Hieroglyphics Trail

Sunday was a beautiful day here in Arizona. The weather cooled down to the mid 70s so it was a great day to head out to do some hiking!

The trailhead that we started out on is called the Lost Goldmine Trail which is located in Gold Canyon. You drive back away from the 60 through some nice housing areas before the road basically ends in the trail parking lot. 

As you start up the trail, you will see where it splits from the Lost Goldmine Trail and the Hieroglyphics Trail. We haven't done the Lost Goldmine yet, but we will be back!

The trail was about 3 miles round trip, so only about 1.5 miles back to the Hieroglyphics. It was a little over 500ft elevation gain, but steady so it wasn't a real strenuous trail overall. It was a little "up" and the views were still beautiful!

When we got to the top we took a break to eat our Honey Stingers snack. While we were snacking, we saw a couple squirrel friends. There were 3-4 total and they were fast! If you look closely in the picture below you may see one. His tail is in the sun, and his body in the shade. 

After our break we climbed down and across to check out the Hieroglyphics. There were a lot of them!

We also found a little "cave" area.....and you know I had to go in. Then I was told to watch out for critters....so I was like hurry up and take my picture before I see something I don't want to be in here with!

At the top there was also a few small pools of water with a little trickle of what you may call a stream. During heavy rains or when the snow up north melts it probably flows much more, but it was still a cool view. 

Finally, we had to take an obligatory selfie. 😉

Overall this was a pretty easy trail with good views and with an end result. I'd definitely go back again to check it out up further from this point and to take the other trail on another day. 

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoy our adventures!

Arizona State Fair

Saturday we went to check out the State Fair. Coming from small town Pennsylvania, this place was insane compared to the local county fairs I'm used to. 

I had heard a lot of things about the fair regarding price so was hesitant to go. We decided we would just go check out this time so we would know what to expect. I can definitely see how it could get expensive if you were taking kids that would be riding and playing games. The entrance fee was $15/person, so for us that wasn't too bad to just walk around and take it all in.

One of the reasons I went was to visit a friend from work. She works at one of the funnel cake stands so of course we had to check that out. These were not your basic funnel cakes! Jason got a funnel cake sundae and I got an apple pie.

After we had our dessert first we continued checking things out. While we didn't eat "real food" at the fair, there were so many options. Mexican food, Indian Fry Bread, Turkey Legs....it was much more than your basic "Chicken and Fries". 

Oh, and let's not forget the fresh donuts!

The rides here were easily comparable to what you'd find a regular amusement park. I don't know the names but they went WAY up and flipped around, definitely not for the weak. Haha. 

They had three different ferris wheels and a sky ride too.

My core memory was unlocked when I saw they had the old school Zipper ride. I loved riding this as a kid and remember my first time to deal ng at the Blairsville Carnival (yes, I just aged myself with that one.) I will say it seems much smaller than I remembered!

Our last stop was the Agricultural Barn....aka COWS!!!! This part of the fair wasn't as farm heavy as the Indiana County fair, but they did have some different animals such as llama and camels! Of course, as I already mentioned, the cows are my favorite!

For just walking around and taking in the sights, we spent just about an hour or so at the fair. I'd definitely go back again, especially if we had visitors during that time. 😉 The fair runs every year for the entire month of October for anyone interested in checking it out! 

Sanctum of Horror - 2021 Adventure

So last weekend it rained here pretty much all day Saturday and Sunday was just a dreary day. Really had that PA feel....and I wasn't missing it! It's abnormal for us to get a full day of rain, let alone rain this late into the year. 

Since we didn't have any adventures last week, I decided it was a good time to revisit a past adventure prior to starting the blog. What better topic than a Haunted House for late October!

This particular haunted house is located at the Superstitions Springs Mall. Since we didn't know exactly where, we decided to just park and walk around. We saw some flashy lights, headed that direction and instead of finding the haunted house we found a little carnival! 

We didn't actually go check it out, but I did see it was set up again this year. Maybe we'll go visit one of these days. 

After walking around the entire mall we finally found it. Turns out we were parked closer than we thought, we just went the long way around. Haha. 

The Haunted House is title the Sanctum of Horror, but you actually get access to two separate houses and are able to go through them as many times as you want for the one admission price. 

We did the Sanctum of Horror first. The lines actually moved pretty fast as there were characters out and about scaring people while we waited, which was pretty entertaining in itself.

This house was probably my favorite of the two. I really like the spooky decor outside as well. 

The Breach was the second house and had more of a sci-fi feel to it. While it was also scary and cool, I like the old school scare feel of Sanctum.

Being in a mall parking lot this event really went all out. Not only did you have the two houses, they also had a live band playing on the roof. One of the characters got up there and was waving his chain saw around. He then started throwing glow sticks to the crowd. It was wild!

The week after we went they were doing a separate event that you could get access to with your tickets. It was the same two house but under black lights. Unfortunately, we didn't get to go to that because we already had other plans and it was one night only. 

There are several other Haunted Attractions nearby, so I'm hoping we get to hit a new one up this year! 

