March 7, 2013 – Stones and Stone Cabins

Last year I purchased a little booklet entitled: “Stone Cabins and Other Excuses for Exploring the Desert Backroads Around Quartzsite” and put it away in safe place – :-).  Two weeks ago when I cleaned out my travel brochures, I found it, read it, and we decided to take some of these trips.  Some is the key word here because “some” of these trips require high clearance 4 WD and I am not willing to do it alone but will consider it if there are others around with us.  But there are “some” trips that can be easily done and we set out to do a few of them today.

Our first stop was the Quartzsite Rock Alignment on Plomosa Road.  These rocks were laid out in the desert for airplanes to see during General Patton’s troop training during World War 2.

The site is not very far from the main road and it is all fenced in with areas to walk thru.  On the fence:

Here it is:

You can see how big these letters are:

The arrow pointing towards Quartzsite:

  

Another arrow pointing north:

 

Then we found another fenced in area with a few other rock alignments.  This one had a star and said “Lone Star State” and C O G.  I would like to assume it was Company G from Texas but I cannot find any information on it.

And this was outside the fence – it looked like some type of walkway:

And some more of that great desert scenery:

 

Our next stop was Quinn’s Pass:

Behind this sign was a 4x4 trail that continued up and over the hill.   We walked to the top – breathtaking views!

Check out the size of this ocotillo:

 

WOW!

The Cholas look like they are illuminated.  Notice the purple and yellow flowers – Spring is here:

Cool saguaro:

Our next stop was the Bouse Intaglios.  After a short walk from the parking area we found a fence with this posted:

  

We went thru the fence and saw another fenced in area in the distance.  We came across this as we made our way – not sure what it is:

We are here:

  

It is really hard to see from the ground and we were told it was better seen from the air.  If you look real hard, you can see the fisherman:

The area around the Intaglios – Beautiful!:

On our way out, we saw this on the path – it says “Close Gate” – :-)):

From there we headed to the Indian Lookout.  We got so far and I chickened out – there were a few roads and I was not sure which one to take, plus it was kind of rough.  Maybe next time. 

However, we did come across this saguaro that looked like it was hugging itself .

The neat thing about the above trips is that they are all near each other. 

But our last trip was not – it was on the west side of Quartzsite, off Dome Rock Road – Joseph Cone’s (pronounced Co-nay) Cabins:

  

These two stone cabins were built by Joseph Cone, one of Quartzsite’s more colorful characters, who occupied them until the 1960’s when he died at age 75. 

The smaller cabin is where he lived.  The door and window openings were decorated with white quartz stones:

Both cabins had three doorways – for air flow in the summer maybe?

This larger cabin was his workshop.  It has a dirt floor and the walls were rough on the inside.  In this workshop, he turned ironwood on a lathe to make lovely bowls and lamp stands.  His wood work is on display at the museum, which we hope to do also.

The workshop is falling down – so sad!

 

Inside the cabin, there were two roofs.  We have learned that many of the cabins and houses were built with 2 and even 3 roofs with airspace between – for coolness in the summer.  This area sees temperatures of 110 degrees and above.

This was the main wall in the cabin – those holes are actually cans embedded in the wall – strange!:

     

And a grave – or memorial – out back of the workshop:

Views from the cabin:

Down the road from the cabin is BLM land where camping is free for 14 days.  It is quite empty now so we want to come back and check it out in January when all the rallies/shows are going on.

We usually camp at the Boomerville rally but it is so dusty that by the end of the two weeks, my allergies have got me down.  I am not sure if I can do that again next year – it took me too long to recover.  I do know that some people camp other places and just come in for happy hour or some of the activities.  And there are others who only come in for a short time – which we may need to do next year.  And that is why we are checking out other places.

We made our way home where we had lunch and watched the clouds come in.  We are supposed to have rain tomorrow so we also put away most of our outside “stuff”. 

Enjoy today!