76 SADDLE AND CAMP 



tracks were everywhere and many wild turkeys 

 were seen. Water was the one thing lacking 

 to make the region an ideal wilderness. Our 

 canteen, which had been lost at Fort Apache, 

 was sorely missed. One should never travel in 

 Arizona without a canteen. Night camps were 

 made by the side of muck holes, generally not 

 above thirty yards in width, which John called 

 "lakes." The water in these was thick with 

 decayed vegetable matter and sometimes so bad 

 that the horses scarcely sipped it. One of them 

 was so vile that the animals refused to drink 

 from it at all, though they had had no water 

 for several hours. We utilized it for coffee, 

 however, for one may feel perfectly safe in 

 drinking contaminated water after it has been 

 boiled. 



We made diligent search for Blue Lake, a 

 pool famous in the region, but failed to find it, 

 though John had visited it once several years 

 before. He described it as filling a circular de- 

 pression, approximately three hundred feet in 

 diameter and probably an ancient crater. Its 

 waters are said to be blue and transparent and 

 of great depth. A party of cowboys once tied 

 two lasso ropes end to end and with a heavy 

 stone to weight the line attempted to sound the 

 depth, but failed to find bottom. 



