2014 Letter

795 Sunrise Blvd

Prescott AZ 86301

Dear Family and Friends,

Here’s my annual letter – again with photos embedded in the text.  As usual, I'm late in getting organized, though part of the delay has been due to computer problems that have made it difficult to format this letter the way I wanted.  Anyway, I did make it before Christmas – just!  I started to send this out in the  early morning here in Arizona on Christmas Eve, and will continue to do so as the day progresses.  It will be a quiet Christmas for us tomorrow – the two of us plus my good friend Herb, who would otherwise be alone.

I'll start by wishing you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, and hope that 2014 was good for you – at least in the main.

This year was sad for our family in that my mother passed away peacefully in the night at the end of May.  She was in her 102nd year, so this wasn't unexpected.  She had a wonderful life and was ready to go.  She became feeble once she moved into the Care Home in Chepstow (Meredith's town) at the age of 99 – before that she had lived on her own in her bungalow in Bradford Abbas in Dorset – her house for 44 years.  I'm glad to say that her mind was in good shape to the end.  Here is a photo of her at her 100th birthday celebration.

Nigel and Donna:  For those of you over 65 – most of us by now – health becomes an important topic.  For you youngsters, you can skip down to Kids and Grandkids!  

Donna's health is generally good but she does have osteo-arthritis, which makes her joints very stiff and painful at times.  It is especially noticeable in her hands.  Unfortunately, there is no treatment or cure – it is due to bone spurs that grow on the fingers and elsewhere.  The multiple myeloma that was diagnosed last year does not affect what she can do.  She has blood tests every three months so any changes will be caught – thankfully nothing has become worse.  Donna's back, which has been problem in the past, is doing pretty well.  

She is still quite active at her church, volunteering once a week.  Her main hobby is making cards for birthdays and other special occasions.  The things that can be done with various tools to produce hand-made cards are really amazing – though very time consuming.  She has a few friends who are experts.  Two of them, together with Donna, have now given a couple of classes for other interested ladies.  A few of you have been recipients of her art, so know what her cards look like.

I am very fortunate with my health, with nothing of importance to report.  I keep active in mind and body – use it or lose it!  I lead a hiking group every other Friday and volunteer each Tuesday, making maps at the County GIS department (Geographical Information Systems).  These maps are both for my hiking group and for the the Hiking Spree, organized each autumn by the Highland Nature Center.  

There is a trail called the Prescott Circle Trail, which is over 50 miles long and goes all around the City, mainly in the National Forest but also over some city and private land.  The idea for this trail was conceived about 20 years ago by Yavapai Trails Association and has slowly been coming to fruition.  This year the full circle was finished, except for a small gap of two miles due to private property and an owner unwilling to allow a right of way.  I wrote a Guide to this trail a couple of years ago, with descriptive text, history and maps for each of the ten segments.  

The two photos on the right give you an idea of the variety of this trail (it goes along the shore of this lake for a mile or so).

I am in the process of producing Version 2 to cover the new sections constructed this year.  The Guide is a popular booklet that sells for $5 – whenever the Daily Courier, our local paper, writes about the Circle Trail, its sales go up!

I also write letters to the Courier on various topics (e.g., religion, politics, trails).  When an article or a letter in the paper gives misleading information, I feel the need to give a different perspective.

Kids and Grandkids:  We see Abby and Andrew, Becky's two children, less often now as they grow older (11½ and 9½ respectively) and are involved in more activities.  They are both doing very well at school, which is gratifying for all of us.  The kids stayed at our house for a week in June.  The Highland Nature Center has day camps during the summer and I was able to sign them up for the same "fun camp".  They enjoyed spending the days out in the woods with other kids, building forts, walking in the creek and learning about nature.  

This autumn they decided to try playing soccer and were both on the same team – we drove down to Phoenix earlier this month to watch their last game.  The soccer was eight-a-side and recreational, rather than competitive.  They both enjoyed it and were two of the better players on the team.  They will play again after Christmas.

B&A&A will come up to Prescott to spend the day with us on Boxing Day (the day after Christmas).  Their great grandfather Bill (Cindy's father) died in November at age 92 – he was a wonderful man.  His wife Jean had died two years previously – they had been married for 70 years.  He had been lonely ever since and was in declining health recently, so this was a blessing too.  So, now all their great grandparents are gone.

Becky is still with MB Associates – Mark, the owner and her boss, is one of the top gun lawyers in the States.  He expects a lot from Becky, which can be wearing with trips to Washington DC and various conferences elsewhere but she is able to handle it well.  There are hobbies she enjoys that help her to relax.  This has included starting a new small business recently out of her home, where she teaches ladies various crafts that she is good at.  She has successfully given two preliminary classes so far. Her front room is set up with tables, glue guns and other implements.  She is working on a website (not yet completed), so currently is inviting her network of friends and contacts.

