Across the road again

I went back out to the spot near Canyon Lake that I had explored for the first time last week. I was thinking that I would hike down to First Water Creek. Silly me. When I got to the point where I started descending to the creek, it was much steeper and much further than it looked from the top of that mountain / big hill.

It's a scenic area.

Instead of going down to the creek, I wound up going around the mountain. I prefer to call it a mountain because it sounds more impressive to say that I climbed a mountain after work. If you tell somebody you climbed a hill, what are they going to say besides "Big whoop"? Anyway, I was hoping that I would be able to make it all the way round and not have to backtrack.

A stick and a saguaro.

I thought I smelled cigar smoke when I was about 3/4 of the way around. I smelled it all the way back to the truck. On the drive home it seemed that Phoenix had a thick brown cloud that evening despite the breeze. Then I saw the smoke rising from the ground. Turns out the fire is in Laveen, which is southwest of downtown Phoenix. It started in some mulch so it's called the Mulch fire. It's filling the valley with smoke. Visibility was bad today. You can smell the smoke just about everywhere. No, I didn't take any pictures of the smoke. I hope they get it under control soon.

2013_05_28