Saturday, May 28, 2011

Brown Canyon Trail

I had forgotten how pretty Brown Canyon is. It's been 18 months since I have been here, the last time was with Colonel Bill in late 2009. It's an anno 1905 four-room adobe ranch house replete with storage shed, water tank and a pond where the national forest wants to stock the native leopard frog. Its location in the foothills does not provide for a view into the valley, so one has a feeling of being alone in the canyon.

This hike was led by Frank, a new member who joined when I was still club president and who's an enthusiastic 77-year-old man. This turned out to be a lovely club hike and picnic afterwards, with Frank providing all the food and beer. He set quite a high standard should these Memorial Day hikes become a club favorite. (And why not? Why only do a club picnic in December when it can be freezing cold?)
There is now a road that takes visitors to the Brown Canyon Ranch off Ramsey Road with plenty of car parking. This was new to me, as the trailhead parking is a mile away and popular with horse riders and hunters.

The meetup was for 7:30; I showed up at 7:10am with Sadie. Frank and a new couple, Paul and Rachel (who dropped out early on) were already there. Turn-out was impressive: Both Steves, Susan and her friends MaryAnn And Jeanie, Rod, Paul, Bernie, Michael (who also had to turn around early for an 11am appointment), Angela (Franks daughter) and a few new faces. Tom, a parks volunteer from Oregon overseeing the ranch house this summer, sat with us once we were back under the shade of a cottonwood enjoying our food and socializing. Frank gave us a "safety briefing" as we sat around as if all in the army listening to the standard long-weekend safety brief.
Brown Canyon is a popular multi-use trail that skirts along the perimeter of Fort Huachuca. Mountain bikers, equestrians and hikers all use this trail and dogs must be leashed while on the ranch house property. This is an easy grade for beginner hikers to our high desert as the canyon meanders along Ramsey creek as it slowly slopes up and into Ramsey Box Canyon, a hidden pool with waterfall

Once we were in the Miller Peak wilderness, I let Sadie off leash. She seemed to not mind any of the people. Sometimes she'd brush up against someone while walking and one push up a particularly steep rock wall her rear paw hit the had of John S who quickly hit her leg to get it away from his hand so that he wouldn't lose his footing.

We stayed at this dry waterfall for a while. I don't ever remember this! The water was stagnant and not something I would have had Sadie drink from, but we stayed here a bit and took some photos before joining the others in the group further up the trail that climbed to a pretty overlook of the valley and the nearby waterfall. We stayed here some more before turning around. Maybe another day I'll hike this trail all the way into Ramsey Canyon and up the Hamburg Trail, but that's a 12-mile hike and I'd need all day to do that. Today was not that kind of day!

Frank wanted to serve the food at 11am and my goodness that's when it happened, too! This didn't give us much time to hike longer, but today was more of a social hike anyway.


His daughter and son-in-law had fried chicken, various salads, sodas and beer (Budweiser) ready. I drank two Diet Cokes and skipped the Bud as I chatted with friends, took photos of the ranch and watched a Vermillion Fly Catcher flit about.

Sadie ate well today, eating two heaping piles of bones, chicken and plenty of leftover meat. She was mostly tied up to the fence around the frog pond, but once the sun was over her, she joined me under the picnic table.
I sat at one table where big Steve, Rod, Eric and Tom sat. Tom, it turns out, is like Eric an amateru astronomer, and even Rod has an interest in the field. Tom talked about his passion for the stars even as a kid, telling us a heartwretching story of meeting Commander Ed White, who died two months later in a tragic launch rehearsal explosion of Apollo 1 with two other crew members, Gus Grissom and Roger Chaffee. Retelling this childhood memory still brought tears to Tom's eyes.

Ed White was good friends of Tom's father. Tom and his older brother shared a room as boys. White enters one evening, squeezing the big toes of both boys. White looks Tom in the eye and asks "You two brothers?"
"Yes, Sir!" replied Tom.
"Then promise to always remain brothers!"
Two months later White burned to death when the cabin he and his crew were in caught fire, 27 January 1967. The men had no chance of survival, being in a pure oxygen chamber.