Not much has changed with Stephen – he's still the supervisor in the bike department of a local store called Manzanita Outdoors.  He has a new toy – a motorbike.  This allows him to travel further and faster than in his 4WD vehicle.  He has added a bike rack that he custom designed.  It can easily be attached above the rear seat so his mountain biking can now start much farther afield. It looks strange to see a bike attached to a motorbike, so he gets lots of funny looks.

For  Michael and Liz, things are changing – they have decided to get divorced.  Liz is living in their house in Washington State with Thomas (3½) and Jack (15 months) while Michael has an apartment nearby.  This is a difficult time for all of them but we hope things will have settled down once the divorce has happened later next year.  Here is a recent picture of the two boys. 

Out of town visitors:  Michael, Liz and the two boys flew down in early August for Liz' graduation in Phoenix.  The university where Liz earned her bachelors in 2010 as a physician assistant was at the University of Washington but she has been working towards her master degree for the last two years.  These courses were taken online from A. T. Still University, which is in Mesa Arizona (a town just to the southeast of Phoenix).  The abbreviation for this small medical university is ATSU, which is confusing for Americans because of the much larger Arizona State University nearby, known as ASU.  It was good to have them stay with us for a few days, and to celebrate Liz' special day at the Phoenix Convention Center.    

In August, two old friends visited us in Prescott for a couple of nights.  John & Chris Beattie had lived close to me in the Chicago area when I first came to the states in 1967.  I had known John earlier – from 1964 during our training with British Telecom.  That was before we went to university.  They had moved around in the States quite a bit since then, including a number years in Phoenix while all of our children were at primary school age.  They visited other friends from those days as well as us.  They now live in Massachusetts.

In November, two more old friends who had also emigrated to Chicago in 1967 stayed with us, John & Pam Woodward – they are both British and now live in Atlanta.  Their daughter, Kit, had recently moved to Arizona from the Chicago area – so that was another reason for their drive to Arizona.   Kit teaches hunter jumping to students – with her own horses.  She has four, so it wasn't a simple move, nor was finding a place to accommodate them.  She found a place to rent that was out in the desert some 30 miles NE of Phoenix – in the middle of nowhere!  It has an apartment over a barn and a corral for the horses.  We all drove down to see her on Thanksgiving day (Nov 27).  Her boyfriend likes cooking so he prepared the traditional turkey with all the trimmings – the setting was different from our normal celebration but very enjoyable.  There was quite a menagerie with a total of 7 dogs, 2 cats, 5 horses, a pot bellied pig and some chickens.  While we ate, there were five of the dogs and the two cats inside !

We'll be moving next year!  Our current house is now a lot bigger than we need (almost 4000 square feet), so we are planning ahead and decided to downsize.  The upstairs and downstairs here is too much for Donna to take care of, and our back garden plus the adjacent vacant lot that we own is more than I want to keep in trim.  We have bought an empty lot a few miles away from where we live, and a little closer to town.  It is near the top of a hill and much flatter than our current home, which is on the side of a hill.  The lot has some great views, looking over the Granite Dells, Watson Lake and mountains in the background – shown in the photo (taken on an unusually cloudy day).   

The builder we have chosen has been doing custom homes for two decades and his wife does the floor plans.  We have just seen her preliminary ideas and will probably meet with her again after Christmas to discuss a few changes we want.  After the floor plan is finalized, it has to be approved by the City, which could take around a month.  This means dirt won't be dug until February and construction will likely take around five or six months.  That puts us into July if all goes well.  We don't want to move twice, so will wait to put our house on the market until a couple of months before our new home is ready for habitation.  Coincidentally, our current house is number 795 – our new home will be 1295 – it's on a road with the interesting name of Raindagger.

Nigel's Adventures.  I haven't done any major expeditions this year, but lots of smaller ones.

Anderson Mill and Isaac Bradshaw's grave:  In April,I did some four-wheeling with two old exploring friends, Kurt and Ben.  We teamed up with a new friend by the name of Bob Cox and visited two places out in the desert NW of Phoenix.  The mill formerly processed mica, mined close by, that was used for electrical and heat insulation.  As you can see from the photo  it was built on the side of a deep streambed, usually dry.  It was in operation during and after World War II, closing in 1951.  A lot of the building is still standing – probably because it is so far from anywhere (15 miles on rough dirt roads).  

