Parker Canyon Lake

May 6, 2018

History

Parker Canyon Lake (PCL) is located in southeastern Arizona, 28 miles southwest of Sierra Vista in the Huachuca Mountains, and about 5 miles north of the border with Mexico. The lake is a reservoir formed by a dam in Parker Canyon at the south end of Canelo Hills in Southwestern Cochise County. Parker Canyon is a tributary to the Santa Cruz River in the San Rafael Valley. The facilities are maintained by Coronado National Forest division of the USDA Forest Service. PCL is a beautiful expanse of mountain water, we were told it is “the cleanest lake in AZ”.

The Lake surface area is 125 acres

Average depth 70 feet

Lake surface elevation 5,400 ft.

PCL offers a number of recreational possibilities for those willing to drive the long paved (and unpaved roads) that lead to it. For those who like to fish, Parker Canyon Lake offers both cold and warm water species, including stocked rainbow trout and resident bass, sunfish and catfish. To make landing these “wily lunkers” a bit easier, there is a fishing pier and a paved boat ramp at the lake, as well as, a lakeside paved area and a graveled path along some of the best catfishing shoreline. There is also a concessionaire-operated country store at the lakeshore where you can pick up some last minute supplies, buy a fishing license, or rent a boat. Bird watchers and nature lovers will also find much to enjoy at Parker Canyon Lake. A five-mile trail leads around the shoreline never getting more than a few steps from the water. The Parker Lakeshore Trail offers excellent vantage points from which to enjoy the ducks and other waterfowl that are invariably bobbing on the lake’s clear waters. Some of those points even have benches and interpretive signs. Bald eagles and osprey are regularly sighted in this area, as are spring warblers and hummingbirds in among the oaks and grasses that surround the lake and in the two campgrounds near its shores. Coatimundi, javelina, and roadrunners, three animals that are about as southwestern as you can get, make occasional appearances as well. Handicap access is available to most facilities with parking for vehicles, motor homes, and boat trailers.

Water Bound

For us, arriving on a Sunday around noonish was a perfect time! We had our choice of 65 campsites (only about 24 accomodate a camper though). We had to choose carefully, shade was a priority – especially for me. The temperature is going to be in the mid 90’s all week. The one drawback to arriving at noonish was the heat. We disconnected Rosalita from our ‘Gypsy’ truck, and then I could do no more for a while (because of the heat). I had sunstroke as a reckless teenager (living in California and going to the beach too often for too long) haunts me to this day… I needed to be extra careful of the heat because there is no electricity at PCL: which means there is no air conditioning to get out of the heat, and the camper acts like an oven without shade.

Actually it took me 2 days to recover from this current ‘overheating’, and I learned a very valuable lesson: we cannot hook up the camper at 9AM in the sun (90+ degrees in Sierra Vista) and unhook at Parker Canyon Lake with 95 degrees 2 hours later. NOT a good idea!

The RV campground, Mountain View, is lovely. There are Oak trees mixed in with Alligator Juniper, Pine and Manzanita shrubs with their burgundy bark scattered in contrast with the evergreen trees. No green grass to speak of, for lack of rain. There is only one site with a full ‘lake-view’ but we choose practicality (shade) over the view.

The elevation of the campground is right at 6000 feet, so we are fortunate, being at this height, in that we are 10-15 degrees cooler than Tucson – which topped out at 105 degrees the day we arrived.

Parker Canyon Lake is nestled in the Coronado National Forest just a few miles south of Sonoita and Elgin. Sonoita is know for it lush vineyards and there are tours and wine tastings available almost everyday.

The first morning after arriving… Patti was up at 5:30AM saying to me, “Get up, we’re burning daylight!” Those of you who know Patti… will realize this is not normal behavior for P! But since it is so hot by 8:30AM, she wanted to get up before the heat rose. We found this was a fabulous plan: get up early to have our tea and coffee outside, read and write, then seek out shade for the rest of the day.

Most days around noon or 1PM we would take a picnic lunch down to the lake and sit in the breeze under the shade trees watching the antics of the ducks begging for food, the fisher-people begging for a fish on the end of their line, or paddle boarders begging not to fall in the water. We would spend a couple of happy hours there, and wander back up to camp when we were sure the sun had arced far enough to the west to afford shade beside Rosalita.