Tom told us other stories of watching launches near Titusville, FL and being fascinated with stars, nebulas and anything related to NASA.
We were under that cottonwood tree chatting until 1pm. Eric and I were coming up with ideas for hikes, such as a moon-lighted hikes or stargazing hikes (Tom said plenty gazers come to the ranch on a New Moon with their scopes) and rockhounding hikes. He and I have many of the same interests, and he shows the same youthful enthusiasm for the outdoors as I do.
I didn't get to make my rounds so well with other hikers such as Susan with whom I usually share photography tips, as Tom's stories were so fascinating, but by 1pm people were ready to leave.

The Baptist Church's marquee read 89F as I drove by at 1pm. Tucson hit 100F today, the first triple-digits for the city.

I had promised Kevin I'd be home by 1pm to join him at his friend's place in Bisbee-Warren for a graduation party for Taylor, who graduated earlier this week from Bisbee High School. But when I got home he had already left. I at least took it easy, hanging out with the dogs, writing this, and downloading photographs. The fire over the Chiricahuas was now obvious over the Mule mountains, and at over 59,000 acres now is leaving our valley air pretty brown and hazy. The increased winds this afternoon aren't going to keep the fire from destroying the western slopes of these beautiful mountains.
The shower this afternoon felt so good, even if the water wasn't too warm and, it turned out, we had no running water except for what was in our water tank. I sat in my clean underwear at this computer when the doorbell rang and the dogs went bonkers. Usually the doorbell means there's a package at the front door; the delivery guys ring the bell and leave. I grabbed K's robe and, with my hair still wrapped around my head, discovered that there was a Mexican man in the front yard wanting to know if K's old Buick Century is for sale. It's been parked on our east side with a flat tire now for several months. (Yeah, it looks real rednecky!). The man must have wondered about me and my attire, but he did catch me totally off guard. No use worrying about it now.

Saturday, May 21, 2011

Hunter Canyon Trail loop hike

GPS record for the 21 May 2011 hike to Clark Spring. Track colors relate to speed of travel (green: 0-1 mph, yellow: 1-2 mph, orange: 2-3 mph, red: 3 mph +). Total odometer distance was 7.76 miles, which is usually longer than the track distance, because the GPS only collects track waypoints every minute while the odometer is updating continuously. Note total elevation gain and loss shown on the profile was almost 2000 ft
Distance: 7.6 miles
Elevation: 5200-6200' Gain/Loss: 2000'.
5.5 hours

There were eight of us: Big Steve, Rod (the leader), Eric S, John S, and new members Para and her beagle Snoopy, Beth and Roger.

This was my first hike with the group since early March. I wasn't sure if I would feel up to this hike because of a slight nausea these last two days, but after the lunch break at Clark Springs I felt better. Rod led this hike, and after a quick meeting at the Mall parking lot, we drove to the Hunter Canyon trailhead. I could have just met everyone there, but me coming to this hike was a last-minute decision. Weather was almost perfect, with an early morning cool breeze.
I hadn't hiked the entire Hunter Canyon trail for quite a while, so I had forgotten about the saddle, the uphill climb and the potential for snakes in this area. The entire hike was a mellow rollercoaster of ups and downs, through a dry desert studded with mesquites, oaks, agaves and yuccas. There was much sun exposure as we climbed out of Hunter and into Miller Canyon. I stopped to take a lot of photos, but I also chatted a lot with Para and Roger and later Beth, who hails from Indy. It was a good pace, not to slow or fast.

The lush green from many taller trees set back well to the dead grey and brown foliage of the younger and smaller emory oaks. The trees aren't dead but the end tips and leaves are. This dead foliage is still good kindling for a fire. We desperately need some rain!
Even though I've been on the various trails this hike consisted of, this was the first time I hiked this particular course. I liked it. It provides scenery, vistas, shade, overlooks and an opportunity to find minerals and chrystals along the way. I even showed the group where I hunt for quartz chrystals. Eric, I discovered, is as much of a rock hound and naturalist as I am, and stop to enjoy the same things.