A lot of the building is still standing – probably because it is so far from anywhere (15 miles on rough dirt roads).  To save money, the two brothers who owned the mine used a lot of surplus war material.  The machinery was driven by pulleys and huge belts, connected to a large diesel engine.  



While we were poking around above the mill, we came across this beautiful ocotillo in bloom.

(Ocotillo bush is on the left, 
                close up is on the right.)

From the mill, we drove north for another 20 miles of dirt road to Bradshaw's grave – an even more remote site.  Isaac Bradshaw died on Christmas Day, 1886, at age 67.  He had a brother and they both mined for gold and silver in what are now called the Bradshaw Mountains.  The photo shows the grave, surrounded by a white picket fence.  Apparently an earlier fence had been replaced with a new one in 2007.  I doubt that there was any fence originally – just a mound of stones with maybe a wooden cross.  

You can see the huge saguaro cacti nearby and other desert flora.  This photo is a close up of the blossom of a spiny prickly pear – cactus flowers are alway striking, with their waxen sheen.  

Hikes to Richinbar and in Sedona: During May, I explored another mine called Richinbar, which is just off the Interstate (motorway) from Phoenix to Prescott.   You can read the blog that I wrote about my visit there plus see some photos: nigelr-yta-richinbar.blogspot.com.  On the last day in May, I took Stephen and his dog on my favorite hike in Sedona – go to the following blog if you are interested: nigel-lost-canyon-2014.blogspot.com  

Agua Fria National Monument (AFNM):  About ten years ago, I did a lot of exploring all over the AFNM (agua fria translates to cold water).  A National Monument is like a National Park, but a lot smaller.  The AFNM has scores of Indian Ruins dating back to the 1300s, plus lots of petroglyphs.  It also has some interesting historic remains from around a century ago – including Richinbar.  Where I volunteer I have access to aerial photos of the AFNM and back in February I scanned a particular area that I hoped would show some new ruins.  I did not see any, but I did notice some black lines that looked worth a visit.  On the far side of a steep valley, there was a walled enclosure – common in England but not in Arizona.  I tried to find out from the archaeologist of the NM, but he had no ideas – I think his interest was more in ancient ruins.  

My friend Bob Cox is a member of the Arizona Archaeology Society and he set up a tour for October, with me as the guide.  A few of their members came, but none of them were really sure when the walls were built or for what purpose.  The best guess was the walls were for cattle, perhaps to feed the miners at Richinbar.

On my visit there in February I had found an Indian artifact – two metates worn into the native basalt on the side of the steep valley.  A metate was used by the Indians to grind their corn (maize).  After much use, the grinding stone they held in their hand (called a mano) created a small depression, as shown in the photo.  We did find some native potsherds in the same area, so modern man wasn't the first person to settle there.

Sedona Tour:  Later in October, I took three ladies for a tour in Sedona.  One was a friend of a relative of Donna – a lady named Jey, who lives near Cape Cod.  This was the second

recommendation Jey has given for my Bumpy Road Adventures.  I took the ladies to a few places including the Devil's Kitchen.  This is a huge sink hole in the red rock, accessible by a steep and scary dirt road, which climbs up a series of 'stairs'.  Another place we went to was the Van Deren log cabin, built in the 1920s.  We finished the day on Schnebly Hill Road viewing an impressive sunset.  The town of Sedona was named by an early settler after his wife – Sedona Schnebly. 

Tragedy:  There have been two forest fires near Prescott this summer.  The first burned over Granite Mountain and was named the Doce Fire.  It was contained before it could burn any houses by an experienced team of firefighters called the Granite Mountain Hotshots from Prescott.  The second fire was on the edge of Yarnell – a town about 30 miles SW of Prescott.  This fire took the lives of 19 of the hotshots.  Such a death toll is very uncommon, so it probably reached the English newspapers as well as being headlines in the US.  The hotshots were moving down hill through tinder-dry brush to a safe place when the strong winds changed direction unexpectedly.  They were in the wrong place at the wrong time and had no way to escape.  

During the early stages of the Doce Fire, the hotshots had taken special action to save a huge alligator juniper tree by doing a back burn around it.  This tree was thought to be the largest juniper in Arizona and about 1800 years old.  It was 53 feet high with the trunk 31 feet in circumference and a 71 foot crown spread.  This tree has become something of a memorial to the hotshots and a plaque has been erected next to it.  My hiking group went there in November – we had hiked to it a few times in earlier years.  Alligator junipers are amazing trees (their bark looks like the skin of an alligator).  After a severe drought parts of the tree can die but some of the branches soldier on – the dead branches seen in the photo are due to drought, not to the fire.

Love Nigel & Donna