Paws and Friends

View just west of House Rock--looking east towards Congress Okay, here we are near the end of March 2014....and it has been 26 days since any updates have been posted here....! The weather has been glorious! Sunny days and cool nights. We have even felt a little guilty (REALLY!) watching the weather across the US, while we have been enjoying such beautiful weather just House Rock north of the Valley of the Sun, here at North Ranch.  We have been busy  planning our spring and summer travels, as well as entertaining "guests" and taking trips into new areas  of our Arizona "Outback" with our 4 seater side-by-side we call the Blue Buggy. Late February a friend took us out to "House Rock," north west of Congress. We found ourselves in terrain similar to that of the Superstition Mountains, an area we fell in love with during our first Paws and Friends "under" House Rock winter season in Apache Junction, AZ before full timing. Following ...

If you are a frequent visitor to this blog, you know that we do love history and this area around Wickenburg is rich with history! There are the first people, first settlers: the Yavapai. Then there is "recent" history, the 1860's, in the Congress area, when a massive gold deposit was found in a place they named Rich Hill. This brought many gold seekers to the Valley of the Hassayampa which continues to this day! Many residents of North Ranch spend their time out in the hills to the north east gathering buckets of dirt which they bring back and run through their temporary wash--hunting for gold dust.... We just enjoy the scenery! So, after traveling by this Preserve , part of the Nature Conservancy, many times these past two years, we finally stopped mid January for a visit! It was a treat! See for yourselves! Here are some pictures of our visit. Its history goes back to the "recent" history of this area--after the gold seekers settled down to ranching in the ...