A morning hike

Most people in the Houston, Texas area prefer to mow their lawns in the morning because it's cooler then.  The relative humidity is also near 100% at that time.  Just looking at the lawn mower had sweat running down my face, so I usually mowed in late afternoon.

People also like to hike in the morning in Arizona because it's cooler.  I've never liked hiking in the morning because it's still hot then and you know it's only going to get hotter.  Much hotter.  I tried a morning hike recently, though.  I volunteered to help put up a sign in Tonto National Forest that depicted the work done to remove salt cedar, an invasive species.  We started out at 8 a.m. from the Picketpost trailhead.

I didn't take any cameras.  Not even my cell phone.  I only carried a backpack full of water.  It was a cloudless day with the high forecast to be over 105F (41C).  The leader of the group walked faster than I usually do on hikes but I didn't have any trouble keeping up on the way out.  After we were done with the sign we hiked a little further to where the salt cedar had been removed.  It was a beautiful area and I knew I'd be back to get some pictures when  the weather was cooler.  We headed back to the trailhead around 10.  It was brutal.  The sun was too high to find shade under a saguaro.  I had to slow down to keep from overheating.  All I could think about was the fact that the temperature was only going up and the only escape was my air-conditioned truck.  I guess I'm still not a morning hiker.

One afternoon a few weeks later it was a little cooler because there were some monsoon storms around.  I drove up the canyon east of Superior the check out the waterfalls and on the way back decided to hike out to the sign we had put up.

Some waterfalls east of Superior.

It was very cloudy so I still wasn't going to get any good pictures.  I mostly wanted to be sure I remembered how to get out there since we had deviated from the official trail.  When I got close to where the sign was, I heard lots of water flowing fast.

Water flowing over small dam near Picketpost Mountain

The trail to the more interesting scenery crossed this creek so I couldn't go any further.  Maybe I'll be able to get some pictures out there in the fall.

White Canyon Wilderness

I've been making Gary climb to the top of this or the top of that for years now. He suggested that we go someplace that wasn't vertical or miles and miles of hiking. I thought the hike up the canyon in White Canyon Wilderness might be perfect. It isn't vertical (well, the sides are, but you don't climb those) and you can't go very far before it gets too difficult (at least for me) to go any further. With a 4wd truck, I could park at the start of the trail, too, instead of a mile or so back. On top of all that, it's very scenic.

I signed in at the register and there were notes there about cairns and purple dots. When I had been there before, cairns were next to nonexistent and there were no purple dots. Anyway, we followed the purple dots and it turned out to be my easiest hike up that canyon. I don't think we saw quite as much in the way of pools of water or small waterfalls, but somebody from Houston probably isn't as obsessive about pools of water as somebody that has lived in the desert during a drought for 10 years.

The trail went through places like this, to the side of the main channel, where walking is easy and doesn't involve climbing over boulders or hoping over water.

We were there early in the day, which is good if you don't want half of a picture in darkness and half extremely bright.

Gary by a small waterfall and extremely white rock. I didn't know he was also taking a picture at the time.

There were flowers all over the place. The water was flowing but was underground at least half of the time. The pools were wonderfully cool.

One of many pools of cool, cool water. There were waterbugs and I hear that they bite, so I didn't want to go wading.

Here's a large stone "paddle" that looks like it's smiling. I don't think it would be easy to get into a position where you could photograph it with a blue background.

I like the way this picture turned out.

It was pretty easy following the purple dots up the canyon. I had more trouble on the way back and wandered from the trail several times. I think that if I had been going where I thought I should go instead of looking for purple dots, I might not have overshot the truck by several hundred feet. If you look closely at the pictures, I think I got the purple dots in a couple of them.

2013_04_05

A side canyon

I can tell I'm still lacking some stamina just by driving around. I look at all the places I've hiked before and think, "That would take too much effort". So I decided to go someplace I haven't been before and where I had no idea how far I'd be able to go. That way, I wouldn't think it was too much effort until I got where ever I was going.

There was a fire a couple of years ago in the place where I stopped. This used to be a sotol.

I decided to try to hike down a side canyon of a side canyon of the Salt River. I've tried that before in that area (near Fish Creek Hill) and quickly came to a spot where I had to turn back. As I started out, I was surprised at how much water was flowing in the side canyon. We'd had a lot of rain two days before. The canyon only drains a small area so I hadn't expected it to still have water flowing. What I learned was that the water had soaked into the thin layer of soil on top of the rock and was slowly draining into the stream at the center of the canyon. Where there was bare rock, you could see the water draining across it.

