Jeepers

When I proudly showed my manuscript "Ten Gateways to Mohave County" to my sister, Jacqueline, she said something to the effect that those paved boulevards were meant for Sunday drivers in low-slung and sissified family sedans. "Where?" she demantled, "are the jeep trails?" I should have expected this from a card-carrying member of the Phoenix Jeep Club, people who delight in playing Follow-The-Leader over some rather absurd trails for the sole evident purpose of hoping the driver of some other make of vehicle gets stuck and requires assistance in being pulled out. (See "Jeeping in Arizona," by Don Dedera, with photographs by Darwin Van Campen, ARIZONA HIGHWAYS, February, 1964.) At her urging I spread out the map once more and found that there are, indeed, other gateways to this huge land we call Mohave County. All require the eating of a fair amount of dust, but they are exciting alternate routes into this big country. Some can even be traversed by the family bus, but local inquiry is recommended!

Gateway No. 1 boasts such a road at Alamo Crossing of the Bill Williams River, a road inviting the more adventuresome driver to rough country northward. This has long been an important route for the miners of manganese ore in Southern Mohave County, who took their loads of black metal down this road to the stockpile at Wenden on U.S. 60. The availability of this road is complicated by construction of Alamo Dam a short distance downstream from the crossing. At some time in the future the dam will start backing up a new lake, which will make this crossing impassable. If the road is open, it leads north from the river to Signal, and then up a broad valley bordered on the east by the lofty Hualapai Mountains to a junction with Interstate 40 at Yucca. At some places on this road there are unusual combinations of junipers, saguaros, and Joshua trees to lend a special scenic appeal.

Continuing clockwise, there's just no way to get across the Colorado River and its string of manmade lakes (other than the regular Gateways 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6) until you get way up into Nevada above Las Vegas. The crossing over Hoover Dam by U.S. 93 is our Gateway No. 6. The road at Tassi Springs westerward leads to rough and interesting country.

The good folks at Meadview, located south of Pierce Ferry, love to explore the back country in four-wheelers, and Hal Brown led a group of five such vehicles on this route last December. The road leaves Interstate 15 north of Glendale, Nevada, and enters Arizona and Mohave County almost due north of Pierce Ferry. Hal also reports a graded road north from Tassi Springs into St. George, Utah, a road few people travel, but rewarding to folks looking for new country to explore.

There's no question about Gateway No. 7-A, however, for that is the road south from St. George past Wolf Hole to Mount Trumbull and on to Toroweap Point. That's one I have traveled, and in a regular station wagon, at that. This route makes an interesting loop trip, coming out near Pipe Spring National Monument and the newly paved Arizona 389 to Fredonia. Here is best shown the great vastness of the Arizona Strip, that harsh and empty but hauntingly beautiful portion of Mohave County north of the Grand Canyon. Climax of this trip is the experience of standing at Toroweap Point to gaze straight down 3,000 feet at the tiny thread of the Colorado River below. At times I am glad that it, like the canyon home of the Havasupai Indians, is difficult to reach. So it's a pleasure to strongly recommend Gateway No. 7-A, but only to those with a bit of adventure in their souls and the wisdom to take commonsense precautions.

There is nothing but regular highways until we reach the country east of Kingman in what will become Gateway No. 10, the new rout ing of Interstate Highway 40. Several dirt roads now travel over this general area, including one northwest of Prescott through Walnut Creek, and one west of Seligman. Lumping them together as Gateway No. 10-A, they provide access to a rugged area that has long been a favorite destination of deer hunters. Access may be somewhat easier now that much heavy construction has been performed in the area, but, again, careful inquiry should be the order of the day.

While these are the more obvious back trails into Mohave County, the true jeeper would add many dozens of his own, including some that he makes himself. It sounds like fun, and should provide an added incentive for going beyond the ten major gateways to far-flung Mohave.