Arizona peak-bagging, county by county

[azdesertfather]

Just saw an old article in Arizona Highways listing the highest peaks in every county ... which counties have you done?

• • Maricopa: Browns Peak (7,657)
  • Coconino: Humphreys Peak (12,633)
  • Gila: Myrtle Point, Promontory Butte (7,470)
  • Mohave: Hualapai Peak (8,417)
  • Santa Cruz: Mt. Wrightson (9,453)
  • Yuma: Signal Peak (4,877)
  • Yavapai: Mt. Union (7,979)
  • Pima: Mt. Lemmon (9,081)
  • Navajo: Unnamed Point on Black Mesa, near Kayenta (8,168)
  • Cochise: Chiricahua Peak (9,759)
  • Apache: Mt. Baldy (11,403)
  • Graham: Mt. Graham (10,720)
  • Greenlee: Unnamed Point less than 0.25 mi off US 191, just N of mile marker 227 (9,441)
  • La Paz: Harquahala Mtn. (5,681)
  • Pinal: north slope of Rice Peak (7,575)

[mazatzal]

@Jim_H
Well, post an event!?
I think Neil is in and I'll go with interested (3 left)

[neilends]

Yes, I'm in. This would be a great first HAZ event for me to meet some of you!

[PatrickL]

Black Mesa is still on my radar. I'm normally free Mondays, Thursdays, and Fridays, but I won't be able to go until October.

I'd like to do Graham from Gibson Canyon, too. Not sure how much hell comes with that bushwhack, but I'd guess a lot. Starting from "the top" is not an appealing option and Ash Creek seems like too many miles for a dayhike.

Brown's via the bottom of Soldier Camp, Miller via Joe's Canyon, Humphreys via Weatherford, Wrightson via Florida Canyon, etc are also on the radar.

[neilends]

Kinda on a whim, I decided to do Humphreys tomorrow. The official route. Will hit the trail at or before 8:30.

[SpiderLegs]

Kinda on a whim, I decided to do Humphreys tomorrow. The official route. Will hit the trail at or before 8:30.

I did it a couple of weeks ago. Fun hike if you can avoid the crowds.

[Jim]

You should have excellent, fantastic, late summer, monsoon break weather. :tt:

[neilends]

The weather was amazing. The crowds were even more amazing. Who brings a stereo boom box hiking in a national forest, and pumps it up so it's loud enough for both him and his buddy? I seriously contemplated a confrontation.

[SpiderLegs]

The weather was amazing. The crowds were even more amazing. Who brings a stereo boom box hiking in a national forest, and pumps it up so it's loud enough for both him and his buddy? I seriously contemplated a confrontation.

I have confronted people for doing that. They are in a designated wilderness area. Was on Wrightson last year and you could hear the music bouncing off the side of the mountain for miles. Luckily another group of hikers who appeared to be military guys got to this guy first and strongly suggested that he turn off the music.

[Jim]

Guess he felt head phones or ear buds were too distracting for people?

[big_load]

That's why I wouldn't bother with the Snow Bowl route. When I came up Weatherford, I only saw a couple other hikers before intersecting the Snow Bowl procession. Nor did I see more than a few others between the lowest parts of the Inner Basin and the saddle. The crowds are all on the shortest, fastest and (to me) least interesting route.

[chumley]

@big_load
And if you're Jim_H you solve all those issues by going in February.

[PhilMW]

February eh...so that's the trick!

[hippiepunkpirate]

I know most don't have this option, but if you go during a weekday, the Humphreys Trail is way less busy than on the weekend.

[PhilMW]

Yeah, I went up about 3 weeks ago on a Tuesday. Still saw some people up there, but not too many.

[neilends]

I'm an occasional stats nerd, so I used Garmin's Base Camp app to figure out the grade of the Humphreys Summit Trail from my hike, broken down into each of its 5 miles. Mile 1 has an average grade of 9.5 percent. Mile 2, 12.3. Mile 3, 10.5. Mile 4, 14.5. And mile 5 plus the additional 0.1 or so to the summit, 15.7.

Probably useless data but it was interesting to see my tortoise-like pace correlate to each segment according to the grade.

[big_load]

Unless you do a lot of hiking at high elevation, I suspect your pace had less to do with grade than with atmosphere.

[neilends]

Unless you do a lot of hiking at high elevation, I suspect your pace had less to do with grade than with atmosphere.

Makes sense. Though more broadly speaking, it has most to do with the extra flab I'm carrying around.

[SpiderLegs]

One of the more notorious drug cheats in the cycling world was asked if he would rather take EPO to increase his hematocrit levels 5% or lose 5 pounds to help up those steep climbs. He said he would rather try to lose another 5 pounds. Sometimes when I go to the gym and pick up two 20 pound weights it's hard to believe that I was carrying that much weight around my gut 7 years ago.