Sunday October 1st 2017

I had less than 100 miles to travel today. I took my time packing up and getting on the road. It was just before noon when I left Dead Horse Ranch State Park. My destination was Lake Pleasant Regional Park in Maricopa County AZ.

Site 53 at the Roadrunner Campground in the Lake Pleasant Regional Park.

Most of the travel was on Interstate 17 with some significant elevation changes. Dead Horse Ranch State Park is in the Verde River valley at about 3,300 feet. Lake Pleasant Regional Park is at about 1700 feet. It sounds like it would be all down hill but it isn’t. Leaving the Verde Valley to the south you need to climb about 1500 feet rather quickly then it is mostly down hill with a few additional climbs thrown in for good measure. The complicating factor was the wind. I had a strong cross wind to fight much of the way. Traffic was also heavy with one accident slowing traffic for a couple of miles.

View of the saguaro cactus in my front year. Phoenix is out there ten miles or so.

I arrived at Lake Pleasant Regional Park around 1:30PM. The terrain in this area is much different from the higher areas to the north. First this area is about ten degrees warmer than the Verde Valley. The other significant difference is I have returned to an area with tall saguaro cactus. My campsite is on the side of a hill with a view across the open desert. I have several saguaro cactus in my front yard.

Sunset over the desert.

Lake Pleasant is a large reservoir providing recreation and water for the Phoenix area. There were lots of watercraft around when I arrived, but I haven’t checked out the area yet. After I got setup I turned the Air conditioning on and stayed inside until the sun was setting. It was around 95 degrees when I arrived and is expected to get even warmer as the week goes by. I’m here until the middle of next week. It will be nice not to be traveling on a Sunday when I leave here. The end of the weekend contributed to the heavy traffic.