February 18
Cochise Stronghold, Arizona

(Click on pictures to enlarge)

(Maybe 2005) It was a beautiful hike the other day. Lots of rain meant that the mountains were full of little streams and some streams not so little. We had to drive through three to get to the trail head and then walk through several on the hike. The plan was to go three miles up and three miles back--that would have put us at the top of something. We made it two miles up and I'll tell you, that last half mile was not much fun.

It's rugged country. You can see why Cochise would have picked this area for his grave site, which, unlike the hapless Geronimo's, was not marked for Yalies to rob for Skull and Bones.

Cochise died of stomach cancer.

Here's my dog, Gumby, all suited up for the hike. He carried his own water (which we didn't need with all those streams) and my oranges.

The rocks at Cochise Stronghold, unlike the volcanic tuff in the Chiricahuas, are granite but they are pink and not the gray with which I am more familiar.

Nothing was in bloom this early except the manzanita shrubs.

This little creature is a red velvet mite. It's on a lichen-covered rock. I'll need to experiment a little more with the macro feature of this camera--it was a little blurry.

Saints celebrating feast days today include Saint Simeon, Saint Leo and Saint Paregorius, Saint Flavian, Saint Helladius, Saint Colman of Lindisfarne, Saint Angilbert, and Saint Theotonius.

Birthdays: Toni Morrison (1931, Lorain, OH), Yoko Ono (1933, Tokyo), Cybill Shepherd (1950, Memphis).

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© Marilyn Jones 2000-2008