Cibecue Creek, part 3 of 4, possibly 5: We happen upon a frog, experience a bit of adventure, then hike into a place of magic

I will begin with the frog, which we happened upon shortly after we started to hike. As you can see, it was a tiny frog, but it brought to mind a bigger frog that I encountered very near to this place over 30 years ago. On March 10, I wrote a bit about my friend Vincent Craig, who was fighting the cancer that on May 15 took him.*

One of the experiences that I recounted was a nighttime rescue that he led that took place in a canyon cut out by one of the creeks that flows out of the White Mountain Apache reservation into the Salt River.

Perhaps it was this very creek, Cibecue. I cannot remember for certain, as we did the hike in and out and scaled the cliffs from which two waterfalls fell in the darkness of night. I have no visual memories of the terrain through which we hiked.

This creek does lead to a couple of falls, however, and it is a creek that is sometimes visited by non-tribal members, such as the blond woman who fell on the cliff and broke her leg.

There is another creek further upstream that also does. So it could have been either one. Somewhere, I have it written down and stored away, but that document would be hard to find and I haven't the time to look for it.

Near the beginning of that rescue hike on that night three decades ago, I was stumbling about on the rocks as we worked our way upstream when suddenly I felt something cool and clammy plop down upon my left wrist. "Snake!" was my immediate thought - "rattler" in particular. I let out a little shriek, but kept enough composure not to jerk my hand away until I knew what was on it and what it was doing.

I transferred the beam of my flashlight from the rocks below my feet to my wrist and there saw the startled eyes of a big frog, looking back at me.

Lisa holds the frog out for Kalib to see. Kalib cautiously touches it.

From the moment we came upon the creek and I looked at the walls rising into mountains on all sides of us, this line from Vincent's song, Someone Drew a Line, came into my head: "Between The Four Sacred Mountains we lived in harmony..."

These were not The Four Sacred Mountains that Vincent wrote about, yet, in their way, I believe all the mountains to be sacred and so it seemed appropriate. This song would stay in my head throughout the hike - for every minute of it, every second. Not for a moment would it leave me.

Sometimes Kalib hiked on his own power. Sometimes, he would be carried - either by his dad or his uncles, Caleb, Rex and Charlie.

Due to my shoulder, I could not carry him.

Mostly, we hiked through water. Before we started to hike, the heat had felt oppressive and I had wondered how we were going to do it. The water mitigated that heat. It turned out to be no problem at all.

Jacob trips and goes down while carrying Kalib.

Jacob gives Kalib an assist up a boulder, to his waiting mother.

There, atop the boulder, she changes his diaper, then helps him into a new one. Let no one doubt - she will pack the dirty diaper all the way up and all the way out. Other than temporary footprints, we would leave no sign of ourselves behind.

Kalib splashes water.

Jacob and Lisa hiking up Cibecue Creek.

Lisa comes to a big rock. She debates whether to go over it or around it.

She chooses to go over it. I walk around and get this picture of her as she tops it.

Although everyone had spread apart, we somehow all came together at this point. Something in the sky then caught everyone's attention.

It is a magnificent bird - a turkey vulture. At this moment, I kind of wished that I drug along my big cameras and my 100 to 400 zoom, but it was really nice to hike with a just a little tiny camera that I could slip in and out of my t-shirt pocket.

As everyone was gathered in one spot, we decided this would be a good moment to make a good group portrait - sans me. Kalib had grown hungry and so dug into his nose to see if might find something good to eat there.

He did. And he ate it.

Rex carries Kalib as we continue on.

Jacob and Lavina, hiking through the water.

Lavina and Jacob, stepping out of the water.

Melanie pauses by a big rock.

Kalib rests upon a rock.

Jacob and Rex survery the terrain ahead.

Jacob climbs over a rock and comes upon this drift log, wedged into a crevasse. "It looks just like a big b..." he exclaimed. I will leave the "b..." to your imaginations.

I will probably get in trouble with some of the female members of the family for even having said just this much.

Jacob climbs out onto the log and waves at Kalib, who is still working his way in this direction.

Uncle Caleb assists nephew Kalib as he works his way over a series of big rocks alongside water that was too deep to walk through.

Kalib tops the rock. Caleb offers him a "high-five."

Melanie finds a very pretty rock, which she shows to everybody. 

She by-passes a deep pool via a well-scuplted boulder. By now, we can hear the distant roar of a water fall. It sounds kind of like a jet.

As we move upstream, past cutouts in the rock, the roar of the falls grows louder.

And here it is, the lower of the two Cibecue Falls. It feels as though we have hiked into a place of magic.

Tomorrow: We frolic in the place of magic.

*Today, June 6, would have been Vincent Craig's 60th birthday. Today, his mother Nancy Mariano passed away, also from cancer. 

Glimpses from the past three days: Cibecue Creek, cookouts, punching bag, US Border Patrol Agent, Sunrise Dance, Charlie in Apache country

Following this morning's session of the Sunrise Dance, I returned to LeeAnn's house with what I thought was a good plan. I would lie down for half-an-hour in the hope that I might nap, then I would get up, refresh myself and, over the next four hours or so, I would put together a magnificent post on the six-hour hike that I took with my children, my daughter-in-law and my oldest grandson up Cibecue Creek from the Salt River.

I did take the nap, but when I got up I was struck by two realizations: one - it is Memorial Day weekend. People are out, having fun, beginning their summer. My readership would be way down. In fact, I checked the numbers and it is way down - down so far that if it were not Memorial Day weekend, I would conclude this whole blog experiment of mine has been a failure and I might as well shut it down.

