December 14

The next day (12-14) was another easy one – from Mesa to Coolidge, which will set me up for one final burst (of about 75 miles) to Tucson, my break point for a Christmas vacation. It was cloudy today, not really overcast, but many high clouds.

The part of the ride from Chandler to Coolidge was really boring, so I realigned the National Football League (based on natural geographical rivalries) into eight four-team divisions as I rode along (no pen and paper needed, although it took me ten minutes to remember Indianapolis).

American Conference
Northeast	Southeast	Mideast	West
New England	Atlanta	Cleveland	San Diego
NY Jets	Jacksonville	Pittsburgh	San Francisco
Baltimore	Tampa Bay	Cincinnati	Oakland
Philadelphia	Miami	Baghdad	Seattle

National Conference
Atlantic	Central	Midwest	Southwest
NY Giants	Detroit	Minnesota	New Orleans
Washington	Indianapolis	St. Louis	Houston
Carolina	Chicago	Kansas City	Dallas
Tennessee	Green Bay	Denver	Arizona

Yeah, I know it’s kind of dumb, but I had fun doing it, and it made about an hour go by real fast. Besides that, the National Football League has already said that they will realign the league into eight four-team divisions, and we’ll just see if their plan makes more sense than mine. If not, then I’ll just suggest to the NFL deep-thinkers that they get away from their desks for awhile and take a long bicycle ride. Oh, in case you just skimmed over this part, there’s a “Buffalo” joke to be found somewhere.

Click on thumbnail to see full photographs.

I also saw some more interesting Saguaros including “Oh, it hurts so bad when I hug myself,” “Okay, put ‘em up, put ‘eemm uupp,” which you have to say like the Cowardly Lion, and “The Flasher – apprehended at last." Great minds see great things in Saguaro Cactus plants. Weird people see weird things in Saguaro Cactus plants. I don’t have to tell you to choose one of the above statements – I’m sure you already have.

The highlight of the day was a visit to Casa Grande Ruins National Monument right here in Coolidge, Arizona. It wasn’t on my route until I had to make some changes in how I was going to get from Phoenix to Tucson a few days ago, but it was well worth the visit.

The ruins are of a village once occupied by people we now call the Hohokam, who lived in this region for around a thousand years until about 1400AD. They disappeared without a traceable history, but there are some solid clues as to their fate. In 1694, Spanish missionaries, led by Father Eusebio Kino, found an empty shell of this once flourishing village. They also found Pima Indians living in nearby huts who said their ancestors were “ho-ho-KAHM,” meaning “all gone” or “all used up.”

It seems that this was a particularly important village for the Hohokam, as it was the site of a large four-story tower that early Spanish explorers called Casa Grande (Great House). The tower apparently served as a celestial observatory for the Hohokam people, since a circular hole in the west wall aligns with the setting sun on the day of the summer solstice, and other openings align with the sun and moon at specific times.

The tower was obviously well constructed (sometime prior to 1350), as it has now withstood 650 years of desert wind and heat, as well as 100 or more years of abuse by modern mankind before it became the Nation’s first archeological preserve in 1892. The builders of Casa Grande found the key construction material literally beneath their feet. The subsoil of this area contains caliche, a concrete-like mixture of sand, clay and calcium carbonate. It took 3000 tons of this stuff to build Casa Grande, laid down as mud in successive courses to form walls four feet thick at the base, tapering toward the top. Hundreds of juniper, pine and fir trees were brought 60 miles from the upper reaches of the Gila River to form the timbers for floor supports. Saguaro ribs were laid across the timbers, covered with reeds, and topped with a final layer of caliche to create floors. The reeds, ribs and timbers are long gone, but most of the walls are still standing. That caliche must be pretty good stuff.

The Hohokam have been called the “First Masters of the American Desert.” By 300AD they had formed a distinct culture in Arizona along the Gila and Salt Rivers. They lived in permanent settlements, made pottery and traded with other similar southwestern cultures. What sets them apart, however, is that they were the first to tame the desert land with irrigation canals fed by the rivers. These canals extended for miles along the Gila River near present day Coolidge, bringing water from upstream to the fertile croplands located on terraces above the river. There the Hohokam grew corn, beans, squash, tobacco, cotton and agave to supplement their diet of desert wildlife, fish and cactus fruit.

No one is sure what caused the demise of the Hohokam culture in the early 1400s, but it’s likely that changes in climate were a contributing factor. The Pima said their ancestors were “all used up,” and that may well have applied to the fertility of the soil and/or the level of water in the river. As I crossed the Gila River on my way into Coolidge, it was bone dry, but then again the city of Phoenix probably has something to do with that.

In 1918, President Woodrow Wilson further protected these ruins by proclaiming them a National Monument.

G.A.S.P.

(Great Adventures to Scenic Places)