Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire OK, Tell Me About Phoenix

I don't doubt Dennis a bit, just schitty if thats the case.

STFU... Kentuck is welcome, but all those other californicators will be headed over... it was just a jackrabbit, see... just a rabbit.

Kent

Was that the SR9c? Just got a note from Ruger today about the SR9c (slim, compact version) being named 2010 Handgun of the Year by the Shootng Industry Academy of Excellence.

"I like the area between Prescot and Yarnell" said Tracks.

I do too. Lived in Prescott for many years and found lots of nice quail hunting spots down that way, and even below the mountains toward Congress. Also very good javelina hunting in that entire area - especially with handgun - and good mule deer country as well. We see a whitetail occasionally. And, in more recent years, the elk that once moved into the PNF in the area beyond Thumb Butte in the 80s are dropping down the back side into the Skull Valley/Kirkland direction.

That area seems like the real west of cowboy film days. Bill Ruger had a really nice place out that way - was priviledged to visit him there once.

That all said, it is even nicer up here.

Grew up in Parks, about half way between Flag and Williams. Wore off many miles off boot leather and tire rubber exploring that area. Great place to grow up in the 70's and 80's. In fact I am heading back out there Friday night for 10 days with my son to do some shooting, camping, calling and scouting about 15 miles North of Williams. Drew a rifle bull tag in my home unit of 7W this year, and am really looking forward to another elk hunt back home. With any luck, I will be hanging a nice bull out of the same tree my son hung his first elk out of a few years ago, that being the same tree I hung my first elk out of 30 years ago as well. Some great elk camps out of that camp!

I apologize to everyone I was misinformed, I'm going off of 2nd hand info from a friend that lives in Williams. I would take Phoenix over southern California any day. As for hunting opportunities AZ hunting is much better and closer than what I get to deal with in the so cal area.

ML

If you have the coin, the best place to live in the Valley of the Sun is the Cave Creek, Carefree area, imo. Housing prices have fallen dramatically and are due to fall another 10% in the area. Good time to buy.

I was in Clints Wells several times this spring/summer. Went to scout out a spot for a scout camp in April and stopped in to have lunch. Signs posted all over. I let them know that I wasn't eating there and that this was a huge slap in the face to sportsman whom they were trying to make their living off of. I won't go back until the signs are down. I bought propane there in June and walked in with my Glock on to the little store and didn't get a single look but I won't step foot in the restaurant.

Roger, BLR358, sent me a list a while back of those that were anti-gun etc. I will see if I still have it.

Good to know Dennis, thanks for the heads up.

Kent

Man, I'd hate to live in a big city again, but a guy has to do what it takes to eat.

My vote goes for the north to northwest side. Gets you close to some great get-away country. Head on out past Wickenburg and you are getting closer to some great country.

Past Congress and the green frog (do they still paint it?), past the dry gulch where the crazy bastard with the yellow Ford, yellow teeth, and yellow hair keeps bees outside an abandoned mine, up Yarnell Hill and then Peeples Valley, Yava Pi, over to Skull Valley, on up to Prescott.

A guy can get in lots of therapeutic time in that part of the world. It helps make up for life in the big city.

Negotiate for lots of vacation time!

HOT!

yeah, it was. Had a very stiff main spring. The guy was saying there might be a few internal issues where some of the parts may need to be machined down. i'm not a big ruger pistol fan, feel the other way about the revolvers. But it seemed to be a pretty well put together gun. Enough that i would like to wring one out. The employees do have a perk, in that they can buy at cost a certain number of firearms per year. A lot of them do this and later sell them for a few bucks when they tire of them.

Nice perk. That would be especially beneficial in the rifle department.

+1 on the Ruger revolvers, and I have several Ruger rifles among my collection, as well, but my "most serious" pistols... are a Kimber Eclipse II (.45) and a H&K P2000 (40 S&W). If the chit's hitting the fan and I can't get to a shotgun, I'm grabbin' one of those.