I followed this as far as I could. Almost.

Water is draining into the stream where the rock looks black.

Since there was water flowing, I had another reason to go slow. I had to get pictures of all that water. I had my tripod but some of the small waterfalls were in shadow with sunlit rock nearby, so it was hard to get decent pictures.

Small waterfall around a large boulder.

This was nice to watch, but I couldn't get a picture of it that I like.

I made a short video of some of the water.

I hadn't gone far before I saw that I would have to stop soon. It looked like the view might be interesting from further downstream. Maybe a nice cliff that would stop me. I looked down there, though, and decided I just didn't have the energy to do it. That was a good decision. On the way back, I would stop and seriously study two alternative routes trying to decide if I wanted to try to hold some catclaw out of the way while hopping over some water or if it would be easier to climb up 5 feet over some rocks with no catclaw. I have the scratches resulting from frequently taking the easier but bloodier route.

If you look closely, you can tell that there is probably a cliff down there that I wouldn't be able to descend. Well, I could, but that would be the end of the hike.

Speaking of blood, that reminds me of a couple of things I saw along the way. On the way downstream I saw what looked like some coyote skin. Then on the way upstream I came across a skeleton. It was most of the torso of what must have been a deer. If the leg that was nearby belonged to it, it was a deer. Anyway, these decaying animal parts were all in or right next to the stream. That's one reason I carry all the water I'll be drinking with me.

Click below for all of the pictures. If you are squeamish, don't look at all of the pictures.

2013_03_10

A maze of canyons

For various reasons, I wound up going for a hike near Mesquite Flat. It's pays to be flexible. It's a good idea to have several hiking destinations in mind. Anyway, I was planning to hike up a creek bed and see how far I could go.

It started out OK. Just a little water here and there.

I hadn't gone too far before I got to a spot where it was not possible to continue upstream without wading. I know that because I tried to go around on both sides. Some guys in the creek bed told me I would be able to climb down in one spot but it looked too risky from where I was.

A large puddle. Actually, it was flowing. Puddles don't flow, right?

I was about to take off my shoes and start wading when one of the guys pointed out that the next puddle looked deeper. I'm glad he mentioned that. I had gone as far as I was going to go in the creek bed.

People enjoying a beautiful day in the desert. In the dark shadow upstream of them is a deep puddle.

So I headed up to the top of the nearest ridge. This area is all narrow, steep-sided canyons with narrow ridges between them. I didn't know how far I would be able to go along the ridge. Some of them end abruptly. I thought I was at the end several times but was able to keep going when I got a closer look at the "end". I also thought about descending into a canyon and following a creek bed out of there. I didn't do that because I didn't feel energetic enough to retrace my steps if I came to a dead end, though.

If you are down in the canyons, you can't see very far and it's hard to tell where you are. Well, you could use GPS, but where's the adventure in that?

Shortly after I started heading north along the ridge, I spotted another solitary hiker. This person was wearing camo and carrying a tripod. Looked like a serious nature photographer. In looking at the pictures later, I decided the photographer must be female, too. At least I've never seen a guy with hair that nice.

A solitary hiker, possibly looking for critters to photograph.

There are some scenic mountains to the south.

As so often happens when I go wandering semi-aimlessly, I came across some cairns. I accidentally followed them for a while. They were going the same way I was. I wonder why people build cairns along a ridge that you couldn't descend from if you wanted to or along the bottom of canyons that you couldn't get out of even if a pack of javelinas was inviting you to dinner (as an entree). You can't wander off the trail, so why say "Here's the trail"?

A moot cairn.

I found a small stone "arch". I couldn't get a good picture of it so I made a video.

Video of a small stone arch.

More of the maze.

More moot cairns.

Click below to see all of the pictures.

2013_02_16

Black Canyon to First Water Creek

Sunday was a pretty day, and it wasn't very hot (probably below 100). I felt bad about not going hiking. On the other hand, with the dew point over 60, hiking didn't seem like a really good idea. Anyway, I felt so bad about being lazy that I did go for a hike on Monday, despite the mugginess. I went down Black Canyon to First Water Creek, to see if there was any water down there after Saturday's torrential rain. Well, it was torrential in some places. I could tell that there had been decent rainfall out there.

People that drive out to Canyon Lake may recognize this view.

The first thing I noticed is that millipede season is here. I saw a small one and took a picture, then saw a larger one and took a picture, then saw a larger one and quit taking pictures of them. I probably saw about 10 of them, which is a lot for such a short hike. They must have been out and about because of the recent rain.

