Bluegrass Festival and Off-Roading in Arizona!

ahschneid
Nov 15, 2024
4 min read

Spectacular Arizona Sunset

We've been enjoying our time in Congress Arizona, getting RV\truck maintenance things done and playing pickle ball about three times a week. We heard about a Bluegrass Festival happening in Wickenburg one weekend, so we decided to go. Anita didn't think she'd want to stay for more than a song or two, but she was pleasantly surprised to like Bluegrass quite a bit! The bands performing at the festival were very talented and we actually stayed a few hours.

Bluegrass Festival Wickenburg Arizona 9 November 2024

Bluegrass Festival Wickenburg Arizona 9 November 2024

The Po' Ramblin' Boys

Bluegrass Festival Wickenburg Arizona 9 November 2024

The Arizona Wildflowers (Oldest band member is 16 years old)

Our campsite at North Ranch in Congress Arizona

We went on our first off roading trip 7 November 2024. This trip was to see a few abandoned mines and desert cacti. It's really convenient from North Ranch Campground, with the entrance to the trails being at a gate at the back of the campground. Ed, our driver, has a side by side with four seats, so we rode with him. Most of the other side by sides were two seaters, many with couples in them. The group met at the "back gate" at 8:45am and left at 9am. We got back a little after 2pm with every stitch of our outer layer of clothes being dusty. No worries, we expected that.

What we didn't expect was to have a dead battery when we got to our truck. It turned out to be two dead batteries (Anita didn't know we have two batteries in the RAM truck). We called our new friends we had met at church for help. They happened to be on their way home from some errands and stopped by within minutes. We took the truck in for new batteries the next day and now it's running great again.

Our first off roading trip 7 November 2024

It was 39 when we left and going about 30mph felt cold!

Side by side vehicles 7 November 2024

View from side by side 7 November 2024

Group pulling up to one of the stops 7 November 2024

Side by sides climbing 7 November 2024

Cacti 7 November 2024

Unusual Crested Saguaro Cactus (center) 7 November 2024

Another Unusual Crested Saguaro Cactus 7 November 2024

Lunch 7 November 2024

Active Gold Mine entrance 7 November 2024

Inside mine 7 November 2024

Steve went inside the gold mine. Anita stayed out and enjoyed the wide open view.

Inside mine 7 November 2024

Inside mine 7 November 2024

Petroglyphs 7 November 2024

Our second off roading trip was to Roleto Cabin which is a miners cabin that is to this day maintained and required to make available for anyone wanting to spend the night in. While the claim apparently had no one there, it is still being mined. The current owners of the claim keep it registered to preserve ownership and the cabin. Our driver, Ed, told us that a couple of years ago some off roaders discovered a young family squatting in the cabin! We saw a calendar from 2020, so we assume it was then.

The Roleto Cabin is down a steep descent about 100 feet after riding up to a 6,000 ft elevation. One of the ladies in our group had a nasty fall on the way down to the cabin. She had grabbed onto my (Anita) shoulders and I hoped to stabilize her, but she went down head first into a cat claw bush.

After she got up, she went back up to their side by side. The rest of the group was down by the cabin having lunch and looking at a mine behind the cabin. The lady who fell was with the leader of that day's ride, so they cut their day short to get her checked out at the ER. Our driver led the group back home. We stopped by Dwayne and Geovanna's place to check on her the following day when we were out on a walk and her ankle/foot is wrapped in an ace bandage. Nothing's broken, thankfully.

After two off-roading trips we've decided it is certainly addictive! We went places we could not get to hiking nor in our truck. We were also amazed at how smooth the ride was. The trails had deep ruts and or rocks in sections, but the side by side just took it in stride. Ed is also a very good driver. It was fun being in one and watching others go over the rough spots. The side by sides look like futuristic transformers while going over the ruts and rocks.