NF 25

I went outside early yesterday morning to rearrange some stuff in the garage. It already felt very hot. I knew I'd have to go someplace high if I was going to hike. Turns out Phoenix had a record high yesterday; 118. That's just crazy.

Iron Dike doesn't look climbable from this side, but I think the north side is.

I had to take forest closures into account when deciding where to go. I decided to check out the view from the top of Iron Dike. It looks like a person should be able to walk up the north side of it, though I would be approaching from the south to reduce how much climbing I would have to do. When I left the house at 2 in the afternoon, it felt ridiculously hot outside. It was only about 98 when I got out of the truck near Iron Dike about an hour later. Being able to see a 20 degree drop in just an hour drive is nice.

The wind was blowing pretty good, too. It might have been stirred up by rain showers. I drove through the beginning of a dust storm as I left the valley. It's weird how much wind is created by these piddly little showers that barely get the ground damp. Anyway, one of those piddly little showers was south of me, and I could hear thunder. I wasn't worried about getting wet, but lightning could hurt. I decided that I would drive around out there rather than hike. I wasn't too disappointed, though. I didn't like the looks of all the bushy oak I would have had to push through on my chosen route.

NF 25. I've never been down there. It's labeled NF 201 on Google Earth, but the sign at the road says "25".

NF 25 is pretty smooth for a seldom-used forest road. It goes up the side of some almost vertical canyon walls. It's kind of nerve-wracking to look at the precipitous drop on your left as you drive along. The road ends at an old stock pen at the border of the Mazatzal Wilderness.

View of Mt. Ord. The forest on that side of the Beeline Highway is closed.

There are agave flowers all over the place.

I was hoping to get some nice cloud pictures, but the clouds weren't very photogenic. Click below to see all of the pictures.

2011_07_02