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| Hiking | 5.00 Miles |
1,000 AEG |
| | Hiking | 5.00 Miles | | | |
| 1,000 ft AEG | | | | |
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| no partners | | This hike turned out to be a lot more challenging than expected! After hiking Heliograph Peak the day before, I thought I knew what to expect as far as snow depth for this trail. The hike up High Peak Road was 80% covered in 0-12 inches of snow but fairly easy to get through. I soon made it to the end of the trail but my plans were to link it up with the Big Creek trail and hike it back down to complete a loop - This is where the fun started!
I never needed my snowshoes on Heliograph so I didn't even bother bringing them on this trip, big mistake! There is about a 1/2 mile stretch of road that links up the two trails I needed to cross and it lies on the shaded east side of the mountain. Took a few steps and I was quickly up to my knees in snow. I told myself to turn around, this is not doable. I thought maybe hiking off to the side of the road would be better, took a couple steps to the side and was now up to my waist in snow. Once again I told myself to turn around. I just hate not completing a planed hike and knew if I made it down the road to the open meadow that links up the trails, the snow levels would drop. The next 1/2 mile was take 25 steps, rest, take 25 steps ..... etc. After about an hour of this, I finally arrived at the meadow - Whew, I made it! As expected the snow level here became more managable as I headed down the Big Creek trail and a little over a mile later I droped down onto the Swift Trail. The road back up was 50% covered in hard ice and I was slippin & sliding in a few places back to my truck. I then drove back down the hwy to Snow Flat and added a short hike down the road for the sunset.
This was just a 5 mile loop, but my thighs & calfs say it was 10. Another fun, fun day playing in the snow on Mt Graham !!! |
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