A smallish millipede.

The sun was bright and the canyon was muggy, without much of a breeze. But it was a beautiful day. Also, wonderfully unbelievably, there were no gnats! Being hot is much more tolerable without gnats.

There were puddles, so I had to get pictures of reflections.

I was the first person to go down there since the rain. There was water trickling slowly through some puddles and spending at least half of its time underground. It seemed that I had to stand in some precarious positions to get any pictures and was wobbling around on rocks and trying not to fall in the puddles. It's tough to take pictures for HDRIs when you are having trouble standing still, but they all turned out OK. I think that's probably attributable to the ability of Photomatix to compensate for camera movement.

I like this one.

I kept having to stop to cool off on the way back up Black Canyon. Fortunately the sun was low enough by that time that I had lots of shade. Then I got sidetracked to look at some fresh pieces of a car scattered on the south side of the canyon. It must be quite disheartening to realize that you've left the road and are plummeting helplessly down a steep, rocky cliff. On the other hand, if you're as drunk as some of the people that do that must be, maybe you're just thinking about complaining to the county about the potholes in the road. Anyway, after checking out the car pieces, I didn't feel like taking the down and then back up route to get to the truck. Instead, I decided to follow the scrape marks left when the largest piece of the car was pulled out of the canyon. If a car was pulled up there, I should be able to climb up there, right? As it turns out I was able to get to the road that way, but it wasn't easy. I need to add to my list of hiking rules that I shouldn't try to follow cars out of canyons, because they have help that I don't have. Click below to see all of the pictures.

2012_07_16

Another one checked off

Along Apache Trail, between Mesquite Flat (which is a short distance east of Tortilla Flat) and Fish Creek Hill, there are a lot of narrow canyons. Every time I drive past them I think, "I should check those out some time." I finally started doing that.

There seems to be a bug in Picasa web albums that won't let me link to the picture I wanted to put here, so this will have to do.

I thought I was going to be following a canyon on one side of the road, but the first thing I did was cross under the road. It was a long culvert; 80 or 90 steps. There was a lot of high-schoolish babble on the sides that I might have taken the time to read if I wasn't worried that my GPS logger might croak without a signal. On the other side, I could tell that I wasn't too far from one of the spots where I would glance over as I drove by and wonder what the bottom of that canyon looked like. It turns out that the bottom was very rocky and had lots of plants and lots of the plants had thorns.

Here's an easy stretch.

Some spots required a little climbing. Just a little.

This gives you an idea of the narrowness. You can also see that it wouldn't be easy to drop into this canyon just anywhere.

I pushed and clambered for a long time. The clambering isn't so bad, but I don't like pushing through plants for several reasons. First, I might pick up bugs (like ticks). Second, Arizona plants are covered in dust and when you push through them you create a dust cloud. Third, some of them HURT. At one point I decided I was tired of getting scratched up and got my multitool out to cut some catclaw out of the way. It isn't the best tool for cutting branches, so I stood there cutting and getting scratched anyway for a while. I finally decided I had cut enough and pushed through and discovered I had missed a major catclaw branch. I gingerly held it out of the way as I worked my way through and had to change hands on it as I went by. That's when it grabbed me. I lost more flesh in that one spot that on all the rest of the hike combined. Then I came to something that made it all worthwhile.

A Canyon Treefrog.

Anybody from one of those soggy places like the Texas coast probably thinks that seeing a frog is no big deal, but I can count on one hand the number of frogs I've seen in Arizona in the past 9 years. I've seen almost as many Gila monsters as frogs. I took lots of pictures of that frog.

I didn't make it quite to the spot I wanted to get to in that canyon, but I had seen (and felt) enough. When I got back to the culvert, I decided to take a different wash upstream. It was much easier.

Much easier walking.

There was water flowing through the other wash so I had to take lots of pictures of puddles.

I'm going to have to explore that second wash further. I also saw some other directions I could check out. I'll keep myself busy in that area for a while. Click below for all the pictures.

2012_04_01

West Fork of Sycamore Creek

Remember the photo point pictures I was taking? Well, anyway, we don't take those pictures in the winter, but the Forest Service has something else to help me explore parts of Arizona that I haven't seen before. It involves getting pictures of creeks. This is a good time of year to do that because there is water in the creeks now. The first creek I visited is the West Fork of Sycamore Creek. It's across the Beeline Highway from Mt. Ord. I tried to go out there about a week ago but there had been a lot of rain and the road was very muddy. If I had driven down to the creek then, I probably would not have driven back up. So I went yesterday. It was a beautiful, sunny day.

