Day 15

Sunday June 23. We are now leaving Winslow, Arizona. If that name sounds familiar to you, too, it's probably because of the Eagles song: "Well I'm-a standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona /and such a fine sight to see....Taking it eeeeeeasy!" I don't know if the town has anything else to be known for, but based on our lackluster experience there, I doubt it. 

We camped last night at a free campground near a reservoir. It was dark when we arrived so we couldn't see much, but the proximity of the water seemed to offer a bit of relief from the desert heat we've become more or less accustomed to. There were a few other groups of people also at the campground, mostly in RVs. We drove around for a bit using the car's headlights to scope out the grounds and settled for a spot far away from everyone else but near the bathrooms and thus well-lit. (Not all of the free campgrounds we've stayed at have offered bathrooms, but this one did. It also boasted sinks, which I guess were just for show because no more than a drop of water trickled out of their rusty faucets.) Unfortunately, the spot we chose also happened to be mostly gravel, and the darkness prevented us from finding a better spot that was also level. We ended up ruining a bunch of tent stakes and I was very grateful for our air mattress.

The sun woke us up the next morning--that and the powerful wind whipping through our improperly staked tent, the nylon cracking loudly as it when from slack to taught with each gust. I climbed out of the tent and surveyed my surroundings. It's always interesting to wake up and see a place for the first time in the daylight: what was once shrouded in the nighttime's mystery is fully and unapologetically exposed, those looming questions formed in the impenetrable darkness now becoming trivial. I looked across the gravel lot to where the sun reflected off the water of the reservoir. A sign notifying us of the absence of a lifeguard said to "swim at your own risk." We hadn't had a shower since our Park City hotel, so a dip in the water seemed like a mighty fine way to start the day. We hastily packed the tent, put on our bathing suits, and drove over to the footpath leading down to the water.

The water itself looked clean enough, and there was an older couple on the other side of the water letting what I assumed to be their toddler grandson wade in it, so we figured we were in the clear. Now, I have always had a slight aversion to swimming in lakes. Maybe it's because I grew up near the ocean, but I can remember swimming in a lake for the first time on a family vacation one summer when I was about thirteen and being utterly repulsed by the sliminess of the soft dirt-sand on the bottom, not to mention the water being so warm that I couldn't shake the feeling that I was swimming in someone else's pee. I even disliked the taste of the water on my lips--it was so NOT salty! To this day, my logic tells me that the stagnancy of lake water is much less sanitary than the constant ebb and flow of the ocean's tides, and this knowledge only compounds those childhood aversions I've never learned to shake. Against my better judgement, we headed down to the water's edge, stepping over empty beer bottles and crushed soda cans left behind by careless litterbugs.

I gazed down into the water. From my vantage point, I could now see a thin layer of algae on the concrete that sloped into the reservoir's entry point. Where the concrete ended, the underwater plants began. I resent these two things about swimming lakes as well: the slimy algae and the water plants that wrap around your feet. The ocean has seaweed, which I'm also not a fan of, but at least it's dead.

At Colin's urging, I stepped my feet in. It was surprisingly cooler than I'd expected. We stepped a little deeper. He splashed me. I didn't get mad.

Then I saw it. Right next to the empty Capri Sun and deflated Cheetoh's bag floating in the water. A plastic shopping bag, water-logged and tied in a knot at the top. That bag and that tie looked every bit to me like one thing and one thing only: a doggy poo bag. (How many times have I picked up after Lucy on a walk with an identical plastic bag, securing its putrid contents with that same knot?) Never mind that the bag was more or less empty, filled now with the very same water our feet were immersed in. I was out of the water faster than I'd gotten in, and I insisted Colin follow me back to the car. His foot was giving him enough pain as it was; no need to make matters worse with a raging infection.

I should probably explain what happened to Colin's foot before signing off here. Yesterday we spent the day in Sedona--I had heard from several friends and acquaintances that it was a beautiful place and a must-visit, so we had planned to go there after the Grand Canyon since it was only about two hours south. It WAS beautiful, and Colin and I particularly enjoyed the abundance of shops filled with crystals and artisan jewelry. (I guess that's what one of our guidebooks was referencing when it talked about Sedona's "New Age-y" charm). But it was really, really hot. We took the scenic route into downtown Sedona, which drove us along a river and past multiple swimming holes that were so overcrowded on this hot Saturday afternoon that we couldn't have stopped if we wanted to--and we DID want to, despite the crowds--for lack of parking. After browsing through nearly every jewelry shop on the main strip, we'd both worked up such an appetite from all the shopping that we were dying for lunch. 

We walked through a welcomed mist (I suppose that's how they keep shoppers cool in the Arizona heat: by planting water spouts along the sidewalk that let out a steady stream of light misting) to a Mexican restaurant on the corner that was buzzing with patrons and high-tempo Latin music. We sat at the bar so we didn't have to wait for a table. This proved to be a great decision as the bartender was a very social yet highly efficient worker named Vicki from--of all places--New Jersey. Vicki entertained us the whole meal with anecdotes about her life in Arizona, and at one point she had us laughing so hard when she mimicked  how Arizonans completely forget how to drive in the rain, as only someone hailing from a place with all four seasons could joke about with her own kind. To top it off, Vicki made a mean margarita, and I was feeling pretty tipsy when we stood up to leave.

Back in the car and sweaty as ever, we were still determined to find somewhere to swim. By now it was dinnertime, so our drive out of town along the same road we came in on was much less congested. We parked at one of the first places we were able to fit the Buick (no designated parking areas, just small shoulders on the side of the road where there were no signs telling us we couldn't park) and walked down to the river, which in my estimation was more of a creek. There was another couple about fifty feet down from us and no signs of the diaper-clad children we'd seen earlier that Colin was so reluctant to share swimming waters with. We stepped into the water, which was shockingly frigid, and in the shade afforded by the tree canopy over us, I almost didn't want to go in any deeper. But we did. I walked in until I was waist-deep in the freezing cold water and splashed my chest and back, trying to rinse off the now-dry layer of sweat, gingerly balancing on equally wobbly and slippery rocks the whole time.

I don't know if it was the margaritas or the algae-slicked rocks that provided such an unstable footbed, but I heard a loud splash and turned to see Colin struggling to hold himself up on an overturned tree log, his feet having slipped out from underneath him. I can't remember exactly but like any good girlfriend, I probably laughed at first, until I saw the big bloody scrape on the underside of his arm. Ouch. That, we decided, was a good signal that the fun was done. Fearing a repeat of Colin's moment of grace, I walked with all the caution and agility I could muster. We made it out of the river sans further drama and climbed back up to the car. Colin was complaining that his foot hurt, so I had him show the expert (does two and a half years' work for Dr. Wisler merit that title?) and there was a nice gash in the bottom, right in the sensitive skin where the arch meets the heel. Double ouch.

After tending to his own wound but allowing me to apply the bandaid (I am, without a doubt, a seasoned pro at that), we were back in the car and on our way, heading east toward our next stop, Petrified Forest National Park. Our overnight in Winslow was conveniently located along our route and close to our destination, where we are headed now. Before Colin and I left on our trip, my dad had told us that the only thing he wanted us to get for him on our travels was a piece of petrified wood. It's a violation of federal law to take the wood from the park, but we're already passing signs that boast its sale at shops along the highway. I'll be sure to pick him out a piece or two before we leave the area.