We met a few birders in the Hunter Canyon area. One couple even asked me where the spotted owl was. Owl? It turned out the owl hides in a tree past the Y in the trail further up the grade, a grade I was not willing to go back up to check out!
We rested and had lunch at Clark Springs, where we all had shade and chatted. Both dogs looked exhausted. Beth told us about her IUPUI days in the 1970s (she did not look older than me!) and that got us Hoosiers all excited about IU-Bloomington. Roger, it turns out, is originally from Minnesota where one birder was watching for birds carrying a 500mm lens around his neck. But once back on the trail and away from Miller we saw no other people, just trash left behind my border crossers off the trail.

It was considerably warmer by now, past noon, and I was drinking more water. So was Sadie.
The return hike was the same way we came, with just a small diversion off an illegal trail we soon realized wasn't too safe to go down on due to the slides and heavy brush. I was wearing shorts and didn't want to be cut up, nor see anyone else cut up or injured. That wouldn't have been a good intro to some of the new hikers today.

We kept ourselves entertained talking about today's Rapture that was held from noon-3pm around the world. Nothing major happened today that would indicate the end of the world: no violent earthquakes, floods or other catastrophic disasters although I read later than the Icelandic volcano Grimsvotn erupted, but not at the strength as last summer where ash was so bad that air travel had to be postponed for a few weeks.
We got back to our cars around 1:30pm. Eric, Beth and Para quickly left but I showed Steve, Rod and John the other creek I take my dogs to. This was my home turf, I explained, and target shooters were shooting up my forests. They agreed with the abuse the trees were getting after I showed them some of the felled oaks from too many bullet holes. Steve had never been here in Hunter Canyon. To me this place is a remote, hidden gem.

Sunday, May 15, 2011

San Pedro River Trail-Hereford Bridge South, Part II

After a relatively lazy weekend around the house and garden I decided I had to take a short hike with Sadie in the foothills. It was 3pm and ALL THREE DOGS wanted to go along. I can't take all the dogs in an area where others may be, so instead of the foothills I opted for the San Pedro River Trail in Hereford again, the same trail I did with them several weeks ago. This time I planned to go further south. I told Kevin I would be back by 6pm.

I got to the trailhead at the hottest part of the day, and the dryness quickly overcame me. I drank a quart of water on this hike, and I probably could have had more.

Despite the lack of rain since my last visit, a few more wildflowers were blooming and the first of the tumbleweeds are now a foot tall.
We are now in rattlesnake season and I kept my eyes open. We were definitely in the kind of terrain where they would be found, hiding under rocks to keep cool. The dogs stayed on the dusty trail but it's Sadie I worry about, as she likes to run on ahead.

Luckily the only thing the dogs found today were two deer in the distance, after which they all took off on the trail. They never seem to run fast enough for the deer, and before the deer disappeared behind a holm, the dogs were back on the trail toward me. I felt it odd that they even thought they could catch up to the deer as it was, so them taking after the deer surprised me. It's no wonder people don't like dogs that chase wildlife; dogs can ver very unpredictable.

The dogs were clearly heated as well and gave them an opportunity to enjoy the water with every opportunity. Had we not stopped for water I could have made this an hour-long hike one way. My mind wasn't in the mood to hike the entire trail, but I did want to go further than last time.
As it turned out, I didn't go any further than the first time I was on this section years ago. The trail stays close to the western banks of the river, but it seems to end at the fenceline of a home two miles down. The trail here loses its marking, so we turned left (east) to head to the river and walked in the shade of the cottonwoods for a while before cutting back to the official trail. Even though this area is allegedly owned by the BLM, a landowner has made the river here off limits going south. I'm not sure this is legal, but I didn't want to fuss with anyone.

The map shows the trail goes due south but I didn't have neither the drive nor the desire to stay out in the hot sun much longer. Two hours plus water breaks is better than no breaks at all, and it was nice to be back at this part of the river again.
This is a pretty section of the trail in the right season as it stays close to the river. In the cooler early spring or late fall this is a lovely area to watch birds of all sorts. I would say I prefer this more remote spot over the San Pedro House further north, where everyone seems to park and meander. I spotted an oriole with its bright yellow body and black wings, and a few other flitting birds. The caterpillars that were out in full force the last time we were here were now gone (yay!). To see birds it's best to come here early in the morning, just before dawn, the same time the illegals wander up the river.

