Redington’s Hurricane Surprise

2023-08-22

“No water!” we exclaim. They said that a hurricane would come through, but what happened was just not very exciting.  We’re looking at some puddles and lots more sand.

While parking, we’ve seen one car this morning and one person. Then another smiling nude body along the trail down to the lovely granite canyon base. At the bottom of the trail, a couple of tanned friendly guys are sitting in the sun. They all say the same perplexing thing, “No water!?!”

There is nothing to do but take resolve, “So, this will be just a hike today, not a dip.”

Everyone that we meet is brown, tanned all over. We had left our coverings in the backpack for when we cross the road on the way back. People know. The textiles and their cars are not found anywhere, just naked people. The extended historic drought and temperatures have taken the incentive of water to play in. Those with textile obsession bring a culture that doesn’t appreciate the nature here. It’s party atmosphere. With the water gone, they stay home. The place feels liberated, distracting us from our disappointment.

Redington for much of the year, depending on the year, gets a desert’s sprinkle of rain. At these times, the flow stops and the critters congregate in puddles of water left in the rocks. They must make due with what their world gives them. They are often terribly exposed, to both predators and heat.

The monsoon this year has been goofy.  There has been an unprecedented long heat and very little rain in the Rincons, which are the mountains that feed our canyon with the cumulative flow of its rainfall. It just hasn’t happened. This is odd and dire.

A hurricane’s storm did blow through here just last night, but left no rain. There was plenty on the other side of the hill to the west, less than a handful of miles away. Southern Arizona again is teased by spotty stuff!

We continue upstream.  Without water, there is little in the way, other than the maze of boulders.

We take the time to explore the places that we avoid when there is generally water, or soggy sand in them.

Stopping to eat around the jaccuzzi formation, there is some shade under the shelf of a boulder. I sit in the unusual quiet. Down below, the roar of the jaccuzzi is turned off. It is a dank green bowl of water.

Looking up, I discover graffiti! Some (….) has painted, “BE FREE.”

As I chew, the nature of freedom crosses my mind. Be free, is to have that element of at oneness with nature and the universe. Whatever were they thinking? These persons weren’t really free. This is just an escape for them. I finish a mouthful as I turn to DF, “I’ll bet a two against a hundred, that they were young and wearing swimsuits.”

When I’m done I rise up to inspect the travesty. The offensive was done with some white acrylic. I take my sharp snow tent peg to it. It won’t scrape off. It will take another trip with paint thinner and several paper rags. It’ll come off, when I get around to it. Dang!

I see an interesting composite rock. I pick it up. There is a tiny scorpion under it, which is now in the palm of my hand. I drop it like a hot coal. The last time I was stung on a finger, the numbing pain lingered for weeks.

The dry conditions will eventually allow rattlesnakes in to populate in amongst the rocks. For 50 plus years, I have enjoyed the freedom of no worries of them here, where they get washed away in floods, it is hot and little to eat. This is the second time in my lifetime, both in the last few years, without the essential monsoon season. It isn’t climate change, anymore. It’s climate crisis.

The ocotillos have turned bright leafy green in the last couple of days. They are opportunistic, when it rains. They’ll do that several times a year. Still, there hasn’t been enough here and everywhere plants are brown and dried.

The brittle bush are brown and leafless. These hills have been usually bright yellow this time of year with them. They expend grand bouquets of yellow flowers, carpeting the hillsides. They may take years to come back to that kind of proliferation.

Barrel cacti have blooms. They are gorgeous, literally glowing deep orange, making use of their stored succulent water.

DF pets a large smooth rock formation, sculpted by millennia of periodic rains. She comments that to her, it feels like stroking a dolphin. She pets it and talks to it.

An odd shadow a goddess rises up from the gloomy ponded water.

There are a few puddles from the trickle of rain. They are silly, but hey, it’s water to Arizonans. We generally take what we can get. DF sits with her feet in one of three puddles.

It is tongue in cheek, wadding. Yea, fresh water, but barely as deep as our ankles.

The contrast here can be stunning. Here’s a comparisons in one spot of peak and drought.

We see just how deep some of the features are, now that they are no longer covered in water.

DF grumbles as she spots two glass beer bottles that were left by pigs. One has a cigarette butt inside, “How considerate!” It’s a little release by sarcasm.

She resolves to carry them both all the way back. If we don’t, they will wash away with the next rain, smash into the rocks, break and float the sharp glass into the water and sand downstream.

I relish the experience of barefoot movement in this canyon. It is different than anywhere that I know in this world. I feel anger, too. My grumble is something more sinister, akin to “Some ignorant people deserve….” This drunk might as well be walking around waving broken glass and slicing bodies.

I see a small stripped water snake looking for a safe haven below in a crevasse.

DF finds another cigarette butt, nearly an entire cigarette of the same brand. She carries it too, all the way to the truck above.

We arrive at the main pool, now main puddle. There are a few newcomers enjoying themselves, all surprised at the lack of hurricane water. We hear our trail names, “Hey there DF and Jbee!” Jeff, who knows this site, makes us feel at home.

Just as we approach the trailhead, we are pleased to bump into regular visitor Archie and his little pack of three dogs. “No water!” has become like a greeting. He decides to head further downstream. This is a day to reclaim the “lost” nude area, which on this day is deserted by the encroaching textiles.

We usually stop at the “Danger Flash Flood” sign and slip on something to get across the road. Today, an ATV is heard, it passes on and there is no need to be bothered with covering. We enjoy that and the sense of walking freely out into a usually public area to go home naked.

DF grins and poses as a hussy with a cigarette, standing naked in the middle of the street.

We like this sense liberation. There is only the comradery of freely nude people here today.

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