Despite this holiday setback, the overall trend is upward, so I will forge on.

Two - I could not do justice to the hike and still accomplish everything else that I must accomplish before I head to PHX Sky Harbor Airport Sunday. Yesterday in the Basha's parking lot, our rental car was struck by a run-away shopping cart and was badly dinged and dented. So I must contact our insurance company and find out what I have to do to deal with this when I return the car tomorrow. In addition, the contract that I had expected to receive before I left on this trip and was counting on the initial payment to provide me with some spending money down here finally arrived by email and now I must review it, digitally sign it and email it back.

On that note, I must add that the only thing that has saved me at all on this trip, other than the generosity of my family and friends here in Arizona, is the support that I have received from readers who have contributed to this blog. Without that support, I would not have had money to buy a tank of gas, or even that Apache-style green chili burrito that I devoured yesterday.

Thank you.

And there are many other things that I must do before I leave.

So I decided just to sum up the past three days or so and then follow up with more in-depth stories after I get settled back into Wasilla. This won't happen until late next week, because, once my plane touches down in Anchorage, I barely have time to return home, give comfort to the cats and take a shower before I get on another jet that will take me to Fairbanks, where I will transfer to a small plane that will fly me to the Brooks Range village of Anaktuvuk Pass.

As part of that summation, I dropped into my Cibecue Creek take at random and pulled out this photo of Kalib, Jacob and Lavina hiking in the Apache homeland.

This hike took us to a very magical destination, so, I still have every intent to give it a full post once I settle back down.

In summation, over the past three days, we have all gotten together for two cookouts. This from last night, at the home of Janet and Emerson Craig - Janet being Margie's sister and Emerson the brother of my dear and late friend, Vincent Craig.

This is my nephew and Vincent's nephew, Cole Craig, beating his punching bag in excellent rhythm as the food cooks on the coals. I had hoped to introduce readers to all of my nephews and nieces, but the time here has passed so rapidly and has been so intensely occupied that I don't think I will be able to - even after I get home. I guess that just means we must come back sooner than we might have expected, so I can continue this journey.

The same applies for all of Margie's living brothers and sisters. This is Red Nose. He received the t-shirt as a gift from his son, Sugar Ray, who lives in Phoenix and has many Mexican friends. So Sugar Ray picks up things like this to send as gifts to his dad.

Red Nose came up to Melanie wearing this at last night's cook-out. "I'm from the US Border Patrol and I would like to see your papers," he told her.

At both cook-outs, we sat around the fire into the late hours, which, unlike in Wasilla, get dark down here. Many stories were told, some about frightening subjects such as Skin-walkers and the Bigfoot-like creatures that many, including, perhaps, myself, claim to have spotted in the White Mountains.

Emerson also told some good stories about Vincent. I have interviewed and photographed a number of people in preparation to make the tribute that I have planned for Vincent, including all of his living brothers and sisters, his children and grandchildren. I had hoped to have it posted in it's entirety before I left Arizona, but this did not prove practical.

I will do it when I can sit down and give it the time Vincent deserves.

This is from this morning's portion of the Sunrise Dance. It is not the dance that we had originally planned to attend as a family. Janet and Emerson were to be the sponsors of that event, but had to cancel, not only because of Vincent's death, but because immediately after, the doctors found that a cancer in the mother of Vincent and Emerson is aggressive. 

This morning, Emerson, Janet and family left to Albuquerque, to be with her in the hospital.

Then we learned about this dance, and that the young woman is a member of our extended family and the Godmother is a young woman who we would sometimes babysit when we lived down here. So we decided to take in at least part of this Sunrise Dance.

You can see my own children, Rex, Melanie and Lisa running behind their Aunt LeeAnn in a part of the Sunrise Dance where everybody runs. Yes, that's Charlie running with them. He came down, too.

You will also notice how different the country here is than down in Salt River and Cibecue Creek canyons. The river-bank elevation down there is about 2500 feet, whereas up here where the dance is being held, it is over 7000 feet above sea level.

Here is Melanie, getting a rare chance to live her Apache heritage. She is blessing Kiana Fawn Carrol who, on this day takes the role of Changing Woman, as she herself changes from a girl into a woman. Even as she blesses Kiana, she is blessed by Kiana, just for being there.

Lisa is there, too - that is her hand immediately beyond Melanie.

The dance will continue into this night and again tomorrow morning. I fear I must leave for Phoenix tomorrow before it concludes.

When I can sit down and do it justice, I will dedicate a post to this dance.

And here is Charlie with Red Nose and Melanie. He has just started a pickup truck of LeeAnn's that had not run in months.

Everyone in the family down here loves Charlie. 

As different as he is, he fits right in.

Charlie credits Red Nose with giving him the tip that helped him solve the problem.

And here is Kalib, Jobe, Lavina and Jacob, leaving here just a couple of hours ago. They are on their way to other parts of the Southwest to visit members of Lavina's family.

"Drive careful," I told Jake before they left. "Remember, you are carrying precious cargo. It does not matter how fast you get there, what matters is that you get there."

Now, God, You know that despite my plea, Jacob is not going to listen to his dad, so, even though I often wonder about You, about who You really are and why You would create such a beautiful, lovely, magnificent, dangerous, brutal, indifferent earth, I leave them to your care.

Please watch over them and bring them safely to their destination.