I got back to the truck by 6:04pm. We had hiked a tad over four miles round trip, maybe five, and one of these days I'll explore the nearby Lehrer Kill site, where a wooly mammoth was found on private property. To think that 12,000 years ago some of the meanest beasts roamed this land is quite fascinating.

The dogs seemed happy to be back home. Kevin was already napping but he had gotten up at 3am. All three dogs rested well, too. I always feel better when all three dogs get exercised. This dusty walk was more fun than the usual evening hike around the neighborhood, although with an approaching full moon on Tuesday, our streets are well moonlighted.

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Lochiel, AZ

Today I did a somewhat unplanned drive to the border community of Lochiel, AZ. Weather was once again cooler than normal, with less breeze, and in the 70s. A perfect day for walking!

I actually started out wanting to take the dogs along a creekbed near the border 20 miles east of Lochiel, but the creekbed was dry and there was an unusual large amount of USBP vans up and down Forest Road 61 that I felt I was in the way. I felt uneasy in these oak-stuffed woods and went on.

Another creekbed further west had some water in it and I stopped here a bit to walk south, following an illegal trail. The dogs were up front and when they stopped and froze, I turned around, but not before coming across a very dead cow that didn't seem dead for long. The poor thing looks like it slipped and fell and broke its leg while trying to get to the shallow creek.
We weren't on the trail for long and I resumed the drive west to Lochiel. This is normally a popular area for ATVers as the dirt roads plow over hilltops and into dry north-south traveling drainage ditches, throwing a dust trail behind the driver that rises for miles.

It had been a while since I was in this ranching community. All the roads leading to the border, including forest roads, were now marked private property or off limits, perhaps because of the increased drug smuggling activity here. Even the old village of Lochiel is now closed off and I couldn't walk around the historic buildings to take photos. The last time I was here I did walk around the church, the old post office, the cemetery and gazed into the pretty valley into Sonora. This area has so much history to it, and there's an air of mystique around the border, and the rolling hills are inviting enough for a stroll. All that is now closed off to the curious explorer like me. A bulletin board for the Lochiel community with nothing on it is all that reminds the traveler that one has arrived in the old village.
But oddly enough, for a well-known drug smuggling area, the border fence here is an easily-surmountable six-foot-high single metal fence reinforced with hedgehogs. This is deceiving to the smugglers as there are other surveillance devices in the area that track movement, but for the casual observer the fence here looks flimsy and hardly an obstacle.

It's also a deceivingly peaceful land. I heard or saw no one other than animals: staring cows, barking dogs and curious horses and ponies stood along the road. It's rolling grassland hills studded with oaks and cottonwoods, junipers and smaller manzanitas, with taller tree-studded peaks in Sonora. Ravens post sentry in tall cottonwoods across the landscape and fly off when you get too close. It doesn't look like violent drug smugglers would want to come here, but come they do when the sun goes down.
It is through this area that a group of drug smugglers came through earlier in the year and killed a border patrol agent as they wandered northbound.

Today the only place I stopped was the de Niza monument north of the village, the only thing that seems to call for visitors to stop and rest. Fray Marcos de Niza was the first European to step foot here in 1539, and the concrete cross and monument off the road commemorates this. This is a nice area for a wayward traveler to stop and take in the landscape, but there is no shade, no water, no stores nearby where people may go and ask for directions. One is on one's own here between Nogales and Sierra Vista, and someone who breaks down here may wait for hours for any help as there is no cell phone reception and AM radio is intermittent out of Tucson.
A border crossing point was open here until the 1980s but then shut down. The old guard shack still remains on the Mexican side. Now all that remains are sun-burned adobe homes with junky yards and blackened wood fences, skinny cows and mangy horses. The cows have open range here, and they sometimes stand in the middle of the road like one did for me as I entered the area.

I didn't see one USBP van though. Instead, I saw fire trucks moving toward the 1000-acre wildfire that had started two days ago between Lochiel and the ghosttown of Duquesne further north. The firefighters had it contained by the time I got there today, but hotspots were still smoldering from a distance. They saved a hilltop ranch home and surely fought hard in yesterday's wind to get this manmade fire out. The tall oak trees look burned but still alive.
I turned around at ghosttown of Duquesne due to the time. This is where ATVers would park and mark the dusty forest roads with their tracks. Today, due to the simmering embers, only fire trucks were parked here.

