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| Hiking | 2.50 Miles |
281 AEG |
| | Hiking | 2.50 Miles | | | |
| 281 ft AEG | | | | |
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| no partners | | Early morning hike in the Goldfields. Started from the Hackamore TH around 7am. My goal was to do the loop as described, but knowing the Goldfields and all the side trail, I had downloaded the route just to make sure I didn’t get sidetracked. This turned out to be a good thing as the trail alternates between road, wash and faint trail.
The trail takes off from the TH following a road. Around .5 miles in the trail leaves the road and the loop starts. I opted to go clockwise. Either direction seemed to head off trail, but going clockwise, there was a trail that came pretty close to the downloaded route. This trail was solid and easy to follow, but didn’t last long before crossing Trail 309 and dropping down into a wash. The trail follows the wash for a bit before exiting the wash to the east. I didn’t see the trail exiting the wash, but the gps came in handy to get me back on the trail. The trail was faint, but evident as it headed up towards a saddle that sloped down the NW side of peak 2297. Once the trail reaches the saddle it connects to Trail 309 and follows it north.
I actually left my planned route and decided to hike to the top of 2297. (Note: there is actually trail signage on trail 309 that refers to this peak as 2409). Fairly easy scramble to the top with mediocre views. I decided to descend down the south side and ended up, back at the beginning of the loop. I went CCW, this time. Following the gps route on my Garmin had me blazing through the desert (no trail evident) for a brief time before transitioning to a road. The route follows the road, going past Green Thumb and curving around to the north side of peak 2297. As I got to the north side, I left the road and followed a solid use trail that tied into trail 309. Following 309 south, brought me back to where I had left to summit 2297. At this point, I had done the Keyhole Arch Loop.
I decided to do some exploring of the area. From the saddle I dropped into wash that was north of peak 2297. There were quite a few use trails that bounced between the wash and the nearby road to the north and east. In this area was Keyhole Arch and I followed a well used trail to take a look. There was also a small canyon wash that fed into this bigger wash. There was a brief section of stone walls that created an enclosed feeling. Bikers had discovered it and it looked like they created a nice little track in the area. After exploring the area, I took trail 309 back to the TH.
Fun area. I didn’t see anyone, except for one motorbike. No wildlife. Never got that far from the TH, but still got some miles with all the gridding.
The Keyhole Arch Loop as described in the description really doesn’t exist any longer. It has been incorporated and lost in the morass of other trails and roads. That being said the Keyhole still exists and is an easy visit. The Bulldog Rec area has created about 8 new trails in this area. One of them, trail 309, the Tarantula Trail does a nice job of circumventing part of peak 2297 and there are other “new” trails that create a loop similar to the Keyhole Arch description. (You’ll notice that I put “new” in quotation marks. I have a feeling that these trails have been around for quite awhile, but they have been adopted and signed by the Bulldog Rec area. |
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