Goldfield and the Apache Trail

This is the remnants of the goldmining days in Goldfield on the Apache Trail, just outside Apache Junction, AZ. The town is a ghost town of sorts, but is being refurbished as a tourist attraction with narrow gauge railroad and mining and jeep tours. A few businesses are opening like a bakery, a saloon and the local "house of ill repute" along with the church. On weekends, local cowboys portray a realistic shoot-out.

The dust flies, the cowboys fight it out and the crowd spurs them on. The gals arrive in period costume to claim the last cowboy standing. All of this takes place in front of the local jail. We sampled delicacies from the bakery and checked out the shops. Trail rides are available for those who wish to ride in the desert but the snakes are very much awake so we passed on this adventure.

Further along the Apache Trail, we passed the beautiful Canyon Lake and on to Tortilla Flat, population 6. A restaurant and gift shop whose walls and ceiling are lined with $1.00 bills is a sight to behold. All who live here, work here! Bikers from everywhere sample specialty hamburgers, hot dawgs and chili as well as Sonoran Mexican fare. "Hanging" is an errant prospector. When Tortilla Flat celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2004, the schoolhouse was set up as a museum. Ten students, five Petersens who originally ran the store, the post office and the gas station and the 5 Connollys whose father looked after the dams, attended. The teacher came from Mesa, staying in the accompanying living quarters from Monday to Friday. Yikes! A long way from home and on such a treacherous road!

Further along the trail, and as the elevation increased, the landscape changed to a barren desert of cacti, palo verde, mesquite and saguaro. Beautiful. Huge canyon walls and crevasses, one of which is Fish Creek towered over the floor below. It felt like you could reach out and touch the sky. Who can doubt....there is God?????

The road narrowed, barely passable to one vehicle as we descended into the canyon. Twists and turns with no shoulder, rock walls, a creek bed marked our descent into the canyon. I cannot imagine how mules and horses packed with construction materials for the Roosevelt Dam navigated this trail so long ago...and this was much improved! But this is the reason that this trail exists...to haul materials and service the Roosevelt Dam through the Superstitions.

The Theodore Roosevelt dam is now 357 feet (109 m) high, after renovations in 1996, and was originally built between 1905 and 1911, and renovated 1989 - 1996. The dam has a hydroelectric generating capacity of 36,000 kW. It forms the Theodore Roosevelt Lake as it impounds the Salt River. When full, the lake covers more than 19,000 acres near the confluence of Tonto Creek and the Salt River. This was, without a doubt, one of the most beautiful drives ever.

Yet, in the vastness and ruggedness of this desert landscape, the delicate cacti flowers dot the terrain as they are beginning to burst forth in their reds, yellows and magentas. Giant saguaros with magestic "arms" are numerous but not in bloom as yet. Cactus wrens flitted about from saguaro to saguaro. Beautiful!