We got to the Parker Dam area on Friday late afternoon. We had passed a few boondocking spots but wanted to try and get closer to the trail to the desert bar. Unfortunately, we struck out and ended up driving back toward Lake Havasu but at this point it was really dark and we couldn’t see where any of the spots were. We finally found what looked like a big gravel lot and called it good enough. In the morning we were happy that we were at least at the entrance of the boondocking area so we found a better spot and then took off for the desert bar.
The Nellie E. Saloon aka The Desert Bar to the locals, is located off the beaten path south of Parker Dam. We found the moderate rated trail early and I was a little hesitant when there was a big rock hill right off the bat.
After trying a few lines, the third was the charm and we were on our way. The rest of the trail was not all that hard. We ran into two other vehicles making their way to the bar as well. We ended up showing up right after them and joined them for lunch. They were from the area and it was fun to talk about the weather and make a little fun of them for having on jackets and thinking it was cold on a beautiful 70 degree day. One of the guys even told us a story about visiting the East coast during the winter and he didn’t know what the weird brush thing was in his rental car.
The Desert Bar was really fun. It truly is out in the middle of nowhere. It’s cash only and do not ask for cheese if you order from the upstairs grill. We don’t know what that is about but they were pretty serious about it. We were there before it technically opened at noon but people steadily piled in as the hours passed. A band started playing and it was a really fun atmosphere. The bar is tucked in among some tall rocky hills and you could climb up them for a better view. Our new friends took off and we stayed to enjoy the place for a while. We ended up taking the “normal” road back and headed back to camp.
Sunday we drove south and east through Phoenix and Tucson and found a great little free campground just north of Sonoita nestled in the middle of a working cattle ranch. We settled in and enjoyed the beautiful views! The sunrises and sunsets were amazing, we heard coyotes howling at night and even had one speed across the road in front of us. And of course there were the cattle that we had to give a little space too.
Monday was my birthday!! I have always loved my birthday and that hasn’t changed. We enjoyed a nice relaxing morning and then headed into the small town of Sonoita that actually had a brewery. I was sad to learn they shut down for the night for their staff party. That was a bummer. Thankfully there was one other restaurant in town, The Steak Out Saloon. We parked ourselves at the bar and watched as it slowly filled up and our bartender ran her butt off. I ordered a steak, which was awesome and when our bartender finally slowed down for a minute, we asked if she would do a shot with us to celebrate my birthday. Her huge smile and sigh of relief was great. She chose fireball, Craig and I chose tequila. We toasted and she went on to get the bar to sing Happy Birthday to me. We had so much fun!
The next couple days we relaxed some more and took some off-road trails that were in the area. One was supposed to be easy and go through four ghost towns on the route. We only found two of them and ended up off the GPS map and wandered around on Forest Service roads. We came upon two Border Patrol trucks and it looked like they were consolidating and getting into one truck, leaving one behind. They quickly took off and we lost track of them. We continued exploring and came to the US/Mexico border, which felt kind of weird. There was just a fence and a road that ran next to it on the US side. We drove it for a little while and then swung back north before we ended up getting stopped by border patrol or who knows who else. There were signs about smuggling and illegal immigration so we definitely didn’t want to run into any problems.
We were on a road that we thought would spit us out onto the main road to Nogales when we passed a couple from Northern California. They said border patrol had just sped passed them and that there was even a helicopter in the air, something was definitely going down. As we continued in the same direction we could hear the helicopter. We climbed up a mountain road and came upon three empty border patrol trucks.
We sat for a minute not sure if they were blocking the road when the helicopter came pretty close to us. We weren’t sure if they were checking us out or what but it moved away quickly. We realized the road wasn’t blocked and continued on only to find it dead ended. We turned back around and went all the way back to where we got on the trail in the first place.
We made our way back to Sonoita and were happy that the Copper Brothel Brewery was open. The beer and food were both excellent and I even got free sopapillas for my birthday since they felt bad they were closed on my actual birthday. If you don’t know, a sopapilla is a sweet dough, fried and tossed in cinnamon sugar and served with honey and it’s warm. So delicious!
We went on another trail the next day that started just north of our campground. There are border patrol checkpoints everywhere and we ended up going through two with no problems. I guess they figure we can’t smuggle anyone in the little black Jeep. They did have a K9 working and he had contact with every single car that went through. Busy dog!
We followed the trail and found ourselves down in a wash and then at the turn we were supposed to take the trail was closed. Bummer. We continued west on the main road and enjoyed the scenery. We popped out in Green Valley and headed south to Tubac. We had talked to Craig’s Aunt Karen & Uncle Roger and they told us it was a cool town. It was a very interesting artsy little town. Lots of beautiful pottery for sale. We went to Jack’s Saloon and grabbed a quick lunch.
We then headed back north to get to the start of another trail that would take us back through the Santa Rita mountains and end up south of Sonoita. The trail wasn’t too hard. We wound our way up and over the mountains, dodging cows and finding weird cacti. We came upon some adobe ruins which were neat to see as well.
Today we relaxed in camp. It’s nice and quiet and there are not many other campers around. Gus has been enjoying being off leash and the weather has been pretty good for the most part. We will pack up tomorrow and head east and eventually set up camp near Carlsbad Cavern National Park, NM.
Off to the caverns…