Lots of water in the West Fork of Sycamore Creek.

There's a 4WD trail that follows the creek upstream. Most of it is in pretty good shape, except for one washed out spot near the beginning. I didn't want to try to get across that, so I parked and hiked. The road goes uphill for a while, and I got pretty warm going uphill in the sun. I was thinking about stopping to take my undershirt off. Then the road dipped back down to the creek in a narrow and apparently always shady canyon. It was very cool there. I was thinking about getting a flannel shirt out before I got back in the sunshine.

The creek in the shady canyon.

Water moves, so I made a video of it.

Now that I'm looking at the pictures I took, I keep thinking of others that I should have taken. I may have to go back soon. Click below to see all of the pictures.

2011_12_28

A scenic part of Bulldog Canyon OHV area

I went back to a part of Bulldog Canyon in which I had hiked about a year ago. Interestingly, in the current (January) issue of Scientific American, Michael Shermer comes to the same conclusion as I did then regarding the computer intelligence singularity, i.e. it will always be a few more years away. I would suspect that he was reading my blog and stealing my ideas if it wasn't such an obvious conclusion. (Plus, I can't imagine contributors to Scientific American doing such things.) Anyway, I thought that was interesting. Now back to the hike.

I took my favorite picture of the outing while I was still driving to the "trailhead".

I've got a couple of weeks off of work and had all sorts of plans for places I was going to go. The time off started last Saturday (the 17th). I got out of bead early that morning, reached down to pick up my phone, and my lower back went *sproing*. I hate it when that happens. It's just as well, though. The next few days were gloomy and wet, so I wouldn't have done much hiking anyway.

This is a scenic walk down a nameless wash (intermittent stream). I'm guessing that I walked about 8 miles. Can't tell for sure because the PN-40 discarded part of my track, and it was a part where I should have had excellent satellite coverage. Well, I could figure it out, but I'm feeling pretty lazy today. I'll never count on this receiver for breadcrumbs, though. It felt like a long walk. My ankles are achy today.

I saw places I want to go explore on my way down the wash. Some day.

The last time I was down there, I took a lot of pictures of puddles. We've had a lot of rain recently, so there were even more puddles. I told myself that I had enough pictures of puddles, though, and I wasn't going to take pictures of any more puddles unless they just happened to be in a good spot and looked good. I wound up with a lot of pictures of puddles again, anyway.

I think I got a picture of this puddle the last time I was out here.

A year ago, I could see some evidence of vehicles having driven down the wash. According to the Forest Service map, they shouldn't be there. I parked at the end of the official road, which is indistinguishable from the non-road that continues to the north. In January, it looked like only a small number of vehicles had gone very far down the wash beyond the end of the road, and there hadn't been any there for at least a couple of weeks. This time, it looked like there had been heavy traffic along most of the wash and there had been multiple vehicles out there the same day I was there (though I didn't see them).

I "hurried" at the beginning of the hike because I wanted to get to the view of the cliff that I like so much while there was still sunshine, and I had gotten a late start (long story). It seemed to be further to that cliff than I remembered, but it was just as pretty.

My primary destination.

After getting more pictures of the cliff, I had enough charge in the camera battery and enough sunshine (or so I thought) to continue downstream. Along the way, I found a small natural cave in a canyon wall. It was pretty dark in there, but I made a movie. There were what looked like fresh tennis shoe prints in the dust on the floor of the cave, but water doesn't get in there unless there's a huge flood and it's probably difficult for wind to blow through there, too.

From one end to the other of a small cave. Surprisingly, the PN-40 did not choke to death while I was in there.

I went all the way to where the wash intersected another wash that is very popular with ATV and 4WD enthusiasts, but is also not an official road. From the cliff to the other wash was rough and slow-going. I noticed a few things about plants that grow in stream beds there, too. There are almost no cacti in stream beds. There are many types of plants there that have no thorns. Some have thorns, but you can brush bare skin against them without getting a scratch. Then there's catclaw acacia. It's thorns are curved, like cat's claws. It takes just the slightest touch, and the claw grabs you. If you move, more claws grab you. If you move more, they sink in and rip flesh, so you don't want to pull away from one because it will rip you to shreds. You have to move towards it to get unhooked, but that just allows more claws to make contact, and they aren't going to let go easily.

