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| Hiking | 5.00 Miles |
1,177 AEG |
| | Hiking | 5.00 Miles | 2 Hrs | | 2.61 mph |
| 1,177 ft AEG | 5 Mns Break | | | |
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| no partners | | Let's call this "Geronimo Trail -- and surroundings". It would have been fun to join the Tuesday Night on SoMo group, but evenings aren't really free, so I planned a trip in the morning like usual. This time: a Geronimo/National/Mormon/beautiful neighborhood connecting street loop. Totally beautiful May morning -- mid-60s with a breeze and clouds floating around, and the desert smelled great after the little bit of rain overnight. Went up the lower part of Geronimo, right to where you drop into a large wash and start heading over to the junction with the Boy Scout branch trail. Then a couple of things happened that changed it from a normal loop. First, right near the junction, I saw and heard a large group going up Geronimo (turned out to be 17 people, when I counted later). Second, I was right in the large wash when I saw the group, and a common thought popped into my mind as I looked up the wash: "I wonder what's up there ...?". And to help with my decision, I thought "Well, I like the lower part of Geronimo better than the upper part anyway ...". And so -- we'll follow the wash! Uhh ... let's call it bouldery and brushy. Nice and peaceful, but a challenge to get through in places. And eventually, there came a place that might have been a nice waterfall a couple of months ago, but now was just a big unclimbable rock. So I went up the west side of the canyon, through more boulders and brush. All of this was eating up time, so I decided to just meet the top end of Geronimo and follow that back down, rather than go up to National to finish the loop. Mostly not too bad getting over there; just about three smaller ridges and valleys to cross. The funniest part of the whole experience: when I was one ridge away from being back on Geronimo, I could once again see and hear the large hiking group, which had reached the top and was now starting down. A big detour, and I'm going to end up right behind the group again! Unless ... I could find a pretty clear cross-country route and get ahead of them! Well, let's just say that I surprised two people in the middle of the line. Half the line had gone past when I reached the trail, and I kind of came out of hiding almost, out of a side drainage, and those two were in a conversation on the trail. They looked surprised; maybe I should have sung a song as I was getting close to the trail. Several minutes later I'd worked my way to the front of the line, and from there I ran most of the way back to the trailhead. (Yeah, I had just the right gear for exploring a South Mountain wash: running shoes and shorts.)  |
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Route Editor
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