Mike in the Wild

I always dreamed that the first time I explored the Verde River would be via kayak, perhaps on a Sierra Club outing where bald eagles soared overhead and red and yellow birds filled the tree canopies.  However July's abundance of monsoon rain reminded me that extremely high conditions along the waterway are dangerous, so I wasn't at all disappointed to explore the river from its safe and muddy banks.  And it was about time: after driving over the Verde on many bridges hundreds of times during the past thirty-three years, I'd finally be stopping to really experience a small section of it.  I started at Tuzigoot National Monument, the site of the partially reconstructed ruins of an ancient pueblo.  First occupied almost a thousand years ago, the dense adobe complex of one hundred and ten rooms sits on a hilltop that's an easy walk to the Verde River.  The apartments were the center of a village where the Sinagua population could farm, hunt, and forage near a peren...