Here's another photo of the small pumpkins we saw at Hunsader Farms last week.

Angela from Just Go is holding her very first Blogapalooza & in the process is also having an awesome goodie bag giveway. Here's what she asked us to do: On October 29, put a photo of a pumpkin at the top of your post (check) and tell us the story of your strangest or scariest trip ever ...

... here goes ...

I wish that in the spirit of Halloween I had a spooky - in a creepy way - strange tale to tell, but unfortunately I don't (though I will admit that I did consider making one up ...). Instead, I'll share a camping trip adventure that nearly scared me out of my britches.

In my mid-twenties, I shared a house with three guy friends and we would often run away for a weekend of camping. We usually headed up to Mingus Mountain, but once we learned there was a seasonal waterfall, well, we just had to make the trip (sorry, I can't even remember the area let alone the name of the falls) ... understand that waterfalls in central AZ are not all that commen, so this was a pretty big deal for us. It should also be noted that though I can play a pretty good pack mule, I am not known as a daredevil ... that said, we made our eight mile hike into this secret canyon and actually found the waterfall. There were boulders to climb on that were huge (taller than me by more than double), beautiful river rock and everything was so lush. Pretty cool even if the waterfall was not much more than a trickle. It was still pretty amazing. We found a nice ledge down "stream" (more aptly dry bed) from the fall that was about 10 feet above the bed and level, so decided to set up camp there. That night we were pretty exhausted after a day of playing and good camp food, so when it started sprinkling we all decided to turn in for the night. That sprinkle turned into a pretty big storm. It rained most of the night and was still raining when we woke. Thanks to being in a canyon, we weren't beaten up by the winds, so I guess that counts for something. ... when we came out of our tents that dry bed had turned into a raging river ... and wouldn't you know it, the trail out was on the other side. The waters were still rising, but the rain had let up a bit, so we broke camp. There we are on the wrong side of the river with the waters still rising and the only way out was UP THE SIDE OF THE CANYON ... I kid you not. The boys had to do some pretty serious cajoling to get me to agree to scale the side of the mountain, but they managed to & I actually made it to the top. The hike out was a good 20+ miles (ok, not really ... remember it was eight miles in and we took that shortcut up the side of the canyon) ... by the time we got back to our truck, we were all exhausted and so ready for a hot meal that we took our rain soaked stinky selves to the nearest Denny's to rehash, revisit and retell our adventurous waterfall trip.

I really should be fast asleep, but I didn't want to be a party pooper ... I'll try to find pictures from the trip when I get home from work tomorrow ... if I find them, I'll be sure to add them.

Now, go check out the other Blogapalooza players HERE (listed on Angela's side bar) ... who knows, maybe one of them will have a wickedly haunted trip to share.