Matt and I headed up to retry our trip from last year that got interrupted with thunder and snow.

The aspens were a patchwork of perfect and absolutely gone with not much in between. I'd guess that there was a freeze early in the turning cycle and those leaves that had begun were stripped bare in subsequent wind storms. Those that hadn't begun before the freeze were in their prime colors.

The lower portion of Bear Jaw was ok, but once getting above Bear Jaw Canyon and all along the Wateline, it was mostly bare. We headed up to Rees, and I got a reminder of how steep this one gets. The weather was calm and perfect as we dropped down to the saddle to set up camp. A few side trips for evening sunset, moonrise an hour later, and sunrise the next morning completed the photoshoot before packing up camp and heading down via a new route (to me) staying just to the west of the bottom of Rees Canyon. I liked this route!

Once back on the Waterline we headed uphill to Abineau where I checked to see if the Abineau Spring Box was open so I could preemptively answer DA3's near-certain question about it: no.

The top of Abineau always sucks, but the bottom part was the gem. Still plenty of aspen in full color as well as a yellow brick road of litter along the trail. It was nice to see outdoorlover as well, who was on her way up.

On the drive out I took the west loop around the peaks wondering if the colors there had suffered the same freeze, and they had. There were pockets of perfection, but still quite a bit of drab bare trunks. Still one of my favorites, and a great night along the crown!

Foliage
A freeze and high winds over the past couple of weeks have left a lot of the aspen bare. If they hadn't started their turn before the freeze they were in prime color, especially on the lower Abineau trail.

Based on the colors at Elden last week, we knew we had to get back up to Flagstaff and get to the Inner Basin color show. We knew this would be peak peekin' season at the Peaks. Starting at 8am, got us a close parking spot and allowed us to avoid the masses on the way up.

Up the Inner Basin trail #29, I always enjoy this one.... when it's not fall and especially in the fall. Just a beautiful trail that meanders the switchbacks up to the Warterline Trail #146. Definitely one of my favorites.

At our turn for the Waterline Trail, we would not see another soul for quite awhile. Roughly following a previous Chums route, we off trailed it up to Rees Peak approaching it from the ENE. It's a 1.75 mile 1,800' climb to this bad boy. I was concerned for downfall for the climb, but that was never a factor at all. This is a worthy peak for the views!

Rees Peak Video https://youtube.com ... OdTo

With weather rolling in, we talked about our choices and decided to continue. We continued our contour of the ridge-line over to Abineau. In .6 mile you drop 200, before climbing 600' to this peak. There is a perfect spot at the top for lunching on this one. On the way up we got some moisture mostly in the form of hail. This resulted in a beautiful Rainbow that anchored one side of itself to the Golden Aspens.

Abineau Peak Video https://youtube.com ... cAiM

We decided at this point to descend the ridgeline between Rees Canyon and Bear Jaw Canyon. We stumbled on some minor parts of the B-17 Wreckage from 1944. We did a cursory look for some of the larger pieces, but found no more in the brief time we checked.

We passed a couple of interesting stands of leaning aspens on our way down before hitting the Waterline Trail again. There's plenty of easy color to be found on this trail. We saw a few MTB'ers, but was surprised we did not see more.

Back on the Inner Basin trail, descending to the parking lot, it's always fun to people watch. From Full packs to no packs... From Hiking Boots to Vans and dress scandals.... From brand new, clean and pressed complete hiking outfits to jeans so tight you have a guessing game to determine how they'd gotten into them.

Karl made a new friend on the drive out.

The off trail was easier than anticipated. Steep, no where near sliding steep. Downed trees are easy to avoid. We had pretty much all phases of weather. Chilly, sleet, toasty, breezy, calm, you name it. Autumn was rockin' along our entire loop. The nicest spot was a tall stand of bending aspens near Waterline descending Abineau.

Lots of people up on Humphreys before the Norwester rolled in. Peaks were nice. Inner Basin was a hummin! Not as crazy cool as Squaw but almost up to par. Lots of large happy groups. Tweedledum and Tweedledee amused each other all day.

Way too many photos and video. Enjoyed it all.

Foliage
About as good as aspens get. Roughly 15% green left so it'll probably play out good through next weekend.

Given that I love to peak bag and have previously knocked off three of the five San Francisco Peaks that don’t require a permit, it’s safe to say that the remaining two [Abineau and Rees] have been on the top of my Flagstaff area priority list. And when I checked the weather and saw there was not a drop of rain or storms in the forecast, I didn’t delay in knocking these peaks off the bucketlist.

Since part of my extended weekend was originally going to be spent with other hiking buds, I hadn’t drawn up routes in my normal, detailed fashion. Kudos to Jim_H, chumley, and BobP for posting their routes for these peaks, which came in extremely handy when some last minute mishaps left me with a full day of hiking to fill on Saturday. It was so nice to have some quality routes to choose from. I opted for the one Jim_H took for three reasons: a) slightly longer traverse on the San Francisco Peak Ridgeline compared to chumleys; b) launch point in more of an ideal location for the type of loop I wanted to do compared to BobP’s; and c) the appeal of the beginning part of Jim_H’s triplog “I wouldn't recommend my route”… go figure that made me want to do it all the more.

Aside from the physical exertion of logging just over 13 miles and just under 4,400’ AEG, I found the technical aspects [dodging brush, dealing with loose footing, etc.] to range from easy to moderate, relative to what I’m accustomed to. There were a handful of spots that were slightly challenging/slightly difficult, but this was strictly due to still not having recovered in full from the equilibrium issues. During the bushwhack portions, there were a few spots where I went my own way over following the exact tracks of Jim_H, but this is typically my style when bushwhacking, [i.e. whether following someone else’s route or one I’ve drawn for myself, I typically use it as a general guide instead of trying to stay on the exact track].

