DESTINATION Piestewa Basin Trail #1D 1 Photoset
2024-07-30 | |
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| Hiking | 4.86 Miles |
808 AEG |
| | Hiking | 4.86 Miles | 1 Hour 57 Mns | | 2.49 mph |
| 808 ft AEG | | | | |
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| no partners | | Early morning hike in the Phoenix Mountains. The plan was to do the 1E Valley View hike, but I always seem to struggle with identifying this trail. Case in point, I missed it on this hike. Went right around it….  When I got home, I looked at the trail locations and realized my mistake. Hopefully I’ll be able to remember the trail location going forward.
I ended up only doing a portion of the 1D trail, but that was more than the 1E. Got to the Dreamy Draw TH around 5am. I had to wait for the gate to open and was surprised to see they still open the gates manually. The design of the gate would indicate that if I ever looked closely. I’d just assumed that they had transitioned with all the other parks. Took some “use” trails to get to the Irregualr Link and then took the Perl Charles down to the 1D. If I had gone 50 yards further I would have been the 1E. Oh, so close. I was only on the 1D for a short time before following 1 of 3 “use” trails that climb up the west side of the valley. (There is a fourth trail that exits the west side of the valley and that is the signed Perl Charles Trail). At one point in time, I’ve done all these use trails and this one is my favorite. It takes off right from that “3 tiered wall” mentioned in the 1E Trail and avoids another minor valley that is just west of the valley you climb out of. I followed the “use” trails to reconnect to the Perl Charles and used that to get back towards the TH. Following the Charles Trail I noticed that it’s route has changed slightly from its previous incarnation as you get closer to the TH. It’s possible the posts that I was seeing with the old decals were part of a trail that lead TO the Perl Charles. I know the park did not do a very good job of differentiating this back in the day. Their current signage does a much better job of indicating when a trail leads to an actual named trail.
Didn’t accomplish what I wanted, it still a nice hike. More humid today than the previous day, but there was an intermittent breeze which helped. Encountered 8 hikers and 2 bikers. No wildlife.. |
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