A less gnatty hike

The past two hikes I've been on were really frustrating because of all the gnats. I didn't really want to go for a hike today because of the gnats. They are almost as bad as they were the summer of 2005 (or maybe it was 2004). That was a super bad year. I even tried carrying an electric fly swatter on hikes with me, but the gnats were so small they went through the holes in the mesh without getting zapped. Anyway, I decided I'd go for a short hike to see how bad the gnats were in a place I haven't been recently. I've always thought it would be cool to be on top of the cliffs by Saguaro Lake, so I thought I'd try that today.

Saguaro Lake Cliff at EveryTrail

Map created by EveryTrail:GPS Geotagging
The route I took. Only 250 feet between lowest and highest points, but I climbed 1000 feet.

I parked on the side of Butcher Jones road. That means that I had to be out of there by sundown. There were a lot of small ridges and washes between me and my destination, but I wasn't worried about that; it was going to be a short hike.

There's always something unexpected. I saw a lot of paintballs out here.

Nice shade, but it was below 100 and the sun was low; very comfortable compared to Saturday.

I ran across a saguaro that had a beehive in it. I've never seen that before. I didn't get any good pictures of it because I've gotten a little paranoid about stirring up killer bees. It would have been very difficult to run back to my truck from where I was.

It didn't take very long to get to the cliff. Oh, and the gnats were there but not very pesky. The view was nice up there and there was a great breeze coming up the cliff. I watched the sun sink behind Stewart Mountain and then hurried back to the truck to get out before sunset.

The view of the lake.

A red tailed hawk checking me out.

I saw a lot of things that I wanted to take pictures of on the way back to the truck, but the sun being behind a mountain made me think that it was later than it really was. I think I got back to the house before sunset. Click below to see all of the pictures.

2009_05_12