See Natural Arches, Springs, Caves, Guzzlers

John and I love to toodle around Arizona in our Jeep, and often we don’t actually have a planned route in mind. Such was the case last week. Our only plan was to avoid I-17. Since we live in the west valley, we hopped on the 60 and headed out past Wickenburg. My thoughts were that we’d be heading to Eagle Eye Road, but since I didn’t actually communicate that thought to the guy driving the Jeep, we ended up on Vulture Mine Road, headed south.

Vulture City Tours

You’ll come to spot along this road with a big sign that says Vulture City Tours. This is, according to their website, “Arizona’s most unique and authentically restored ghost town”. They say that Vulture City was established in 1863 because of the Vulture Mine – Arizona’s most successful gold mine. It produced 340,000 ounces of gold between 1863 and 1942! But in ’42 the War Production Board ordered the closing of all non-essential mines and that was the end of that.

Vulture City offers self-guided tours Thursdays through Sundays from 9 to 4. They also have Christmas in the Desert, Civil War re-enactments and living history camps, a blacksmith experience, Flashlight Ghost Tours, and Vulture City Lockdown Paranormal Investigation. It sounds like fun, right? General admission is $15 for adults, $12 for seniors and veterans, $7 for kids 7 – 12, and free for kids under 6. Their website is https://vulturecityghosttown.com.

We Wanted New Stuff

I guess the only reason we haven’t been in there to take a tour is because we are usually hunting when we’re out that way, and when we aren’t, we still have a dog with us. But I’d really like to visit sometime. On this trip, since it was still quail season, we had put the shotguns and a couple boxes of shells in the Jeep as well, in case Mochi found us some birds.

We have explored in the Vulture Mountains before, but not with a dog in tow. There is a LOT of cholla around there! However, if you keep going on Vulture Mine Road, you’ll come to an intersection with Aguila Road. If you keep going straight you’ll reach the Belmont Mountains and find all kinds of old abandoned mines and structures. It’s a fun drive, but we were in the mood to find some new stuff.

Guzzlers, Tanks, And Springs

Maybe it’s because I was born here in the desert, but I can’t resist any side trip that looks like it might offer up some type of water. We stream Gaia GPS to the Jeep screen, and meanwhile I keep the Topo Maps app open on my phone. When I see a side road with a tank, spring, or guzzler marked on it, I tell John and we head toward it. We have found some incredibly beautiful little places that way!

On this trip, we took a side road to a guzzler that was not too far from the main road, but a bit hard to find because of all the trails made by off-roaders using the sandy bed of a big wash. But we did eventually find it, and it has two troughs. A guzzler is a man-made rain collection structure that stores the water underground but gives game animals and other critters access to the water via small concrete boxes with shallow steps or a ramp so that even when the water is low, smaller animals still have access.

Guzzlers For Wildlife

In this one, one of the two boxes was dry, but the other had water. These guzzlers almost always have a fence around them designed to keep cattle out and allow other animals in, and this one was no exception. Cattle have their own water sources – tanks and wells, etc. This guzzler was a fun little side trip off Vulture Mine Road, but then we got back on the main road until we reached Aguila Road, where we turned northwest and headed toward the town of Aguila.

There are more guzzlers along this road, on both sides, including a few around Black Butte, but we had already explored those. We decided to check out Wildcat Tank because we were there during dove season and it’s a really nice waterhole with lots of trees and shade. But once we got on top of the hill above it, we could see the cattle were already using it, so we decided we’d have lunch somewhere else.

Be Careful Of Abandoned Mines

We took a side road that headed toward a mountain with a mine on the side of it, and pulled under a tree to have lunch. Anytime you get near mountains in this area, there are going to be mines, some of them abandoned, and some very dangerous. We’ve come across many that weren’t fenced off or closed in, so we keep Mochi leashed unless we know there aren’t any holes around.

Also on this road you’ll pass the road to the old solar observatory at the top of Harquahala Mountains. This is a fun road that we’ve been up several times, and the old buildings are still there. There’s also a picnic area and amazing views in every direction. If you’d like to learn more about this drive, it’s on Western Outdoor Times in the April 2018 issue.

Eagle Eye Peak

Whenever you’re on Aguila Road near the town of Aguila, you can see Eagle Eye Peak. Aguila means “eagle” in Spanish, and one look at the top of the mountain will tell you why it has that name. It looks like an eagle’s beak – it’s a large natural arch. Now I’ve seen that arch dozens of times, but one I hadn’t seen is the one marked on the Topo Map in the hill next to Aguila Peak. It plainly says “natural arch”.

We decided to go see that smaller one. I thought I had glimpsed it as we headed north up the Aguila road, but I didn’t say anything. Once we got close to the mountain we found a road that headed toward it and took that. It had quite a few off-shoots and lollipops, but then it narrowed down to just one road that went between the peaks. CAUTION: this road between the peaks is rough, and covered with large, sharp, volcanic rocks. There’s no place to turn around once you’re on it, so when you find the big dusty area where you can tell people use to turn around, stay there or turn around unless you have a 4x4. I’m not kidding!

Fun To Find Them All

You can see the small arch on top of the smaller hill, and in fact, at one point from the road you can see three small arches at the top and glimpse the sky under them! There is also another smaller one on the side of that hill – there could even be more that we didn’t see. It’s really fun to find them all.

Like I said, that road is super rough, a little off-camber in spots, and it’s slow going, but it isn’t very long and it comes out right next to the little cemetery. There was a benchmarker there, too, which is a bonus for me! I love looking for them on our drives, too.

Have A Great Drive!

There is a lot more to do out in that area, so I hope you check it out sometime. In fact, when I was consulting the map for this story, I noticed that it says there are caves in the western side of the Eagle Eye Mountains! You’ll need a 4x4 out here if you go off the bigger roads, so do your research ahead of time, and have a great drive!