Well, OK, a Kahr MK-9 Elite thrown in there, too, just for max concealability. Of course, a S&W Centenial-style 640-2 slipped into a pocket serves the same purpose, but I better not get started on the revolvers...

I was born in Tempe, a Phoenix suburb, and have lived in Arizona my entire life (56 years), mostly in Phoenix. I am now at a point in my life that I hate living here. As many posters have observed, the pollution, traffic, and crime are now out-of-sight, to say nothing of the transmogrification of Phoenix into Mexico Norte. In addition, the entire state seems to have been hijacked by carpetbaggers and Rinos (e.g., John McCain). I'm largely indifferent to the heat; I don't particularly like it, but it's something one simply grows accustomed to.

I'll admit that Phoenix is still preferable to, say, Gary IN or Detroit. However, when I think back on the Phoenix of the 1970's and earlier, I'm stunned at how much it's deteriorated from what it once was.

That's true of a lot of places... this will be a matter of going where the work is... and choosing the lesser of evils. At least it's close to some great country.

Tuco,

Reminds me of something Jack O'Connor said when asked why he never returned to his "beloved Arizona". He answered (loose quote here) "It would be akin to walking into a brothel and encountering an old high school sweetheart, my heart just couldn't bear to take it". And he said THAT in the 70's!

I feel much the same, with rampant ATV and other abuses, and the after effects being heaped on all of us via the Forest Service because of it in large part. Williams district of the Kaibab is getting a little out of control IMO, and our public lands are becoming less and less "public", but I'll digress from that rant.

But the connection to AZ is still too strong for me, and does feel like near paradise when I can get back home and out of Kalifornia, as I will be for a week starting tomorrow. But, hopefully when the time comes relatively soon that I can get out of here, I'll be seriously investigating New Mexico. Hopefully a bit more like the AZ of my younger days. Damn the things we took for granted back in the 70's in Arizona... But, still a damn site better than where I find myself presently.

I'll grant you that one.

I was there two years ago, on business, for about three months (Mar, Apr, May). Weather was awesome for outdoor activities.

They provided me with a rental car the entire time.

When I turned that car back in, they probably looked at the odometer and sold it!

I was gone nearly every day after work (hiking in the Superstitions was a favorite after work activity, or climbing Picacho Peak), and practically every weekend, from the Mexican border (literally shaking hands across the low fence with a friendly elderly Mexican rancher, me on my side, him on his side), to Tucson, to Sedona, to Flagstaff, to the Grand Canyon (had to be a tourist at least one day; couldn't be that close and not at least stop), and up into southern Utah (Bryce Canyon, etc).

You're right, there is some great country not far in most directions. Ironically, I did very little, recreation-wise, right in and around Phoenix though. I put a TON of miles on that car!

New Mexico IS great... but not a lot of jobs. And I'll happily take AZ. over SoCal.

well, you are just a youngin since i am 62. I tell people tempe is now where the gays live. I started at A.S.U. when i didn't have any sense, in 66 before all the concrete, and before i got smart and went to flagstaff. I can remember in the 50's coming down from prescott to my sisters house at 18st and thomas which was pretty much the edge of town, when the cities in the valley were actually separated. We use to take the bus down to central and the fox theater.
As to william ranger district, it is kind of funny. I got a brochure from them a couple of years ago explaining you were in bear country. If encountering a bear, you were supposed to shake a can with pebbles in it to discourage the bear.
One of the areas a lifelong friend of mine is interested in his northwest new mexico accross from springerville. Water rights ARE an issue but neat country. reminds me a lot of early arizona. Except you have to deal with the even more liberal politics there.

HaHaHaHa...Ron, you're probably right about Tempe being "where the gays live." I rarely go to that side of town and know very little about Tempe. I've never actually lived in Tempe, I just happened to be born there. As an aside, my mom was born in a house on 16th St. and Roosevelt.