After the overly exciting day getting into and out of the first campsite at Ponderosa Campground, I was glad to open my door on a beautiful new day.
There were a couple things I wanted to do, and both of them involved rocks.
My first stop was hunting for crystals at Diamond Rim Quartz Crystal Collection Site.
Since it was after March 1, I was restricted to looking for crystals on the surface. The ranger at the ranger station recommended that I look in the washes. I parked and headed over to the wash.
I found a rock that looks like it has quartz crystals imbedded in it, but it’s larger than I wanted. It stayed in the wash for someone else.
It was a nice day for a walk in the forest.
It smelled very piney. I know pine forests smell piney, but there was a lot of logging taking place. On the way to the site, I passed several active logging locations. The remnants of previous logging were still visible here.
I found some beautiful rocks.
I’m more of a “catch-and-release” rock collector these days. When my pockets got full, I took a picture and left them in the wash.
This was an interesting rock in the bed of the wash. When I found it, it looked like it was filled with sugar-white sand. I started brushing it out, and found damp reddish sand at the bottom. It looks like the rock was gouged out by hand, with finger prints raking from the rim to the center of the rock.
I pushed on, and discover this recent hole. Not only was it not back-filled, it was at the base of a tree. Now, maybe this isn’t a ponderosa – I didn’t think to do a tree ID – but it definitely isn’t backfilled and it looks like it was dug after March 1.
I collected another pocketful of rocks. It was time for a little more “catch-and-release.”
I finally found my crystals!
I’m pretty sure that the one on the left is a crystal. The one on the right might be a piece of glass.
The map the ranger gave me said that there was an overlook at the end of the road I was on. I decided to drive up and take a look.
What a view!
Believe it or not, there was great cell phone reception. Four bars LTE!
It would have been hard to be much closer to the towers!
My next rock-related activity was geode hunting. Konnie had shared an article about it that included a location, and the ranger marked the map where I might find them. I drove around and didn’t see any places that looked too promising. I finally found a small wash and got out to look around.
I found some interesting lichens. They almost looked like fractals.
I poked around until I found a rock that looked most likely to be a geode.
I planned to crack it open when I got back to camp.
I drove on, intending to head back to Payson and then back to camp. I came across an archeological site.
This site had been a walled village that was occupied between 1000 and 1200 AD. There were about 80 rooms in the village and they were built in different styles.
The site was first recorded in 1930 by archeologist John Hughes, but further studies didn’t take place until 1984, when Dr. Charles Redman from Arizona State University lead a field program over a four year period.
The evidence of the rooms are just outlines now.
Some of the rooms are squarish.
Other rooms are more oval-shaped constructed in a style called “jacal”. From what I understand, these houses had a stone base with the walls constructed of “wattle and daub” – vertical poles were lashed together and then the walls were constructed of branches, grasses, mud and adobe.
There is not much to see anymore.
According to a sign, this pile of rocks is the remains of a two-story apartment building.
This stump is so old that it looks like it might have started growing in the last days of the village.
The site is surround by the remains of the village wall. Trees grow in what is left of it.
Incidentally, I think I know where the name of the village came from. I was swatting flies away from my face the whole time I was walking the trail.
On my way back to the truck, I discovered another survey marker. More for my photo collection!
After I stopped off at a store, I headed back to the campsite. I couldn’t wait to see if I had found a geode!
I assembled the tools.
I proceeded to work on splitting the rock. Geode? Node?
Nope. Just a rock.