Unfortunately my pre-expedition adventure has come to an end. Leaving Yellowstone, I hopped on the interstate, set the cruise at 60 (mileage = yummy) and cruised towards Winnipeg.

Along the way I made one last attempt at a cool blurry-water picture, but it also didn't turn out too well. Seems like you need to do it in fairly low light to have the exposure work with the slow shudder speed.

I woke at the KOA, delightfully late, to the sounds of thousands of children drowning in the nearby pool. Upon inspection, it turned out to be only two who weren't drowning, but they fooled me all the same. A shower was great, and the facilities very nice. I was expecting the showers to be one of those "get naked with strange old men" rooms, but they had nice little stall things with changing rooms.

Out of Mantua (which had some incredible ranch homes), is a forest road which leads to Inspiration Point - a 360 panorama from a summit. From the topo, it looked like there should be some dramatic views. The land in the area was beautiful, with fields of wildflowers and snow-capped peaks in the distance.

The theme for the morning was bugs. BUGS… And after that there were some bugs, followed by BUGS. I broke down camp in a mad, ear- and mouth-full scramble and ran away without eating breakfast. That could wait…

I’d never tried to use Delorme Topo for route finding, so I took a few minutes to plug in some stuff for Reds Canyon to see if I could navigate from the compy alone. That turned out to be a waste of time since there was the greatest and most complete signage I’ve ever seen throughout the whole area.

Reds Canyon was rated a scenic of “10” in the Backcountry Adventures: Utah book. I don’t think a single trail in Arizona made that, only 9’s. So was Reds Canyon worth the hype? Yes.

Unsure of what time it was, but assuming it to be about 5am, I awoke with the sunrise. The change in lighting offered a much better chance to take pictures of my campsite and I played with the camera a bit.

I woke up at the Gillette ruins after a very good night’s sleep in the roof top tent. The temperatures at night were mild and the wind absent. Also camping were Lance (and Martin) and Tim who drove all the way up from Marana to take part in the previous night’s campfire.

The last few days have been a mad rush to get everything in order for me to leave... less than a week from my scheduled departure date, and my tuck was falling apart with no roof top tent, no storage, fridge not wired or mounted, no HAM setup, tires out of balance and one flat, etc etc. Yikes!

At Lance's we installed the tent and figured out a bunch of things. With the tent on and the time fast approaching midnight, it was time for a shakedown run - camping in the coves of Saguaro Lake!