Miller Peak

My last time up Miller Peak was in January with the three dogs. It was Sara's last long hike, as the nine plus miles exhausted her and I had to stop many times to let her rest.

There are several ways to climb up Miller Peak. Hanna, a member of the hiking club, led us from the southern terminus. She had never been up this peak. Neither had Steve. Another hiker, Cliff, had been up here years before. The last time I hiked up Miller from this trailhead was with Kevin in December 2002, and we had 18' of snow on top.

We met at the Montezuma parking (6575') lot at 8am for this hike. This is a mile from the Mexican border so it's not unusual to see many Border Patrol vans here. The new wall is also quite visible from this vantage point.

There were five of us. We left promptly at 8:10am. Sadie knew her place in line and followed the others uphill. Shortly after the start she and I took the lead so that she could run around a bit. But she soon realized that this was a serious hike and conserved her energy.

The first two miles of this trail is steep uphill, exposed to the sun. On a hot day this could be unbearable as the trail is mostly exposed to the southern and eastern sun. Sadie rested a few times in the shade of several manzanitas, even in the shade of one of three abandoned mines while we waited for the others to catch up to us. I always let her rest whenever she wants.

We made it to the Miller Peak wilderness an hour later. From here on the grade is more gradual, as we loop around to the eastern and northern slopes of the mountain range and enjoy the shade of Ponderosa pines. After the pines we enter a burnedout area, more grade, more exposed ridgeline before we hit the steep rocky last 1.5 mile to the peak.

From the intersection of Lutz canyon it gets rocky and steep. The wildflowers here weren't as spectacular as they were last Saturday on Carr Peak, but the views to the west are always my favorite.

This is also the place where we saw a lot of trash left behind by the Mexicans. I picked up a small bag worth of trash on my way down, but even that small bag proved to be tiresome after three miles of shlepping it through thorny brush.

We met only one other hiker, a lone man, who passed us all to the peak. By the time I reached the summit he was already on his way down. "You have isolated thunderstorms all around you!" he said, but we were lucky: the one lightning storm stayed north of us, moving toward the northeast.

We got to the peak at noon, enjoyed the views. Carr Peak and its flowers was still covered in yellow. We saw several rain clouds aroud us but nothing closeby. I ate my cheese tortillas, Sadie had her Turkey Bites and wanted more, looking at both Steve and Hanna for hand-outs.

We went down after 30 minutes. Since I was the lone trash picker-upper I went ahead with Sadie and didn't stop until we got back to the shady rest area at the wilderness boundary. We made it back to the trailhead parking at 3pm. I had a hot spot on my right foot and my left knee was hurting. I must have twisted my knee and not known it.

Sadie drank an entire quart on this hike. I finished a little but more than that. There was no other water available on this hike.

I'm glad I made it up this peak again. It's a rough climb no matter what trail you take to the peak, but the vistas are worth it, and the trail is nice.