A 455 mile day trip with Mike Mattes. We finally got him back out on the trail after a major round of surgery this summer. We picked this trail to explore because we thought the old railroad grade would provide some gentle elevation gain without any major obstacles to climb over. We thought we'd be able to see some fall colours and although they seemed to be at their peak in the area, the only colours seemed to be yellow and green.

Not surprizing that we were the only hikers on the trail. Some ATV tracks are evident on the old railway bed and thankfully none were to be seen or heard!

After hiking to the tunnel and the upper reaches of Johnson Canyon, we continued north on FR6 putting Mike's Jeep to the test in a couple of areas. Nothing too extreme that my 2WD F-150 couldn't have handled. We encountered a couple of frustrated elk hunters as we traveled up the Forest Road towards the present day BNSF mainline.

Also stopped in Flagstaff on the way back to visit my daughter at NAU. Hannah took us to the Big Foot BBQ downtown. Interesting place with large helpings of food. Perfect for the hungry hiker!

Having completed this hike to a railway tunnel, it has whetted our appetite to go explore the incomplete RR tunnel near Payson. Check out;

http://hikearizona.com/decoder.php?ZTN=97

A fun day exploring some history...