(new post - travel, photos) two animals, rocks, and a bridge

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                January 7, 2025

            (new post - travel, photos) two animals, rocks, and a bridge

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here today to launch a new genre of post on my blog. i'm not a professional photographer by any means, but like millions of other creatures i do have a camera - and i like capturing things that look nice.
a couple months ago, my girlfriend and i planned a trip around northern arizona. having gotten a taste of the area the year previous with mutual friends, we always tossed around going back to sedona again as a little weekend getaway - the time finally felt right once the fall weather hit and existing outside no longer felt like a nightmare. this trip had the dual purpose for me as a send-off of sorts to this region; like i say on my now page, i'm moving to a different part of the US soon, and because i mostly came here out of desperation, i never really went out of my way to learn about the beauty and history here. i've been fortunate to have a couple of local friends who've educated me about the O'odham and nearby Tongva stewardships of these and those lands, and some of the ecological workings; it helped deepen my understanding of those parts of the southwest, and get an appreciation for a place i was forced to go that i couldn't stand to be.
this vacation was my first time planning one with a partner, and it went really well! we started by leaving phoenix for camp verde, which is where we would stick around for the first day.
day 1
montezuma castle monument, right by camp verde. it's an old complex built by indigenous peoples, who lived in the rooms and caves that are mostly tucked away into the rock face. just below the site is a river that is a lifeblood for this area; the height of the structure provided a safe vantage point to watch for its flash floods.
the second day was a lot busier.
day 2
dead horse ranch park, just west of camp verde. this is a little forested hiking spot - i'm not very able, so we stuck to a couple very simple trails as we got warmed up for the day. this path led right down to the verde river, which in my hometown we would call a creek but was beautiful to see nonetheless.

jerome, an ex-mining town way up in the mountains. my gf found this place a couple years ago on a whim, and she insisted we come back so she could show me and we could have some bbq here that was apparently pretty good.

waaay up in the mountains - i'm used to mountain driving where i'm from, but i'd never stopped in a town that was this high up! (the bbq was very tasty.)

moving on after lunch, eventually: rocks! this is cathedral rock, specifically.

sedona, the one and only. on our first trip with our friends in 2023, we must've lucked out to have found a perfect spot to climb on the rocks and look around; this time we had a lot of difficulty finding a good place to park and be close to the red rocks that wasn't hiking-intensive. i was Very confused. i didn't really get the opportunity to watch the sunset wash over them like i wanted, but it was still beautiful and i was with my gf, so i can't really complain. we made the most of it by walking around a couple shopping centers and laughing at the dumb crystal stuff together. sedona is a very, very weird place.
after that, we drove back to our hotel in the dark. because so much of northern arizona is a dark sky spot and we went long stretches without anyone else on the road, i could actually almost see the milky way and i spent a lot of that ride with the window down, trying to stick my head out far enough to look up, transfixed by the sky above. i tried to get a good picture, but this is all i ended up with:
the sky wasn't nearly this bright, it was pitch black - my phone's camera has some night-vision capabilities to see stars more clearly, and i guess it interacted weirdly with the horizon and maybe ambient light from the car.
day 3
the whole trip was pretty touch and go, but the last day we were even less sure of what we were gonna do. i found the tonto natural bridge on google maps and was delighted, and then subsequently devastated when i realized it would add an extra 2 hours of driving on the way home - in the mountains. my girlfriend (the designated driver of the relationship) was very gracious though, and wanted to see the bridge with me. this was my favourite stop of the entire trip, and it's all thanks to her.

tonto natural bridge. first photo was from up above; i'd read that the only way to see the cave from below was to hike down a very, very steep, if short, trail. and initially i had no aspirations of trying, knowing my physical limits - but when i looked at the waterfall from above, i knew that i was probably never going to come back here, and i would rather my legs be miserable than to be miserable myself for the rest of my life for having never even tried. so we very ambitiously hiked down, and it was hell on my body but it was so worth it.
i had a really good time on this trip.
northern arizona is odd - it doesn't seem to be rural in the way some other sparsely-populated places are, especially not where i'm from. it's way more affluent, sub-urby, more consumerist. the bigger municipalities are very chic; aesthetically cutting-edge. the surrounding beauty is "preserved", but the life inside is curated. it almost feels a little defensive of itself. in a psychic shop, a security guard ignored the other patrons and followed us very closely until we left. as an indigenous person, there's a bit of a rancid vibe that i can't shake while trying to enjoy the sights up there; but you really, really can't beat those views.
for completionism's sake, i'll post a couple photosets from our 2023 sedona and grand canyon trip, as well. the weather was much more dreary and even a tiny bit snowy when we went, which i actually really loved!

The Rocks. the vibes were impeccable (and i'm not talking about the spiritual vortexes)

The Rocks (or lack thereof) of All Time. like... come on, man. i'm so, so so glad that i got to see the grand canyon before moving away. (that last picture, we must've been within two meters of the cliff face; that is the closest i'm ever getting to an unfenced drop in my entire life.)
another thing i love taking photos of is the storms here in phoenix, so i'll probably do a best-of with those next time i wanna share some pictures. as tough as it is to live in this climate, there are some really wonderful sights to be had. i'm glad i learned to appreciate it before it was too late.
howling at the moon
(leave a comment on the blog post if you like! thanks for reading 🧡)

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