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| Hiking | 2.00 Miles |
500 AEG |
| | Hiking | 2.00 Miles | | | |
| 500 ft AEG | | 18 LBS Pack | | |
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| no partners | | This is a log entry for only the north half of Half Moon Trail. (Sobo from the 288/42 TH to the "Upright Vacuum Cleaner" campsite.)
Important things first:
1) If you do the trail southbound, it's Phoenix to Beeline to Rye exit. FR 414 to FR 442. (Otherwise, nobo starts at the Barnhardt TH.)
2) Three creek crossings on the roads. The creeks were all dry, even the day after a night of heavy rain from thunderstorms. But still, you'll want a high clearance vehicle to clear the large rocks. 4x4 not necessary. But nice when climbing out of the creek beds.
3) This trail is still an enigma in that the south third is well curated and well marked with cairns. And the north third is somewhat taken care of, with a few cairns. BUT the middle third is unmarked, un-maintained, and blocked by downed trees. It's easy to lose the trail nobo after the campsite.
4) The only water that I know of is the unnamed Spring south of the 288/42 sign. (See my previous triplog.) In the past, someone here on HAZ has left a Water Report that there is a Spring near Rock Creek near the Vacuum Cleaner campground. I intended to look for it this time. But I forgot. (Rats.)
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This was part 2 of 3 of a 3-day "excursion."
My main reason for making this excursion was to 1) find where I went wrong when I lost the trail a few months ago nobo and could have ended up dying as a result. 2) To look for water per the Water Report above. And 3) to see if I could find my lost bed roll, which I lost while crawling under a tree branch months ago when I was off trail.(Spoiler: I couldn't. For now.)
I drove to the parking area (just off 442 at the "Up arrow 42 TH" sign) and hiked from there along a jeep trail to the official 288/42 TH. (So you are walking west about a half mile to go east.)
The trail is still easy to see and follow. There are still some tall bushes encroaching on the trail in a few places. (I'm going to start bringing small Fiskers clippers with me.)
The trail slowly climbs a hill. (Half Moon, I think it's called.) In short order, you'll be on a ridge line of sorts. (A soft ridge, since it's a hill.)
Once on the ridge line, there are occasional cairns. But I don't think needed. Until the last one.
At the last one (GPS helps), the trail suddenly makes a 90 degree turn south. (Also, there is a large fire pit on the top of the hill, just before the last cairn.)
From there, the trail is followable. But no cairns or signs. I had an advantage because, having been to the campsite before on the other side of Rock Creek, I kinda knew where I wanted to be.
The trail kinda-sorts switches back and forth every few feet because you're going down a kinda steep slope. But then the trail stops.
More correctly, if I was really on the trail, it's blocked by tree fall. (See photo.) No wonder I couldn't find it going nobo the first time. (Although I think it's easier to stay on it going sobo.)
I broke off a few tree branches for you to make your way easier.
From there, I retraced my off-trail steps to try to find my bed roll.
I'll come back to that in a moment. But if TL;DR, from here there is a shortcut that you can take back to your vehicle.
You cross Rock Creek and will see the abandoned upright vacuum cleaner in the campsite area. Continue south a bit and you'll run into a jeep trail.
If you take the jeep trail eastbound, it will slowly descent back to FR 442. From there about an easy 3/4 mile walk back to where you parked.
Okay, back to my off-trail adventure.
I don't feel too bad about thinking that I had been on trail last time because there is still a trail north of Rock Creek that goes due west. Apparently horse use it. (Lots of horse poop along it.)
Now, last time, I had marked GPS breadcrumbs on my previous (no trail) GPS app. I was pleasantly surprised to find myself this time tracking those breadcrumbs perfectly as I followed my pseudo-trail.
With a lighter load on my back this time, it didn't take very long to return to where I had slipped and fallen a few months before. (The grade gets steeper and the ground more crumbly there.) I found the first tree that I had crawled under months before. And I stopped.
(There was another tree about 200 more feet away to the west with even lower branches that I had crawled under last time. I'm fairly sure that a branch snagged my roll (I remember struggling to free myself while crawling under that tree.). If I'm right, it's still there, with its strap hanging on a branch.)
By now it was about 2:30 pm and thunderstorms were moving in. I didn't want to 1) get caught there in a storm, or 2) get caught there inured at night. (I only had survival stuff with me for this.) So, armed with a satellite map app this time, I was able to scramble up to the Half Moon trail at a relatively do-able place that I had previously marked at home.
From there I tried to use some shortcuts from the top of Half Moon hill back to FR 442 that I had marked out at home. They looked easy on the satellite. But in real life, they were steep descents into Rock Creek, where it meets up with Alder Creek.
As it was starting to splatter rain, I went back to the last cairn that marked the descent to the vacuum cleaner campground, wound my way down the trail, passed by the tree that I had made more accessible, passed through the campsite onto a jeep road that descends down to FR 422.
I was at my Blazer by 4 pm. I noodled around for an hour. It's a nice campsite there. But after noticing bear scat (albeit "small") in the campsite, I decided to drive along 442 nobo to Collum Mine and camp there for the night. Glad that I did. |
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| Be careful. It really is "a jungle out there." |
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