Body Bag while hiking?

So, after the Heber reunion, we all came home and spent a couple days at the TFO (Tryon Family Organization).  It's the reunion with Grandpa Tryon's siblings and decendants.  Aunt Ruth asked me to plan a hike for Friday morning.  Well, I wasn't super excited about it cause I knew how hot it would be.  The only people that ended up there at 5:30am was Dad, Dan, Charisse, Monson and Jessica, and Amber and her kiddos.  We heading out on my favorite hike, Garden Valley Loop.  When we got to the main trail head, what do we see?  Search and Rescue...and Channel 3 news.  Apparently someone got lost in the Superstitions and they have been looking for him for almost a week.  We, having been in Heber for the week, had no idea.  Well, Search and Rescue got us quite a skeptical look when we coming walking up with 3 adults and 5 kids under the age of 7.  Uhmmmm....They came running up and asked if we had water cause it would be getting hot.  I said, "Of course."  Basically, they ignored us and proceeded to give us 20 more water bottles.  REALLY?  As if my backpack wasn't heavy enough! 

So we start out on the hike.  The helicopter is circling over us and Dad jokingly responds, "Better watch out, we might see a dead body."He proceeds to train Dallin and Jarom (Amber's kids) how to become junior rangers.  He shows them animal tracks, teaches them names of plants and which ones they could eat.  It was so cute.  Jarom turns around and shouts, "Mom, I am learning so much on this hike."  As we mossy on up the hill, the sun is getting brighter and the sun hotter.  We get to the top, on Black Mesa, and we begin across the flat place called, "Garden Valley". 


In front of us, not even 1/8 of a mile, the helicopter stops flying and drops down a rope.  After a minute or so, up come a body bag in a net.  The helicopter flew away with a body bag.  Not sure if my eyes really saw the sight, until we passed by some rescuers with repelling gear.  Dad asked them," Did you find what you were looking for?" 
They responded very sadly, "Yes."
Are you looking for anything else?"
"No." and kept walking.  Dad said that by the look in their eyes and their body language, it wasn't good what they had found.  He could tell that they were having a rough time. Dad thanked them for their service and we all continued walking.  A few minutes later the helicopter returned to pick up the men. 

At this point there was a small rocky hill to the left of us and a ravine straight ahead.  We hiked our way around and down the ravine, and about 1 1/2 later made it back to the parking lot.  By this time is was 10am, over 100 degrees.  We were glad to get in our air conditioned car.  As we headed out of the parking lot, we passed Channel 15 and 10. It was really weird, as we were heading down the dirt road to the parking lot, a pickup truck came flying by. The person saw us, reversed and asked us where they found the missing body. We thought this was a little strange.
We were very curious as to what have happened.  Returning home, we turned on the news.  Sure enough, It was a BODY BAG.  The missing man had been found.  Apparently, he was hiking the same trail we were on and was found in the ravine we past, just deeper down.  Dad guesses that he hiked the rocky mountain to take a picture or something, and got hurt and fell in the ravine. What was really weird, was the man that asked us about the missing body, looked EXACTLY like the missing man.  It must have been his brother or something.  He had been missing since Sunday.  He was found at 7:30am on Friday morning.

Needless to say, a very somber and important 1st hand lesson was learned today.  STAY ON THE TRAIL, no matter how many times you have hiked there.  This man was an experienced hiker in the Superstitions.