Just like other portions of / peaks along the San Francisco Ridgeline that I’ve traversed previously, the views from Abineau and Rees and the other Ridgeline portions of this adventure did not disappoint; and the views from Abineau Canyon were pretty amazing as well. I definitely could have spent more time enjoying Abineau Peak, but there were 4-5 bees buzzing around on the summit upon my arrival, and I definitely did not want to overstay my welcome. Thus, after quickly signing the register, snapping a few photos, and pausing to take in some of the views, I got the hell out of Dodge and continued on to Rees.

For something different and new I opted to try the north side of the Peaks, since I have visited it only once before. I wouldn't recommend my route, but you got to try something, sometimes.

Up Abineau Canyon, hiked a small section of the Waterline RD, then directly up a steep and rocky slope with abundant (ouch!) low hanging branches( without any fruit) to a nice broad ridge that led to peak 11783. Headed briefly towards Humphrey thinking I could tag that, but I was already tired and I guess I am not good off trail at altitude the way I was in the past, so I turned back towards the original plan of Abineau Peak. There were dark clouds over Humphrey and rain showers to the west, so it was fine by me. I had nice views to the north and east, which was what I wanted, anyway.

Over the ridge to grandma's house on Abineau Peak for a nice summit at 11,838 and great views to the north and east. Calm, and mild while there and signing the little peak registry, but cold out flow descended from the west and I layered up to head to Reese. Going down the loose slope towards Reese was a challenge, but after tagging Reese it seemed like cake compared to the horrible landmine strewn slope that I went down. Nearly the same route as Todd in June, except in reverse. Not only was there abundant debris, but I ended up catching on a branch and falling in to a rock slamming my upper tibia into a rock. It hurt, but I managed to stave off death in the wilds of the Peaks before continuing down. At least I didn't fall on the steep rocky slope I ascended!

I took the Waterline Road back to Abineau Canyon as I must have come on to the road just west of the Bear Jaw Trail, which would have been a nice change of scenery and cut some AEG and miles out. I spotted a bear near the bottom. It was so quiet, I heard it snort, and turned back to see it running away.

The knee seemed OK until back in Flag when the swelling set in. Basically, I won't be hitting Bear Mountain today.

I used some existing GPS routes and added in some off trail remotely created tracks. I believe this to be accurate, as I probably cut out some AEG and miles as I had few data points. Not 100% sure, but I think rounding down to 4200' and bumping the miles to 10.5 is close to what I really did.

Foliage
In some Aspen on the road.

I was going to be in Flagstaff for the weekend and wanted to get a good hike in, but wanted to avoid the popular and crowded options. That ruled out pretty much anything that's a trail! I think most people who hike Rees begin in the Inner Basin, but after OHs recent camping trip report, I decided that was a crowd I'd like to avoid.

In no hurry to start the day, I got to the Bear Jaw trailhead around 10 and was happy to see only about 5 other vehicles in the lot. Signing the register I noticed somebody had written about a "huge" bear sighting on Friday. A few minutes later I passed a hiker finishing the loop counterclockwise who told me he had seen a huge bear in Abineau Canyon earlier in the morning. I know there's not a lot of bear in the Flagstaff area, but it's nice to know there's a healthy one in this area. I hope the population is able to expand a bit!

I cruised the Bear Jaw trail up to the Waterline Road and just went straight up from there. The first 500-700 feet of elevation were choked with a lot of deadfall and travel was a real chore. Lots of bouncing left and right to get around things, and plenty of climbing over. Eventually the forest thinned out, but it also steepened. I wasn't sucking wind as hard as in Colorado a couple of weeks ago, but I still took plenty of short breaks just to catch my breath. Near the top, I wasn't gaining more than 50 feet before taking an oxygen break!

Along the way, I got a text from a trusted friend who suggested that I couldn't hit Rees without also hopping over to Abineau. Though that wasn't the plan, that seed was now planted. Once hitting the summit of Rees, the jaw-dropping views of the Inner Basin and the rest of the peaks were amazing. I enjoyed a short break there, but decided that Abineau would be worth the attempt. There was rain visible to the west of the peaks, and an occasional distant rumble of thunder. I was a bit leery of the weather, but after looking at the clouds for a while and determining that they were moving slowly away from me, I decided to continue on.

The route between Rees and Abineau is loose and steep. Both down to the saddle, and back up to the peak. Travel is slow but steady. Abineau does not have the trees Rees has and offers 360-degree views. I could see dozens of people on the summit of Humphreys just a mile away. This peak had a register that was very recent and only had three names. I searched for another one but couldn't find anything else. I found this to be a bit strange.

After photos, a well-earned summit beer, and some snacks, I headed down along a ridge that appeared to have the most moderate slope on the topo contours. As on Rees, the upper part was steep but more open, and the closer I got to the road below the more deadfall that needed to be negotiated. The descent wasn't too bad, but climbing this route would have been steep.

Back at the road, I contemplated heading up the road to descend Abineau--primarily in hopes of spotting the bear. But I wasn't in the mood for the extra mileage, so I headed back to Bear Jaw and hobbled back to the car. Some light sprinkles added to the breeze and the refreshing sound of the quaking aspen. It was a perfect day and the cloudiness provided the perfect relief from the warm June sun.

I might have to do this one again sometime