It was already past 4pm now and I had driven 43 miles, and did very little walking with the dogs. I didn't want to go any further and drove back the way I came. The dogs resumed their barking at cows and skinny horses along the way as fine desert dust waffed into the open truck windows.

The road to Lochiel is a double-wide dirt road that seemed much smoother in Santa Cruz county than in Cochise County. Once back in Cochise County, though, the USBP vans increased again. Something had to be going on today that I wasn't aware of. I saw no other vehicles or people the entire time. This is where armed agents position themselves on rocky overlooks with their sights on the border. It's best to leave them alone.

Today's little roadtrip didn't yield much in hiking as I had hoped as what I wanted to walk along was closed off to me. I doubt we even went two miles when we did get out of the truck. I wanted to see for myself the change in this area, the seemingly depressing view of both buildings and landscapes. Where had all the people gone? I felt as if I was driving in abandoned Nomansland, and despite the beauty of this place, was glad to be back home in the early evening.
We were back home shortly after 6pm and once again Kevin was already in bed listening to his radio; that's what happens when one gets up at 3am most days. The Mississippi River continues to rise and the floodwaters have now reached the Vicksburg, MS area. Entire river communities are under threat of being washed away; peole's entire livelihoods at a loss.
Spain had had two earthquakes in the southeastern part of the country, registering 4.5 and 5.1. I could hear NPR updates via my AM radio intermittently while driving along the border. Ten people were announced dead by the time I logged online and massive damage was reported. This is so odd as despite me reading the usgs.gov site most days, hadn't seen any tremblors for Spain that registered above 2.5. A long-deceased seismologist who died in 1915, Bendandi, had predicted a big quake for Rome today, which resulted in one out of five Romans taking the day off today. My question of course is, had Bendandi predicted the big Italian quake of 2009 in which around 300 were killed? He was either off by two years or off by a few hundred miles!

Saturday, May 7, 2011

Hiking up to Miller Peak via Miller Canyon

I went to bed sore from yesterday's injuries and decided in the last minute (it may have been when I woke up at 4:30am) to hike up Miller Peak instead of Gardner Canyon. It's a decision I do not regret. The trailhead is only 3.5 miles from our house, there's no major gas expended to get there, I wouldn't feel cautious about Sadie around strangers and I wouldn't be spending three hours driving.

Kevin went shopping early. I left the house with Sadie at 8:40am and got to the trailhead at 9:12am. There were a lot of cars in the parking lot, and I learned later most of them were from members of the Southern Arizona Bird Observatory (SABO) that was bird watching in the lower Miller Canyon.
I was feeling good and hiked at a good pace but once I came up to the SABO people, I stopped and chatted with Sheri Williamson, director and naturalist of SABO. There were indeed many birds heard and seen today, more than my last hike. Sheri told me the group was looking for a rare red bird that was allegedly spotted here recently. The group was tracking one bird Sheri said was flying around marking its territory. She identified the yellow-striped bird I saw last time at the bathtub as the Townsend Warbler and quickly took out her field guide to show me. She knows her birds! I didn't want to interrupt their sightings, thanked Sheri for her willingness to talk to me, and walked on.

I enjoy bird watching and trying to photograph birds, flowers, lizards and other wildlife always slows me down, but I couldn't sit still for hours in the woods hoping for a specific bird to fly down.
Once I got past the group the steepness began, and I started feeling the heat of the day. I slowed down many times to listen and watch birds. Columbines were now out and Red Cardinal flowers were also in bloom. What a change from the last hike a few weeks ago! I could have just as easily sat somewhere quietly in the shade to watch and listen to birds.

Once I got past the SABO group I never saw another soul on the trail.

I was so engrossed in the bird songs that I failed to pay attention to where the trail was. At the 2.5 mile mark the old trail is "closed" using a few fallen branches, but the branches aren't tall enough to act as a wall. I went over these branches and follwed the old Miller Canyon Trail, found two spots to sit and watch birds, and even got to the bubbling Miller Creek where Sadie got some water. The prettiest part of Miller Creek is here at the old, closed-off section of the trail.
I continued up this abandoned trail, noted the many fallen trees over the trail (thinking at first they had all fallen in the last two weeks) and when I hit a major rock slide and continued hopping around the rocks, I finally realized that I was on the closed trail. The real clue was realizing how close the creek was at this point, remembering that the new trail is higher and farther away from the water.

