After 19 (NINETEEN!) straight days of work, I finally had a short break this past weekend JUST in time for a girls (plus Andrew) weekend camping down Woody Mountain Road (Forest Road 231)!
My friend Jenni booked Fernow Cabin for a night WAY back several months ago.
Like all things scheduled during fire season, I was a very strong tentative maybe.
But, luckily, after the Miller Fire and then the Volunteer Fire, I had a perfectly timed weekend break right before I hop over onto the Wilbur Fire to work with the NAZT3 team briiiight and early tomorrow morning.
So, as soon as work finished Friday, I loaded up my Jeep and drove straight down Woody Mountain Road until I lost service.
I met Emma, Katie, Jenni and Donté at Fernow Cabin at about 7 p.m. — I hadn’t been before and I’m so glad Jenni booked it because it was really cute!
There was a wood-burning stove, solar-powered lighting, running water (and even a bathroom with a shower!), a vault toilet, two bedrooms, a kitchen and a lofted area up top.
The outdoor area had a little grill, a fire pit and some picnic tables.
The cabin itself is located in a gorgeous secluded draw, so it was really private, which was nice.
I unpacked and then we all explored a little bit. We walked down a two-track road, and Yukon saw a cow. Then, we started dinner (which was campfire pizza), ate s’mores, talked around the fire and went to bed.
The next morning was breakfast (pancakes, eggs and hash browns) and coffee (I had a chance to try out my new manual burr grinder!) before we cleaned up the cabin and checked out.
Check out was a little weird. The group that booked the cabin for the night after us got there like, 90 minutes before our checkout, and then just parked their cars in front of the cabin for a while trying to figure out what to do while we made breakfast and just felt incredibly awkward.
Anyway, we got back on FR 231 and drove down to Edge of the World, which is a pretty popular spot for dispersed camping in Arizona.
It’s located between Flagstaff and Sedona, and you can stand on the edge of a cliff that drops down into the Red Rock-Secret Mountain Wilderness area. You can see all of Sedona from the cliff, and it’s just such a stunning view.
We all set up our tents and got a fire started. Donté left, but our friend Andrew arrived to crash girls’ weekend. We wandered around the informal network of trails around our campsite, stopping every few minutes to take in the views.
We got back to our campsite. I was a little wary of taking Yukon any further since he was really sketched out by the big scary cliff, so everyone else continued exploring while I read some of my book around the fire and Yukon napped.
Then, we had dinner (burgers and watermelon), MORE s’mores, and we wandered back over to the cliff to watch the sun set over Sedona.
We were up until about 11 talking and joking around the campfire. We were stuck with really noisy camp neighbors, unfortunately — the group of bros about a quarter-mile away from us played LOUD music until at least midnight.
Casual reminder to not be that person.
Regardless, I was up with the sun today. I made some coffee and packed up my stuff, ate breakfast and then hopped back on FR 231 to drive back up to Flagstaff.
And that was it!
I almost, almost bailed due to sheer exhaustion after my latest string of fire assignments, but I’m so glad I didn’t. This weekend was really great, and I’m lucky to have these incredible people in my life.
Anyway, work awaits! I’ll be clocking in at 6 a.m. tomorrow to make it to my next fire assignment, so I’m off to go prepare. Already craving my next restorative weekend adventure!
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