Hunting Stories Online
We were not planning to go rock and arrowhead hunting in Arizona. My wife and I just liked the hot springs in the desert. It was agood place to escape the Michigan winter for a while.
Then we met Felix, an old Mayan Indian living in an old RV. After sharing meals and campfires for a week, took us to the desert to show old grinding stones (stones for grinding grain), and arrowheads. They also found hundreds of beautiful stones of all kinds, including Apache Tears, Fire Agate, quartz and diverse.
Irina, a nineteen-year-old "rainbow kid," who had been living in her van for months, was with Felix in his old truck. We took our van. We spent two hours at the first stop. The recent rain had made the rocks and artifacts stand out, washing them clean. We were mostly just rock collecting.
Irina and my wife Ana found odd pieces that may have been arrowheads. Found ancient pottery, and Felix came back with half a pot painted with a complex design. It was probably hundreds of years. Felix had been in the wilderness for years, and kept seeing things we missed.
Pony Express Ruins
In our second stop, Felix showed us ruins of an old Pony Express station. Unmarked and forgotten, the grass and mud brick walls were still partially standing. I realized I had not seen a single other car. There are some isolated areas in Arizona, and this is one of them. We started arrowhead hunting around the ruins, because Felix insisted the building would have been fired upon by arrows.
Up the hill behind the ruins, Felix showed us rocks with holes six inches wide, a foot deep or more, and perfectly round. They were full of water – its purpose, according to Felix. We like the water with fewer errors, but he and Irina drank the water collected in them. It was quiet, overlooking the valley.
Arrowhead hunting success
Above the hill, we had a little luck searching for rocks and arrowheads, but not like Felix. We have seen hundreds of pieces of pottery, but all very clear about the future. He found pottery that had beautiful designs, and grinding stones. There was a small arrowhead transparent quartz, well done, probably had been used to hunt small birds two hundred years earlier.
Each of us wandered a bit. Ana and me back to the first van, and returned Irina and Felix, who cooked beans with instant rice on our camp stove. After dinner, we said goodbye, and the directions of trade. Were Back to the baths, as we drove away with bags of rocks, an antelope horn, and two broken arrowheads.
Notes:
For interesting rocks, go out after a rain and you can see the fire agate and tears Apache laying in the sand. For the best rock collecting, visit the areas Rockhound designated in southeastern Arizona. As for arrowhead hunting, and ancient pottery, enjoy, but may be illegal to keep any artifacts now. The BLM office in Safford can give you directions and more information.
Steve Gillman hit the road at sixteen, and traveled the United States and Mexico alone at 17. Now 40, he travels with his wife Ana, whom he met in Ecuador. Read more stories, tips and travel information at: http://www.EverythingAboutTravel.com
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