Wednesday I decided to walk around the lake, a 5-mile adventure. Leaving at 5:50AM I arrived at the lake at 6:00AM sharp, gathered my CamelBak, hiking stick, camera, hat and I was on my way. It is an easy walk with a few moderate sections and you are just a few feet from the lake most of the time. There are many willows along the edge of the lake where you can see that the water is low, revealing a lot of the willow roots with debris caught in and amongst the exposed roots. I spooked a blue heron on the first shady curve of the lake and later, towards the end of my journey, I saw the heron again with its mate (I’m assuming). When I started my walk the temperature was awesome… but then an hour into the hike it started to get hot and I was losing shade cover. I have learned to bring an energy drink to replenish my energy on such occasions – which was needed this time. The average time to walk around the lake is about 2-½ hrs. It took me about 3 hours as I am always stopping to take pictures. It was approaching 90 degrees when I returned to camp.

On Thursday we took a drive to Patagonia, about 40 miles north and west of PCL. Patti had wanted to eat at “The Velvet Elvis”, a pizza joint in the town of Patagonia. We made some necessary phone calls (to our kids, saying, “We are alive and well”), ate a fantastic lunch and Patti bought her fudge (!) at the “Ovens of Patagonia”. We love the Ovens of Patagonia, for it has all kinds of neat stuff… from fudge, to silicone utensils, to cards and local wines. If you’re ever in Patagonia, stop by. We did not go to Patagonia Lake this trip because now they charge $15.00 just to drive through the area; besides… we have our own lake for $5.00/night. We did however go to Nogales for gas ($2.80/gallon) – as the price of gas in Sonoita was/(is) $3.29/gallon.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday were windy days so we did not go to the lake: seems the wind has a special attraction to standing water i.e. lakes. It would be windy at the lake yet still as a heron’s leg stalking a fish in the reeds… at camp. So Patti took up reading her books and I spent some time perfecting my hat leash. If you have ever been in the hot sun and windy conditions you know how important it is to keep your hat on your head. Sometimes even hats with a drawstring won’t keep your hat on, if the wind is a tailwind. So I thought it would be great to have a way of securing the brim of the hat to your shirt collar or to a backpack etc. Soooo, I invented the Hat Leash, and this way, when the hat blows off your head it doesn’t wind up 2 miles down a cliff or in the water or in the thermal pools at Yellowstone, irretrievable. It has taken me several attempts to get the pattern down but I am coming closer. The hardest part was finding suitable clips with a hole in it for the Macramé to knot through. You be the judge…

My other passion of late, mostly from having time on my hands, is finding suitable walking sticks (no easy task, I might add) and sanding them. I can spend hours with coarse sandpaper creating a smooth surface and often I find an ‘artistic’ face in the handle or along the long, lean base. I only use dead or downed wood; I do not cut a live limb to obtain a stick – unless it is a dead branch still on the tree. Mother Nature is too precious for me to defile one of her living trees.

Finding a stick with character is the biggest challenge – curvy, knotted, shapely branches are the most appealing. It must be thick enough at one end to be sturdy, the thinner end strong enough to not break, and long enough to be helpful. I prefer a longer stick: mine is 6’4” long, which is very useful when bushwhacking downhill.

On Friday, the campground started filling up. The RV section was impacted with all sizes of rigs with all sorts and sizes of people and dogs. The tent section was filled with 3-4 tents per site, food scattered on picnic tables, lanterns, ice chests, kids with toys/bikes, and hammocks strewn between juniper trees. Everywhere adults and kids were laughing, running and riding their bikes – perfect potential for a good weekend. Goodbye to the quiet forest. Most will leave by Sunday mid-day, but as school closes, there will be more families residing in the forests searching for a simpler time gone by.

There were NO FIRES allowed in the campground and we are finding there are no fires allowed anywhere now (so far in AZ and NM) because of the high fire danger. Although people will be people… Patti and I, on our daily evening walk saw some campers with a roaring fire. Needless to say, we reported to the camp host that they had a fire and the camp host immediately went and told them it was a mandatory fine of $5,000.00 +++ 6 months in jail for making a fire – if they did not put it out ASAP. (They instantly doused the fire!)

We were going to stay for 2 weeks, but decided to start our trek up to cooler temperatures on Monday the 14^th… mostly due to my inability to handle temps above 65 degrees. LOL. But the second reason is because Patti broke her reading glasses – irreparable this time?? Since we are in the southern part of the state near where Patti got them in the first place, we will venture back to Palomas, Mexico to get her another pair. We can also visit the “Pink Store” again and have a fabulous lunch there too… (Happily, Patti’s glasses were fixable and so we did not have to stay right beside the border in Columbus, NM for 2 nights…)

Leaving at 7AM we left Poncho Villa Campground in Columbus and made our way to Elephant Butte, NM where we will stay for 2 nights… so Patti can get her annual quiche fix!!! Then on Thursday we will be back on the road northbound to Cochiti, NM.

Here are some local views along the way