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| Hiking | 8.97 Miles |
3,099 AEG |
| | Hiking | 8.97 Miles | 6 Hrs 25 Mns | | 2.03 mph |
| 3,099 ft AEG | 2 Hrs Break | 15 LBS Pack | | |
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| no partners | | Arrived at the lower Arcadia Camp Ground at 0600 to temperatures in the lower 60's. I didn't realize till later that I should be about .1 miles further up road at the Upper Arcadia Camp ground. No big deal it just adds about .1 mile to the hike. I came with a GPS route that I downloaded from HAZ. The problem with that route is it has the trail heading over Heliograph ridge at the wrong saddle. There is a sign near Eagle Rock that indicated the Arcadia trail crosses the ridge there. I created a route by tracing what I could see of the trail on Google Earth and filled in the rest. Turns out this GPS route I created was pretty close. As a note on the GPS route that goes with this write-up; The upper one third of the upward trek is just a copy of the upper one third downward trek. I forgot to turn my GPS back on after a break and did not realize it til I got to the summit.
As a trail goes I really like this trail, It climbs the almost 3000 feet in 4.5 miles at a really nice slope, would be fairly easy to keep up a 2 MPH rate. The issue is that the trail is either hidden by brush or washed out, so the going is very slow, I think I did 1.25 MPH going up. At .7 miles in you come to Wet Canyon Creek crossing. Where the trail use to cross is a 20 foot drop. It took me twenty minutes to find a place to cross and get to the other side. Coming down was easier than going backup. On the way back I was spread eagle climbing up the bank and the dirt and rock at all four of my anchor points was sliding down about as fast as my upward movement. I wasn't terribly high up but the only thought in my mind as I was making an attempt to go up was how bad is this going to hurt if I slip down. I figured I wouldn't kill myself, probably not break anything but it was going to probably hurt a lot. Luckily I didn't find out as I was able to inch my way up. The sad part is a younger version of me (much younger) would probably have gone up without an issue. This was the only place where there is a washout issue. There were numerous dead fall but I expected this (plan to get really dirty as a lot of it is charred). Every so often you get a nice section of trail but it ends when you come into an area overgrown by ferns or brush. The trail is there so if you know the general direction you come out on the other side on trail. Expect a lot of this. On the ridge crossing at Noon Creek Ridge I lost the trail completely. Took me wandering around a bit to locate it again. The odd thing was that on the way back it happened to me again in this same area. Once back on trail with a little vigilance you can stay on trail. At the final Noon Creek Ridge crossing is in the general area that the Route I downloaded from HAZ differs from the route I made. The trail is fairly easy to follow in this area and it definitely follows the one I created. It appears that at one time there was a trail that crossed Heliograph Peak Ridge higher up but all traces of that trail are now gone. After crossing Noon Creek Ridge the trail enters the Noon Creek upper water shed and there was no issue staying on trail but it was really overgrown. At one point I was on hands and Knees crawling under brush to get through. The up side is that there are a lot of dew berry plants here and therefor lots of bears use this trail, if you get down low like a bear getting through this brush is easier. I was unable to sample the dew berries because of a procedure I'm having done next Monday and am not allowed to eat things with seeds in it 5 days prior. After looking at the bear droppings full of these seeds I can see why. They sure looked good though, The dewberries not the bear dung. Other than the aforementioned items this was a great hike. I'm not sure that in a year this trail will be passable unless some trail maintenance is done.
This is a really nice hike even with the slow going, terrific views and I was fortunate to have great weather, could of been much worse for a July day. The half hour break at the summit was one of those times where you are thinking, life can't get any better than this. Wet Creek had a good flow of water, In fact on my return trip I emptied my canteen and filled with the cool stream water. There were also few seeps along the trail on the way to the summit. |
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