The -- Mostly -- Desert Scene

While in the White Mountains, we visited Fort Apache on the White Mountains Apache reservation. Our cabin was in Greer, about 75 miles from the fort. We weren't sure what to expect at Ft. Apache, but what we saw wasn't it! To start with, it was a rainy day. We had a moderately decent map, but the fort wasn't on it. So we went where we thought it was -- but once we were on the reservation, there were no longer the expected "dumb tourist turn here!" signs. So we drove well past Fort Apache before realizing it. Finally, we turned around, and -- miracle of miracles -- there was a sign when heading north. So when we finally found it, we renamed the fort -- it is now "Fort Apogee", because it was the furthest point from Earth (aka Apogee) for us!

Here is a picture down the enlisted men's side of the fort:


It turns out that Fort Apoche -- oops, I mean Fort Apogee -- was the fort that was involved with tracking down Geronimo in the late 1800's. They were also involved in training the Apache scouts, and in maintaining peace on the Apache reservation. There is a pretty good tourist level description, with copies of the historical documents, in the log cabin, shown here:



The log cabin is one of the oldest buildings left on the fort, and was the house of the fort commander in the 1870's.

This house in the officer's row is a bit newer, and I think it was the house of a later commander or his deputy:



You'll notice a tower on the top of the house here. It was an observation tower, used to look out and see approaching weather. It is currently being restored. Here is a close up of the tower:



Fort Apache ceased to be an active fort in the early 1920's. It was converted to a boarding school for Native Americans -- mostly Apache -- and continues in that role today. You can find out more about it -- including more accurate information than what I'm remembering from a few weeks ago -- at their homepage.

We confirmed Fort Agogee's new name on the drive back to the cabin. We went looking for the Mogollon Rim. One of the tour guides I read described the rim, and talked about a road that drives along it for about 50 miles. The rim is an escarpment, where the Colorado plateau drops off, separating northern Arizona from southern Arizona. The drop off is 3000 feet or more in places, and sounds quite interesting. Alas, we never found the road, so I can't report on most of the rim from this trip. But it did take us about 4 hours to return to the cabin from the fort, confirming the designation "Fort Apogee"!