Sedona Again

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One more day and we’ll start our long drive home. On the way we’ll see Monument Valley and Arches National Park. That part will be fun, but all the driving in between….Yuck!

We have settled into a nice routine here. I am up early and out for a walk and latte by 7:30am every morning. Others in the house seem to like to sleep longer.

The Oak Creek Fire continues to burn. The fire teams have cut and burned areas surrounding the fire and need to wait until the main fire burns up to those stop points. Sort of lighting a fire to stop a fire. The strategy should prove out, one way or another, during this coming week. In the meantime the smoke is filling the valley and smells awful.

On Saturday my friend and I went into Marg’s Draw near Sedona and saw some most marvellous country. I got a nice panoramic image of the draw, but I spent most of the time on the hike looking more at the close, micro scenery. I had fun with this and have enclosed a few of my images.

We also went out to a fantastic restaurant on Friday called ‘Elote’. It is a Mexican based restaurant, but serves meals that are like no other…..anywhere. My meal was a delicious chicken and vegetable meal obtained in a large, green pepper skin with a pumpkin cream sauce. We ate at 4:30pm so that we didn’t have to wait too long. That part of the evening worked. When we came out at around 5:30pm there was a huge waiting line. Evidently this is common every night. You can’t book ahead so many people end up waiting in line for two hours to get in.

Today, Sunday, we went to see some very good petroglyphs at the V Bar V Ranch near Sedona.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-Bar-V_Heritage_Site

The guide at the petroglyph wall was very knowledgeable and added to the visit.

We also went to the local Sedona Art Gallery and listened to a writer-photographer named Larry Lindahl.

http://www.larrylindahl.com/portfolios/

He had a very good presentation and demonstrated his arts of writing and photography. He seemed to coming at his art in a way that is similar to my approach, but he is making his living at it and has many published works, so I guess he operates in a bit of a different league. He was a very nice fellow and not at all pretentious.

Not much more to say without boring you. We do spend a lot of time just hanging out in this marvellous place….not much to say about that other than it feels good. I hope you enjoy the attached photos from the past few days.

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Photos

Marg's Draw
This area is special. While the rocks, plants, and animals are not unique for this area, they come together in a unique way.

Red Bush Root
I have no idea what this plant is, but the intensity of the dark red part of the bark winding its way around the small trunk is very beautiful to me.

Agave Plant
This is the plant that produces the agave that we use at home as a sweetener. I produces a long stock(8 ft.) in the centre on which an array of blooms appears.

V Bar V Petroglyphs
This is but a small showing of the petroglyphs.

Oak Creek Fire-May 25
Again, this is an awful blow to the people of Sedona and Flagstaff. It is the loss of a scenic gem and will probably prove to be a loss of tourist income in the future.