We woke up to the kids’ favorite, “hotel breakfast!” and even had time for a hot tub. Since it was drizzling rain, there wasn’t a big rush to go hit the trails. But by 9:30 we were headed to the Mescal Trailhead to do a hike to “Devil’s Bridge” arch and thankfully the rain had subsided. It was a lovely trail on red sandy dirt through the forest and under the imposing giant rock formations. There were a lot of people on this trail. At Devil’s Bridge, they all cued up for pictures. I snapped a quick pick in between people’s turns and then the kids and I found a nice ledge to sit on that was away from all the hoopla. Having some time to sit and think and look out over the valley was really welcome. But we started getting sprinkled on and it quickly turned to a downpour for the two miles back to car. We cleaned ourselves up at the car and made our way to Airport Mesa which has a big view overlooking Sedona. We skipped the hike up there because as soon as we got to the viewpoint it started dumping rain again. At this point, our mantra turned to “Sedona… we tried our best….” We headed south, stopping at the ruins of Montezuma’s Castle (actually a cliff dwelling from the pre-Hopi people of around 1100-1400). It was a really impressive pueblo built into a cliffy-cave and overlooking a beautiful and lush valley. Though it did start raining just as we got to the Castle. Sigh.
Back on the road, south to Cave Creek Campground, about 30 miles north of Phoenix. I was worried the campground would be hot and dry and dusty. But actually, this has been a little slice of desert heaven. It has rolling hills, pipe organ cacti, ocotillo, and many other cacti in bloom, and everything is lush and verdant. Our campsite was enormous and felt private, even the pebbles around the fire had been raked into a soothing swirl pattern. Since we’d left Sedona earlier than I had planned, we ended up with extra time here. We used it to play some games together and I went on a long walk around the nature preserve. We also got to catch a colorful sunset. We capped off the night with a fire under sparkling, bright stars in the warm desert night. This was the perfect ending to our camping road trip!
