I was in the desert this morning. I went with my sister-in-law. We knew there was a chance we might see wild horses. That was not the main attraction. For her, she wanted a hike. For me, I always love being out on the land. This is the viewpoint of a desert walker.
My highlight was seeing a teeny, red bird. Not much bigger than a hummingbird. I think it was a vermillion fly catcher if my bird book is anything to go by.
She liked the river walk and the up and down; side of the mountain hike beside the river. It’s too steep for me. I am a flatlander but I did not like the river stones or river rock I guess you would call it. They are hard to walk on. She called them ankle twisters. I decided we’d leave them as we were headed to the great blue heron rookery. We were able to get on flat, sandy, desert soil and see lots of great blue herons leaving the safety of large trees, going for a gentle soar through clear blue sky and onto their next perch.
We circled the Salt River site keeping some buildings in view in order not to get lost and just before our two and a half hours were up; two women came into view asking if we saw a wild horse.
“No,” we said and they continued on. We were hardly out of sight of each other when my sister-in–law pointed out the large, brown rump of a wild horse. We had one, full ass end view of a well-fed wild horse. That ended the long-awaited desert walk we had promised each other since November.
February 22, 2016 – Ten Minute Writing –
ellensagh 