Going back down to the real turn-off was disheartening. It was 11:40am and I debated just going home after this. I don't know how much time I wasted in this canyon, perhaps 45 minutes with a snack break, and was now feeling stronger winds. Were gusts predicted for today?
I drank a lot of water and despite having had breakfast, felt low on energy. I was walking into the sun and that may have worked against me, stopping many times in a shady spot. But once I got within a mile from the Bathtub saddle, I felt energized again.

I was curious what the tub looked like. Would it still be clean or would algae have taken over again? Instead, what I saw surprised me: there was no algae but there were plenty of worms (caterpillars?) at the bottom of the tub. These "worms" weren't dead, either. I had left Sadie's bowl at home and had nothing to scoop water with, so I used my hand to sweep out the worms and whatever pine needles I could grab. The water was cold!
I got to the tub at 1:23pm. It was later than anticipated so I decided to go toward Miller Peak until 3pm and to turn around at that point regardless of where I was. We took off 15 minutes later with just an hour to spare. I felt energized and so did Sadie, and having a level trail helped. This section curves around Miller Canyon between Carr and Miller peaks. The 1977 fire burned down a lot of the Ponderosa Pines, many of which still remain as black stumps. Aspen are taking over the northern slopes of the canyon but there's stilll quite a bit of barren soil. These aspen have eyes that kept looking at us as we meandered through the grove.
About a half mile south of the tub I finally got a view of the Santa Cruz valley. Smoky haze had been predicted there and I wanted to see how bad it was. The sky overhead looked fine and I didn't taste any wood or fire, and was quite surprised to see white smoke blowing not toward Sierra Vista but toward Tuscon, making it a north-northwest wind. The smoke resembled low-lying cirrus clouds. Mount Wrightson was shrouded in smoke. Which means the hike up Gardner canyon was probably not very scenic or provided any vistas.

And boy was it windy! I had to hold on to my cap to sit and enjoy the view. The smoke seemed to slowly shift toward the east, and by the time I made it to Miller Peak at 3:01pm I could see the haze enter the San Pedro Valley. The aspen grove below the peak provided for a lush green canopy. The slopes off Carr peak were in contrast brown and grey.

I called Kevin to let him know I had made it to the peak. I was expecting a noon summit, not 3pm summit, and surely he did, too. I descended at 3:20 and made it to the tub at 4:10 which is still ten minutes earlier than my last descent from the tub. I knew that from this point on it would all be downhill and about a 90-minute hike.

Sadie seemed reenergized in the last two miles. She found some horse shit to nibble on and darted ahead of me that last mile. We got back to the truck at 5:58pm with only a few cars in the parking lot. A lone USBP van drove up as I drove down the mountain.
We were home by 6:15pm. I feel tired but satisfied to have hiked this. I wish I had the energy to start a hike like this at 7am when it's cooler; the heat clearly tired me quickly. However, I plan on doing peaks every weekend, and what better place than right here in the Huachucas? I have these mountains in my back yard, I don't need to drive all the way to Tucson to hike!

The Miller Canyon trail is truly a beautiful trail to get to Miller peak. the hiker sees a high desert, travels up a riparian habitat of sycamores, oaks, junipers and various succulents and then ends the one-way hike in an alpine setting with panoramic vistas. And although the grade is steep in the second and third mile and almost two miles are exposed to the sun, this hike offers scenery, physical stamina and diversity in flora and fauna. I feel honored being so close to this canyon.
I'm seriously thinking of hiking up to the tub saddle in two weeks and starting from our home. I'm also thinking about backpacking the southern section of the Arizona Trail which runs the ridgeline of the southern Huachucas and starting from our home and up and over the tub saddle. I'd have to work out the logistics and check out water and fire hazards, though. My big question is the availability of water and my personal safety, as the area around Parker Canyon lake has become a haven for drug smugglers. Kevin isn't planning on anything this Memorial Day, and since I'm leaving for Indiana right after the holiday and spending three weeks in Chicagoland (without Sadie), he's willing to be SAG for me. If we can agree to making Patagonia the pick-up point, this would be doable. Hmm, this is something to seriously think about.

