Gold Canyon ,Horsebacking riding

Well, here I am horse backing riding in the

Superstition Mountains! 4 of us who work here in the Grand Canyon,took this past weekend to go horse backing riding, & to visit a ghost town.We all had a great time! The scenery was breath taking& so was the heat

I now have a new idea of what heat is, I had always thought that hot was 85 to 90 degrees. Well, on this trip ( we were on the outskirts of Phoenix) the hot sun was 114 degrees & if you were lucky to find shade.The shade felt like a few degrees lower, not much difference to me!

The horse backing riding was to be 4 hrs long up in the mountains. We stopped to rest for about 20 minutes at an old store that was long gone now,but some of the building remain. It was here that I realized I was way to hot even after drinking lots of water the whole time. Our trail guide ,Sue, was really great! She knew I was way to hot & so I got water poured on me, which helped some. But in the end I could not finish the last hour of the ride. I knew I was at the point of heat exhaustion. So Sue called the ranch to have the truck come get me. My safety was more important than finishing the ride.At least I know enough to get help, I have heard plenty of stories were people don't get help. So, once back at the ranch, i removed the cowboy boots, sat on the porch & drank water and more water. Your body doesn't cool down very much in 115 degrees heat. So, I got another ride back to the hotel ,so I could get into air conditioning.I took a cool shower & that helped get my body back to cooling itself.

Then, once everyone got back to the hotel & got cooled off themselves, we all headed out to Goldfield Ghost Town. We ate lunch at the Saloon, walked around town ,but here we could get out of the hot sun cause the shops were all air conditioned! We all had an old time group photo taken and just tried to enjoy what we all could .The other picture I have added is of Goldfield .

I will write more about this trip in the next day or two. Cause on Sunday, I drove the Apache Trail, which I thought was great! but my passenager John, said it was the scariest road he had ever been on!