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| Hiking | 15.39 Miles |
4,105 AEG |
| | Hiking | 15.39 Miles | 1 Day 2 Hrs 31 Mns | | |
| 4,105 ft AEG | | 23 LBS Pack | | |
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| no partners | | I led an Arizona Backpackers Club hike for an overnight adventure in the Chiricahua Wilderness. After an overnight at the Sycamore Campground along Turkey Creek Road (nice outhouses), we headed out on the Morse Canyon Trail. There is limited parking at the trailhead. Be sure not to block the turnaround, as people come up here with trailers. The dirt road coming in was a little rough, but easily driven with a small SUV.
The climb up to the ridge went surprisingly fast. Morse Canyon trail is in great shape, as it must have been maintained recently. Turtle Mountain Trail had a few deadfalls, but not bad. I wasn't sure about my conditioning, and most of the crew was much more athletic--and younger--than me. At Monte Vista Peak, the view was somewhat obscured by the haze from the Stronghold Fire about 50 miles to the west; I couldn't smell it but some in our party could. There is an outhouse at the summit. I thought it seemed fine, but some of our party were not impressed.
There is a lot of dormant stinknet weed (Globe Chamomile) along the ridge. This invasive plant will probably lead to yet more fires up here. Crest Trail 270B was in pretty good shape but Crest Trail 270D was the worst with lots of deadfall, and the the last half mile to Aspen Saddle was very sketchy and hard to find.
We camped at Aspen Saddle; from there it is about 0.6 miles to Eagle Spring which had plenty of water in the concrete springbox. It wasn't difficult to filter out the green stuff. There was a 25 MPH wind blowing most of the night across the saddle, and in the morning, with temps around 38F, we were anxious to get going.
Crest Trail 270C up to Chiricahua Peak is mostly missing, but the direction to the peak is obvious. We were freezing in the wind, though, and we actually missed the summit by a few yards in our anxiety to get out of the wind. The trail down the north side of the peak is in great shape, however, and from there, we were out of the wind and started to warm up.
We took Crest Trail 270B back to the Mormon Ridge Trail 269, then down the Mormon Canyon Trail 352, which again was in excellent shape. |
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Wildflowers Observation None
Nothing in bloom yet. |
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Eagle Spring |
Dripping |
Dripping |
| | | Spring box was full of water. It was easy to filter the algae out, and we pulled lots of water for our party. | | | |
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