Restaurant Review - Slaughterhouse: What The Hell Bar & Grill

Even when we were still in Pennsylvania, one thing we liked to do was check out different restaurants. Any time we'd take a road trip I'd always scope out the best or most unique places to eat. Now that we live in Arizona there are SO many different places to eat we often have a hard time deciding where to go!

This past weekend we had stayed close to home. Actually, we were going to eat at the Celebrate Mesa festival, but it was crazy expensive....like $14 for a hot dog expensive! So we skipped the food trucks and went to WTH.

This was our second time here and they are now under new management. The previous name was just "What The Hell", which is a pretty cool name for a place if you ask me. However, now they are known as "Slaughterhouse: What The Hell". Whatever the name, the menu was still the same. 

Once of their signature drinks....and Jason's favorite, is their Hellz Mary. It's a 32oz Bloody Mary that literally comes in a pitcher with a straw. Not only that but it has celery, bacon, a beef stick, green onion, green olives, lemon, lime, bell pepper mushroom, cherry tomato, jalapeno pepper, habanero pepper, sausage, ham and even a chicken wing! It's basically a meal all on its own. 

I'll just let the picture speak for itself!

Hellz Mary 

Now on to the food. 

Since this is a bar & grill the menu overall is your normal bar food - sandwiches, burgers, etc. They do have Mac & Cheese and Tacos as well, but we haven't tried those yet. We did decide to get an appetizer and try their Mac and Cheese wedges tho. 

For my PA friends....these had a very strong resemblance to Sheetz Mac & Cheese wedges. All that was missing was some Boom Boom sauce. Haha. 

Mac & Cheese Wedges

For our main course we both decided to go with chicken sandwiches. Jason got the Southwest Chicken Sandwich and I got their California Chicken because avocados! For some reason I've been on an avocado kick lately and anything with them on the menu calls to me. 

Southwest Chicken

It was unexpected but a nice change that both sandwiches came on toasted sourdough bread as opposed to a bun. They also have pretty good fries!

California Chicken

The restaurant itself isn't a fancy place. As I mentioned previously, it's your basic bar & grill. It does seem to have a heavy biker presence, but that's not a bad thing. They also have nightly/weekly events such as live bands, karaoke, etc. If we were setting up a new "Villa Night" in Arizona this may be our place. 

Ratings:

Food - 6/10

Atmosphere - 7/10

Service - 8/10

Old Town Farmers Market

The Farmers Market in Old Town is one of my favorites. It has over 100 vendors and is for food and farming only. Due to the hot summers here in Arizona they close July-September, but just reopened for the season on October 1st.

(View of the market from the parking garage.)

(Just a few of the vendors.)

There are many different vendors from salsa to baked goods. What we normally go for is breakfast! Last year we tried some breakfast burritos which were pretty good. However, we had seen this vendor that had these giants skillets making Paella and Breakfast Hash last year but hadn't tried it. We had planned on going back, however we weren't able to make it before the off season. So today we decided we go check it out.

We actually almost ended up getting something else because the first time we walked around we didn't see this booth and thought they weren't there this year. Luckily we kept looking, made another loop and found them. We both decided to get the Breakfast Hash. The portion wasn't cheap ($14), but it was huge and delicious! 

After we ate we took a another walk to find our favorite booth to support - Happy Tails Barkery! What is a trip to the Farmers Market without picking up some treats for the fur kids! 

Today we got them some Chop Lickin' Chicken Jerky and Peanut Butter Bones.

The Old Town Farmers Market will be open every Saturday from 8a-1pm now thru April. They will then start to change their hours to earlier since it starts getting warmer and then close in June. 

One last thing I can't forget...we saw some people on these fun rideables when we we walking back to the car. 

There's always something fun going on in Old Town!

Silly Mountain

Silly Mountain.....yes, that's actually what it's called. Silly, right?

This was probably the first weekend it's been less than 100° since May. Just barely and still in the upper 90s, but why not go for a hike! We didn't want to do anything too crazy and wanted it to be short day for our first time out this "Fall", so we decided to check out this Silly Mountain. 

Since it was getting close to lunch time, I packed us a quick lunch and luckily there was a picnic table right at the trailhead. So we ate first with a beautiful view before starting out.

After lunch we started our hike. The trail maps posted were worn and not readable but we were able to rely on All Trails to follow the direction we wanted to go. We quickly started through some switchbacks heading UP hill.

For those of you that know me, I don't do up well. But that doesn't mean I'm not doing it! I just need to take more breaks. Haha. Well, we eventually came to a cross road ls with "Huff N Puff" trail, so of course that's the way we went. Let me tell you, for me it definitely lived up to its name!

When we got to the top there was another trail called "High Point Trail" that, you guessed it, continued going up! I decided to chill in the shade for a bit and enjoy the views, while Jason went to top to check it out. 

(View of the Superstitions Mountains and Apache Junction)

After about 10-15 minutes, Jason came back down from High Point and we continued back down the trail. We made our way back to truck and headed home for the day. It was a short day with just under 1.75 miles (Jason did close to 2 miles by heading up High Point.)

(There's Jason at the top heading down from High Point)

There are still a number of trails we want to check out in this area, including a short trail at the start that looked like a little garden area. We'll definitely be hitting this place up again soon!