Saturday in Sedona

Mom and I drove to Sedona yesterday. Her grandson (my nephew) Lance was getting married there. Not wanting to drive alone she asked me to go up with her. It was a beautiful but windy day. The trip up took less time than planned so she easily met up with the wedding party by 4:45. I went on my merry way to see some of the world famous Sedona landscape. I headed for Crescent Moon Ranch - aka. Red River Crossing. This is where the tourists flock to. You get a very good look at Cathedral Rock with the reflection in the waters of Oak Creek. Many gifted photographers want to take a picture from here. I plunked 8 whole dollars down in order to park my car at this facility. Yipes! That hurt a little bit. But I needed something interesting to do. I got the wonderful views I had read about. Here is a sampling.






Sedona capitalizes on psychic energy, cosmic balance, feng shui, ying yang, etc. So an area near this Red Rock Crossing had a "vortex" - a place of peace and reflection a place to get inner calm - a place where peace and balance abound. I went to this place and I'm not sure I felt this invisible energy but I guess many people can. And as an outward expression of this cosmic energy people stack rocks - make cairns. Lots of people do this. Hundreds of people do it. Maybe thousands? I couldn't count them. They were all over the ground, some were made of large rocks, some with little rocks. Some were tall stacks others short. Some were on tree stumps, some by the trunks, some up in the branches. Some were in the rockbed, some were in the sand, some almost in the water. I took a couple pictures there. Luckily my batteries gave up because I might have taken too many pictures of these rocks stacks. As it is - I have displayed a couple.

This is the tallest stack of rocks I saw. Pretty impressive!

And yes - I found a spot where everything seemed at peace and in balance and I made my own rock stack. I left it there as a testament to the . . . - well I did it because everyone else did.

MY STACK - VERY VERY IMPRESSIVE!!

I found a nice SITE with more information and pictures about this area.

As the sun began to set the rock formations looked so beautiful! I had a good time. Sedona is very unique and beautiful place. My Saturday in Sedona was wonderful! I'm glad I went.

P.S. for Shanna and Evan - I think I found some good yucca wood. And now if anyone else ever asks me for some yucca wood I know exactly where to get it.

Whoooo?

Today my feet are hurting. Training for hikes isn't always fun. But it must be done. Today wasn't the best day to hike because it was extremely windy but the week was gone and I didn't want to be hiking during conference tomorrow. I meant to hike about 9 miles today but ended up going more like 10-12. Plus I did it with a 15 pound pack on. It really wasn't that bad - except for the feet.

About 8 or 9 miles into the hike I experienced a treat that gave me a thrill. I stopped and looked up into a Palo Verde tree and saw an owl perched on a branch and looking at me. The owl was no more than 10 or 15 feet from me. It was a medium sized owl with "ear" tufts. I'm not sure what kind it was but the Great Horned Owl is a possibility I was in the middle of Phoenix but on the Phoenix Mountain Preserve trail I was surrounded by desert trees and shrubs, cactus, and dust with not a building or vehicle or another person in sight. I spent several minutes looking at the owl - the owl looking at me - and feeling very lucky to have the experience.

So "whoooo" is the lucky one? Me! Very lucky indeed!

(the owl is in the center of the tree - the pictures don't do it justice)

Here is a photo I found on the internet that shows you better what the owl really looked like. I have determined that it was a Long Eared Owl.