Greetings form Arizona

[im_pilot]

Hello shooters. I am retired military and have lived in AZ about 10 years. I am raising my two boys and we spend as much time as we can shooting, camping, or anything that keeps us outdoors. Looking forward to a forum of like minded people!

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[VoidShot9]

Happy to make your aquaintance, im_pilot. See you at the range!

 

[delta6]

Welcome...

 

[DB is Here]

Glad you found us.

 

[wetrain4u]

Hello shooters. I am retired military and have lived in AZ about 10 years. I am raising my two boys and we spend as much time as we can shooting, camping, or anything that keeps us outdoors. Looking forward to a forum of like minded people!

Welcome neighbor!

 

[CAMPMEAT]

Hello n welcome.....I'm in Tonto Basin.

 

[MadDuner]

Welcome from Chandler.

 

[Joe Link]

Welcome!

 

[badbob85037]

Welcome...

A little late but I haven't been here in a while. Where in Arizona do you live? I'm in west Phoenix. I use to take my 3 girls shooting. Now I take the 5 grand sons, but not all at once. I can't afford that.

 

[delta6]

badbob85037
West of Ben Avery

 

[im_pilot]

A little late but I haven't been here in a while. Where in Arizona do you live? I'm in west Phoenix. I use to take my 3 girls shooting. Now I take the 5 grand sons, but not all at once. I can't afford that.

We are in East Mesa but have ammo will travel. Now that it's cooling off a bit we are always open for some desert shooting.

 

[Belevolk]

Have you driven the back road to Roosevelt Lake? Highway 88 out of AJ. My bad
Apache Junction. Take a lunch and water if you go. Mostly gravel and some narrow mountain roads reminiscent of the trucker shows in South America. It is a long day to Roosevelt and then home on the highway. Lots of wonderful sights and plenty of places to pull over and loose some lead.

 

[VoidShot9]

Have you driven the back road to Roosevelt Lake? Highway 88 out of AJ. My bad
Apache Junction. Take a lunch and water if you go. Mostly gravel and some narrow mountain roads reminiscent of the trucker shows in South America. It is a long day to Roosevelt and then home on the highway. Lots of wonderful sights and plenty of places to pull over and loose some lead.

Now that sounds like a place I'm going to have to visit.

 

[CAMPMEAT]

I live maybe 300 yards off of that infested with coyotes highway.........

 

[Belevolk]

There is one place back there past Tortilla Flatt's where decades ago I went with a buddy to get some rattle snake skins. It is in the bottom of a canyon with water running in it when I was there. We got all the skins he wanted with in 5 minutes and 30 feet from his truck. I sat on the hood and with my scoped 10/22 found em and sent them to heaven as quick as can be.
Be careful out in the desert there are lots of critters that can and will hurt you and yours.
Always tell someone back at home where you are going and how you are getting there and back. There are huge areas of the South Western US that what I call "no G land". Used to drive from Tucson to Silver City there is at least and hour out there with no cell coverage That trip was ALL interstate and state highways

 

[Chopins11th]

There is one place back there past Tortilla Flatt's where decades ago I went with a buddy to get some rattle snake skins. It is in the bottom of a canyon with water running in it when I was there. We got all the skins he wanted with in 5 minutes and 30 feet from his truck. I sat on the hood and with my scoped 10/22 found em and sent them to heaven as quick as can be.
Be careful out in the desert there are lots of critters that can and will hurt you and yours.
Always tell someone back at home where you are going and how you are getting there and back. There are huge areas of the South Western US that what I call "no G land". Used to drive from Tucson to Silver City there is at least and hour out there with no cell coverage That trip was ALL interstate and state highways

Best advice I've read coming from a native Arizonan who's trekked 100's of miles of "No G Land" starting as a kid who did not start out telling the folks exactly where I'd be. A must for sure!

 

[Belevolk]

Also NEVER leave your vehicle, as in NEVER. Unless you are 1000% sure you know where you going and it is not that far. Vehicles are big and can be spotted from the air. Humans not so much even with bright backpacking clothing. I keep 2 red and silver space blankets under the back seat of my truck. Staked out together one silver one red they make a big flag for airplanes. Last tip stay away from forest service roads in the winter time. ESPECIALLY the ones with gates across them. May be open today and closed tomorrow.
Rescuers will not think the first time to look behind closed gates. That happened to me in the Sasquatch National Forest in BC Canada. Half a day hitching to the local Mountie office to get the place reopened. Then 40 questions about what I was doing behind a locked gate, and being a foreigner et all.

I learned the hard way, I was out in Bloody Basin ish North of Phoenix think Aqua Fria National Monument. ( There are lots of places in Arizona that have the same name and are no where near each other) I popped a tire off the rim. No biggie put on the spare and promptly got stuck. Spent the night in the cruise lander and waited. End of next day the wife had called the forest service and they sent out some folks looking. 3 days with no food, and very little water, lots of alcohol and lots of ammo. Of course when I needed to shoot some food there was nothing near where I was. Got out of the stuck and proceeded home. Took the lady out to her favorite restaurant, which I detested but I needed to be a good boy for at least a week. This was decades ago and pagers were all the rage. I had a CB for a while which worked OK as long as you were on pavement. If I were to set up another 4x4 I would consider a sat phone.
In a lot of ways Arizona is still the west. I love the desert and enjoy it more than any of the places I have visited. Just need to keep the brain engaged when traveling in the back country.

 

[Old18C]

I had a CB for a while which worked OK as long as you were on pavement. If I were to set up another 4x4 I would consider a sat phone.
In a lot of ways Arizona is still the west. I love the desert and enjoy it more than any of the places I have visited. Just need to keep the brain engaged when traveling in the backcountry.

As I drive too and from the house in Alaska cutting through BC and Yukon Canada and every backroad I can find that going in the direction I am traveling from coast to coast in the lower 48 I agree. I carry a SPOT Satellite Transponder for my adventures along with a HAM radio.

 

[Belevolk]

The drive you describe is on my bucket list in the next couple of years. I want drive from Arizona to Denali with a with stop at crater lake. I have seen the crater in Arizona many times would like to see another one. Took a girl friend from Moscow to N. Arizona. The wide open spaces put a serious damper on her speaking. She was in AWE especially with the Indian stands on the side of the road. I guess there is nothing like that in Europe. I tried to contrast it to the gypsy's I had seen in France. She disagreed.

 

[Gabby]

Now that sounds like a place I'm going to have to visit.

Don't forget Canyon and Saguaro lakes!
As I recall all of that country is snake country so stay alert.
Pretty Hot in the summer and probably gettin pretty nice about now,
Darn I miss the desert, and all of AZ. It's beautiful here in SW OR
But fires every summer is getting old,
we evacuated for a week, because of overblown reports of how close the fire was,
and how fast it was traveling etc, etc!