Today's hike was to the upper falls of Brown Canyon, a 5.75-mile out-and-back hike. I led this hike via Meet Up and we were a group of eight people plus Zeke. We started just a little before 11am and were done 3:15 hours later. This gave me some time to walk Gretel around the block at 9:30am , as her ears were flattened by the 20mph winds. She does very well when she is by herself. She doesn't pull on the leash nor have her brother to bite.
I don't normally like to hike when it's windy, but once we were in the canyon, the surrounding trees protected us. We kept a good pace.
I started the hike in the late morning to allow the sun to be above us once in the slot canyon, and having the sun shine on the sycamores and red maples. This worked out well. The red maples right now are in their prime; the sycamores look to have dried up before turning orange and are therefore not as vibrant as they could have been. A crowded parking lot meant there were many people in the canyon.
What saddened me was the lack of water in the canyon. The horse trough at the two-mile mark, a popular stop for a water break, was dry. Even Zeke looked disappointed not being able to wet his feet. The cave was damp and there was some mud higher up. The only water we saw was near the lower falls, where the trail takes a sharp turn left and starts switch-backing to the upper falls.
The lack of water probably was the reason we didn't see any animals. Coatimundi and turkeys make this canyon their home and all we saw were birds.
We stopped to eat a snack at the lower falls. Everyone was interested in seeing the upper falls, so off we went. I was very pleased that everyone came along, although Carol near the end of the upper falls said "this isn't a hike, this is a rock climb!" when she needed her son-in-law, Geoff's, help pulling her over some steep rocks. The rock climb was only about 50 feet. At least everyone enjoyed the views.
We went back the way we came. It was now 1pm and people were now entering the canyon. The winds had died some and bikers were out again, too, including several dog walkers.
This was a good group. HollyW, SusanM, Carol and Geoff, new gal Celeste, DavidB, RobF made the group. We have now hiked together a few times to know each other's strengths. We gathered by our cars, thanked everyone who showed up, and went our way. Theresa and I agreed to meet at the Horned Toad for beer, but discovered that it is closed on Sundays. We instead went to BoneDry Taphouse but there we were told the front of the building was at 25 people capacity and we had to drink outside on the back patio. Danielle the server told me this is a regular "Drink and Paint" group that meets here.
I was home by 4:30pm, too tired to walk any more dogs. Tomorrow I hope to give all the dogs who didn't walk today some extra attention. I may also drive up to Tucson for a recycling run.
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