The Road to Ruins.

Big country, big skies, big canyons...

 I like to wander.  I could walk all day all alone and be in heaven though I seldom have the chance anymore. In my youth, however, I often would spend my entire day off in a different locale just wandering. Sometimes, I would get lost. Sometimes I would walk all day without seeing another living thing. Sometimes, I would stubble upon something wondrous. One such hike occurred while hiking in the wild country southeast of Camp Verde. It's a big barren land, cut by a maze of big canyons. To make a long story short, I like canyons, so I dropped into one to see if I could hike it all the way to the river. Towards the end, I walked around a bend and there stood one of the most amazing indian ruins I had ever seen. It was three stories and still had wooden beams poking out of the adobe.

 I was about to give up when I happened to
peer over the edge and... oh there it is.

Asking around town afterwards I learned that the ruin was known about but seldom visited. A lot of people knew of, had heard whispers about, but no one  seemed to know the exact location of them. Immediately people started asking me for directions. Now, backcountry secrets are not parted with easily. You don't just jump on the internet and post the Google Map with GPS coordinates (Yes I'm talking about you Mr. Outdoor Travel Writer--you whore of the backcountry), but if you're in the Inner Circle or you have someplace to trade quid pro quo, I would consider telling you.

I'm sure, at first, my directions were pretty accurate, but as the years passed they became increasingly vague. Something like,"Take that road off Fossil Creek. Take the first right then a bunch of left forks. When the canyon on your left starts to get really deep, look for a fence line. Follow the fence line to the bottom of the canyon. The ruin is around the corner..." Yeah. I'm sure anybody who ventured into that wild country with that intel found nothing but contempt for my backcountry knowledge.


So I ventured out the other day to see if I could rediscover it following my own vague directions. Like a lot of hikes I've repeated in recent years, I found the road was much rougher and longer, the trail about for times longer than I remembered and the descent into the canyon suicidal. Funny I don't recall that detail. But, though a combination of faint recollection and dumb luck, I did find the ruins. They have weathered the years a little better than my own mind.

Nothing sweeter than an old relationship rekindled.

These are all blocks of flooring from the second story. You can
see where the mud was layered on the sticks.

Detail from the second story. A piece of the
floor still in place in the corner.

   

Uniquely this ruin is constructed of smooth river rock. They had
to use a hell of a lot of mud to motar those stones, Probably why
it's aged so well.