We had one other reason for taking the Apache Trail besides its widely advertised beauty. Everyone who mentioned it spoke in bated breath of its difficulty, “the steepest and most dangerous road in Arizona,--you two women surely can’t mean to go over it alone? It’s dangerous even for a _man_.” Whatever inward qualms these remarks evoked, they made us only more curious to try our luck. We had already learned that taken a car-length at a time, no road is as bad as it seems _in toto_, and few situations develop which admit of no solution. As for doing without a man, we found Providence always sent what we needed, in any crisis we could not meet ourselves. In Tucson we found two old friends, Miss Susan and Miss Martha, who shared our brash confidence in ourselves enough to consent to go with us as far as Phoenix. One can travel north from Phoenix to the Dam, then east to Globe, or reverse the route. Most people consider the Trail more magnificent going north and east, but circumstances forced us to take the opposite course. A month later, we made the reverse journey, so that we had opportunity to judge both for ourselves. It is hard to weigh splendor against splendor. No matter which direction you take, you will be constantly looking back to snatch the glory behind you, but on the whole, if I could travel the Apache Trail but once, I should start from Phoenix. We left town in a raw, bleak wind which became bleaker as we circled the small hills about Oracle. For fifteen miles we had fine macadam, though occasionally torn with deep chuck-holes. Then we left the made road, and meandered up and down bumpy paths through forests of the finest, most varied cacti we had seen anywhere. Steep slopes were covered with the giant sahuara, standing bolt upright and pointing a stiff arm to heaven, like an uncouth evangelist. Demon cholla forests with their blurred silver gray haze seemed not to belong to this definite earth, but to some vague, dead moon. Among them wavered the long listless fingers of the ocotilla, and the many-eared prickly pear clambered over the sands like some strange sea plant. In this world of unreal beauty, tawny dunes replaced green slopes, and such verdure as appeared was pale yet brilliant, as if lighted by electricity.