Twelve Mile Wash

With weather so mild and snowless, we've been riding almost every day.  Twelve Mile Wash is close to home and quite convenient for daily workouts. 

We find interesting rock formations,

and vistas of mountains over sandy canyons and sandstone hills. 
In over 60 miles of riding this week, we haven't met a soul on this huge BLM (Bureau of Land Management) tract. 

A power line passes overhead in one place.  We followed the sandy access road along part of our trek.

When we came up on our first white cow, the horses were terrified.  Apparently they thought it was a giant sheep/ogre, and Boss believes any sheep is out to kill him.  Later, seeing the white ones among the more acceptable black color gave the horses new confidence that these were harmless cows, not scary abominable sheep-creatures. 

I had never seen a "witness post" sign like this before. Someone has used it for target practice, proving their semi-amazing criminal marksmanship.

We located a survey benchmark nearby. 

Limestone Bench

We shivered through a cold (10 F) night in our gooseneck trailer.  Actually, we were warm enough wearing jackets and covered with blankets and down sleeping bags. The first rays of sun rising over the San Rafael Swell began a slow warming. 

The horses spent the night in a sturdy corral, built by ranchers who have cattle leases on the BLM land.  The horses look happy, but Daisy seems a little guilty.   I wonder what she has been up to...

The drinking water left outside overnight was frozen solid.   Fortunately, we had another water container in the trailer that was slushy, but pourable. 

The horses drank from a stretch of the San Rafael River that flowed near our camp.  There was ice along the bank, and they weren't too sure about the getting close at first.  As you can see, Mischief has been rolling in the dirt again.

We decided to bag the rest of the trip and drive straight home.  However, the desert warms quickly, and it was 40 degrees before we reached the highway.  We couldn't pass up a ride on Limestone Bench.  All that open territory was just too inviting. 

We came across this old camp, complete with stone benches and a stove.  With that fired up, campers would have been comfy. 

Someone went to a lot of trouble to build a sundial in the middle of nowhere.  Boy scouts, maybe?

We had a nice ride across the bench, covering about 8 miles, just a taste of this vast territory.