Water & Wild Horses at Tonto National

After years of visiting the Greater Phoenix area I hiked mountain rocks dotted with prickly cacti and cooled off at the pool. After passing multiple green road signs that said

“river” and seeing not a single drop, I’d written off the area as a dried-out desert. I’m here to let you in on a secret that took me a few years to discover–Tonto National Forest.

The Lower Salt River is located in Tonto National Forest, part of a 200-mile river that feeds nearby lakes–Saguaro, Canyon, Apache, and Roosevelt lakes. Flocked with Sonoran Desert cacti and rambling flora and fauna, Tonto National Forest occupies over 2.9 million acres. The mountains and cacti are stunning here, but