Friday, May 6, 2011

Sliding down the mountain here she comes...

OK, I admit, what I did today was stupid. I could have gotten seriously hurt and no one would have known where I was. I have a scraped left arm, two bruised hands and a cut below my left knee. None of these wounds are serious, but any one of them could have been.

I had told Kevin that I was going up Ash Canyon today. It was a half-day for me at the school and I wanted to take the opportunity for a nice steep trail. The four-mile trek up Nipple Peak is steep and short, but also exposed on a hot day like today. I waited too long to get started today, which was my first mistake.

A school bus was parked at the lower Ash Canyon trailhead so I drove to the upper trailhead three miles further. I didn't want the dogs to scare off any school kids and just drove on. After letting the dogs play in the water we began our ascent via an illegal trail, which was a well-trodden path along a dry drainage. There was lots of discarded Mexican trash here, something I hadn't seen in a while.

This first section wasn't bad as it followed a fairly gentle sloped, sandy drainage with little impeding brush. JUMEX cans and plastic water bottles littered the sides of this trail. When this trail intersected with the main trail I should have stayed on that main trail, but instead followed Sadie along the illegal trail through a shady manzanita grove going due south straight up a steep, rocky and dry drainage. It was 1:30pm and quite hot and I didn't mind the detour through the shade.
This section was trashier than the first section, and after a stop at a large aligator juniper tree, it got even steeper. This trail showed signs of severe erosion and heavy slide. I really should have turned around here. Parts of the eroded slide were several feet deep. Sara and Sammy were showing difficulty maneuvering up the slide. But my pride said otherwise and we trekked on. I could see the top of the ridge.

I stopped a few long times to enjoy the view and give the dogs a break. All three were panting hard. The San Pedro valley was visible from most of this trail, and I imagined the joy the illegals must feel seeing that after trekking up from the other side. But how they do this trail at night is hard to imagine, unless it is on this trail that they fall and hurt themselves. The only good thing about descending this way is the tree cover overhead.
Knowing I was on a heavily-used illegal trail I remained alert for any other human noises. The dogs kept alert the entire time and I thought I heard short voices as well, but luckily never encountered anyone. Anyone who would have seen me in the condition I was in would probably have been shocked to see someone going up this steep slope with a camera around her neck and three big dogs providing security.

Emory oaks, yuccas and manzanitas were the primary vegetation here as the slope got steeper and steeper and suddenly the "hike" became a treacherous rock climb.
This climb wouldn't have been bad had there been something to hold on to. At one point I had lost all grip as there was nothing nearby to catch me and I slid. There went the left arm, with superficial laceration above my elbow. It stung but didn't bleed. My fullsize camera was still slung around me. This wasn't looking good. And depite being near the top of the ridge at this point, I knew I had no other option but to turn around. It was 3:30pm now and if something had happened to me here, not even the USBP guys would have wanted to trek up to this point to get me out.
I aborted the mission and turned around, sliding back down to more secure footing before packing my camera and leashes away. I slid hard two more times, both times gashing my hands. By the time we got back down to where we had taken the illegal trail, my left knee was also gashed but not seriously. I was covered in grey dust. I must have looked real nice to anyone watching me.

The dogs were tired when I was back home. Even Sadie collapsed on the back porch with her packmates; Sara looked sore from the many jumps up rocks she had to do, and even Sammy looked exhausted from the climb. We didn't go far mileage wise but even my knees felt we got some elevation training in. But looking back now, I must say I didn't much enjoy today's adventure as it could easily have ended tragically. The only good thing about today's jaunt is that I now know where that illegal trail goes from off the main trail and I have no desire to ever go up it again!
Kevin was home by now, too and noticed my cut-up arm and leg. As I write this four hours later my left arm and both hands are still stinging. The knee is the lighest injury of them all and doesn't hurt at all. One of these days I'm going to take a serious fall and that will be the end of me. I have got to avoid these off-trail steep bushwhacks!