The Arizona Strip ATV Ride

Last week my cousin Lowell (the Bishop) called me up to see if I wanted to go on an ATV ride with he and Mitch, and perhaps others if they wanted. It sounded fun to me so I agreed. Something quite funny happened when I did a google on Arizona Strip. Kind of shows you have to be specific, and careful when surfing.

We left Friday afternoon and drove down through Saint George and out toward Trumbull. At the old school we went west and zig-zagged through the fields and trees until we finally found our camping spot. It was dark by the time we got there but there was already a fire ring so we gathered up some wood and got a blaze going.

We cooked hot dogs and smores and it was all quite good. Mitch brought a cot which looked like WW-I surplus, Lowell and I put our bags on the trailer just to be off the ground. Lowell has this machine he wears at night to keep him from snoring, but when he tried to hook it to his truck battery sparks flew and it wouldn't work at all. When we put the flashlight on it he had hooked it up backwards. Then we read the instructions which said "Don't hook it up backwards". I took a Lunesta so I wouldn't have to listen to him snore and I slept quite well.

When morning came we had breakfast of sorts and prepared for the ride. Mitch's brother-in-laws were coming out so we rode back toward the school house and met them, then we all headed down the canyon.

It was a little like "Journey To The Center Of The Earth." The road winds down a canyon, then follows an old riverbed, then down another canyon. You keep thinking you are going to hit the Colorado any minute, when actually we were still a long way from it and never did see it.

We explored the remnants of an old copper mine and talked with a couple of guys who had a Jeep down there. Actually it was a Suzuki. They were getting ready to bring a bunch of friends on Thanksgiving week-end.

Later we rode on west, exploring and watching for pertroglyphs. We ended up at a place called Mud Springs where there is an old cow cabin and watering set up. On the way back we ran into a huge covey of quail, there must have been around 60 or 70.

We got back to the camp around 6:00pm and by the time we made the old school it was dark. I hunted around there for a while and found a geocache while Mitch and Lowell looked at the old photos in the school by flashlight, then we moved on. It was a lot further coming back than going out for some reason and it was around 10:30 pm when we got home.

It was a fun trip. I enjoy being with those guys and hope we can do it again soon. I even enjoyed the camp out, which was something I thought I didn't like that much any more.