my first ever overnight trip through a canyon where I would be spending more time hiking through water rather than on a trail. Actually, using the term "trail" here is over stating what we were hiking through, bushwhacking and being whacked is more accurate. I've hiked through areas where bears were a factor, but not where stepping on a poisonous snake was more probable. Actually, about 50% of the time, I have no idea what I was going to step on (water, grass, mud, solid rock, moving rock, weeds, sand, gravel, my foot, slippery rock, etc.) I guess you can get the idea. Bears are easier, you just have to yell out "Hey Bear!" often, (i.e., see Sept. 2007 posts for reference). Needless to say, no one was bitten or even saw a snake, way cool.

The hike/trek was great and I forgot all about work, which is tough to do for me, 'cause I like thinking of new crap, which is part of my job. And yes, a lot of my thought do turn out to be crap, but I got my PhD to PROVE it is crap, that is harder than you may think (or maybe not and I am just making myself feel good).

I only have pictures of the aftermath of the trip right now, so I will up load more pictures later. Thanks to my traveling companions to have purchased water proof digital cameras. My camera was displaced (thought I lost it) in the truck, but I only had a water proof container for it. After the trip, I am confident that it would have been destroyed due to all of the water we trekking through. We even got to swim through one portion. Way cool. 

I was dropped off at the Phoenix airport to take the shuttle to pick up my rental car. Nothing like sitting on a crowded shuttle bus when I have been hiking for 3 days through dirty, algae infested, crawdad populated, swamp water.  So I'd like to apologize to everyone on the shuttle bus to the rental car facility. I am sure I was a lovely sight and...ummm smell. 

You can see from the pictures of my bony ass legs, that the blackberry bushes had very sharp thorns which like to cut flesh. Lucky for me  do very well with discomfort on the trail. It's discomfort in the hotel which is tough.

More pictures of the actual trek will be posted later...stay tuned.