Comments (0) Best Place to Encounter Tenderfeet - 2009
The Big Buttes at Papago Park
For a hiker, it seems counterintuitive that going up should be easier than getting down. Down is good. Down is always better.
Well, not at the Big Buttes, humongous sandcastles of petrified mud that must look tame, even comic, to someone from Indiana who's in town for Cactus League.
Here's how the scenario invariably unfolds: Dad and two kids — it's always a dad and two kids — toodle by the Buttes in their rental and decide to have a spontaneous encounter with the Wild West. Dad rings mom at the resort. Hi, honey. We're gonna climb one of these cute rocky things. Should be back in 20. Twenty minutes later, you've got a dad and two kids from Muncie frantically clinging to a badass butte.
In defense of tenderfeet, these mountainous molehills can be deceiving, even deadly, with their slick-rock downs. Ups are a breeze, even for people in shopping-mall sneakers — and especially for kids, who bound up the rock faces like fresh-fed goats. Inevitably, Dad's forced to bound to their rescue, and the trap is sprung. You can almost hear the buttes chortling: Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha.
To date, we've herded two clans of chastened climbers down these building-size boulders — and no thanks required. Just do us a favor. If one of you Indy types sees a poor stranger gazing fretfully at a map of Muncie, show some compassion. We desert dwellers are nothing without our mountains to guide us.
