Mountain Road & Coronado Nat'l Forest

There is a gravel mountain road east of Tucson that will take you to Benson, AZ the long way.  Tanque Verde Rd ends and the beginning of Reddington Rd begins.  I'm not really sure why this road was built other than as a ranch road, but it sure is rough.  It also takes you to some of the most pretty areas around Tucson.  The Coronado National Forest covers most of the area and is quite wild.  There are a lot of "sign hunters" in this area and that must be the reason the sign above is made out of steel.  

There were so many beautiful areas that it was impossible to capture them all.  Down in the valley was a stream that had numerous waterfalls.  Of course since it hasn't rained in a couple months, the waterfalls were dried up. I would like to come back when they are flowing and get some photos .  The area is very rocky and difficult to walk around in other than some hiking trails.  These trails are beyond my ability to hike now, but it would have been great a few years ago.   Gerry and Sharon took a short walk down a trail to check it out and said it was a nice walking trail.

Al retrieving the cache

There was a geocache about 2 miles off the main road on a ranch road and we decided to drive there and pick it up.  Wow, that was one rough road and we had to take it both ways.  The truck was fine on the road, but it had us bouncing around the cab of the truck like rubber balls.  We did find the cache and also the small lake back there.  The lake was very beautiful and I wonder how the water level stays so high.  I found the cache and Al crawled out on a rock to retrieve it.  I tried to come in from the side, but Mr. Cactus didn't want me there and gave me a reason to not try that again. 

The area has numerous cattle roaming around and every once in a while we came upon small groups grazing in the fields.  They must be sturdy cattle since the hillsides must be difficult for them to negotiate.  I don't know the different breeds of cattle but there were 4-5 different ones there.  They must not see many people and stared at us as we drove by.  

 

We drove through some wild groups of Saguaro cacti that were even nicer than the ones in the Saguaro National Park.  We were very surprised to see so many old and large cacti growing in the wild.  Many of them had to be over 150 years old and they were in great shape.

By this time we were getting worn out by the rough road and were ready to head for home.  We still had about 43 miles of dirt road ahead of us, however it was in pretty good shape and we were able to make good time.  We did pass this water tank that was decorated like a work of art.  You never know what you are going to see out here in the desert.

And that is how we managed to drive over 130 miles and spend 7 hours on the road.



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