The harmless plants are scattered here and there. You could brush up against them if you wanted too, but you almost never have to. Even when you get to a choke point, where there is only one possible route through, there are rarely harmless plants there. Those special places seem to be reserved for catclaw acacia. So you're clambering over slippery rocks and trying to avoid falling in a puddle and you have to drop the last foot or two and guess what grabs you just as you start to drop. Every time. Riiiiip rip rip rip riiip rip. Usually, I try to ignore the results, unless the blood runs down to my fingertips. Then I try to keep from getting blood on my camera. What adds insult to injury is when pesky gnats move in to feast on the blood. Fortunately, there were no gnats this day. I often get home from hikes and pull catclaw thorns out of my arms as I shower. I guess the best thing that can be said about catclaw is that, once it's embedded in your flesh, it doesn't release chemicals that cause pain (the way rose thorns do).

Catclaw got my nose. Ouch.

The sun had set by the time I got back to the cliff that was my original destination. It was quickly getting too dark for pictures, so I didn't have to stop to take many more. I was getting tired, though. My legs ached. I concentrated on moving steadily ahead, without stumbling. I didn't want to look like easy pickings to a hungry cat. I had to squat down occasionally, though, for a short rest and to stretch the muscles that were aching. This is when I discovered an advantage to having hurt my back a few days earlier. I had to keep my back straight up and down. That meant that any time I needed something off the floor, I used only my legs. It's surprising how much stronger they had gotten from a few days of picking up newspapers, dropped items, and Emily like that. My legs never got tired of pushing me uphill on that hike.

I like the way some pictures taken in the dark turned out.

After a while, it got hard to see any detail in the bed of the wash. No moon. I could tell where water was, where sand was, and where solid rock was, but that was about it. The solid rock became dangerous to walk on, because I couldn't see the ripples in it, and I wound up stumbling a couple of times. I had to resort to using a flashlight. I used the one my younger sister gave me a few years ago. It's a single LED. Bright enough to see the texture, but not so bright as to destroy my night vision. It was perfect. I got to the truck about 150 yards after getting the flashlight out. Click below to see all of the pictures.

BC_2011_12_23

The waterfalls by Willow Creek

Back in September, I had found a "dry waterfall". I imagined that it would look great with water pouring over it and said that I would have to go back some time when it's raining. Of course, hiking in the rain usually isn't much fun, so I wondered if I would ever really do that.

We've had a lot of rain the past week or so, and probably more than an inch from Monday to Tuesday. It was raining pretty hard as I drove home yesterday, but looked like it was starting to clear up by the time I got home. I decided that yesterday was probably the best opportunity I would have to see that waterfall for a long time, so I went.

Along the way, the sun came out and there was a beautiful rainbow in front of me. I wasn't planning to take any pictures of it (I had to get to the waterfalls before it got too dark), but it was a very unusual rainbow. It was a double rainbow, which isn't too unusual, but there was also a third vertical piece between the other two. I had never seen intersecting rainbows before and at first I thought that what I was seeing was impossible. I rolled down the window and blinked a few times, but it was still there, so I took some pictures. Turns out that what I saw can be caused by reflected sunlight. Usually the light producing such rainbows is reflected off a body of water. I think that in my case it might have been reflected off the wet streets. There are plenty of long, flat streets in this part of the valley that would be ideal for reflecting sunlight.

Another rare photograph of intersecting rainbows.

I was worried that the water might have already stopped flowing when I got out there. I couldn't see any water anywhere out there, and the desert does seem to soak up water fast. Along the path to the waterfall, though, I could hear water trickling through the stream to my left. As I started down the steep bank to Willow Creek, I could hear water rushing below. Lots of water. There was quite a bit in Willow Creek. Well, it looked like a lot to me. The most I've seen in there before is none.

Willow Creek

As I made the short video of Willow Creek above, I could hear water pouring over waterfalls to my left. I hurried over there and there were several waterfalls. It was better than I'd hoped.

Waterfalls on a Willow Creek tributary.

I never did get any good pictures of the first big drop. I haven't found a good vantage point to see it. Also, I didn't bring a tripod with me. That wasn't very smart. I wanted to take long exposures to get that soft effect with the water, but that's hard to do without a tripod. I also had to take long exposures because it was getting dark fast. Not only had the sun set, but clouds were moving in again. Shortly after I got back to the house, it was raining hard again. I had the perfect window in which to get these pictures and videos.

Woohoo!

Here you can see a little bit of the first big drop at the top.

I'm going to get some neutral density filters and carry a tripod with me in case it rains again some time. Click below to see all of the pictures.

2011_12_13