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| Hiking | 20.54 Miles |
1,200 AEG |
| | Hiking | 20.54 Miles | 9 Hrs 38 Mns | | 2.24 mph |
| 1,200 ft AEG | 29 Mns Break | | | |
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| partners | | This was planned as a shuttle hike. I tried some options to get a ride up to the north end but none panned out. We dropped the Xterra off at Doll Baby and got into Wally's Bronco for the ride up. At that point he mentioned that he decided to just make his hike an out and back from out starting point, eliminating the need to drive back up to Pine. Wally isn't all that interested in either hiking all of the AZT or driving until after dark to pick up his car, so he saved the day and did us all a favor.
I was able to cajole Wally to take us not to the Pine TH, but down Hardscrabble Road, down FR1655 to the powerline, which was where we stopped. It was only .6 miles to the hike we had done in 2010 that led to the AZT, and only 1.4 miles to the AZT.
We backtracked on the new singletrack reroute of the AZT to where it turns to a road and then turned around and headed south. Wally turned around at the 6 mile mark and headed back to his car. Brian and I kept soutbound to Doll Baby where we left the Xterra.
Most of this was downhill with a very gradual grade, with a few exceptions of a climb after crossing a wash and a few steep descents. The worst descent was a little before the river crossing, which was steep and also very loose. We were able to cross the river without getting our feet wet with the low flow. We saw 2 NB hikers, one of which told us the river was up to his knees. There was a spot where that would be the case, but just downstream was a low flow and dry area.
We took the shortcut back to Doll Baby, which had the steep singletrack, but more climbing once we were on the road.
The weather was perfect except for the bad visibility with the haze from the winds, which seemed to be the case all the way down to Phoenix. Very windy and a little cool to start, but it warmed up once the sun hit, but never really got hot.
This is definitely the rockiest section of the AZT I've done so far. Most of the rocks are half buried so it's not like much can be done in the way of maintenance to make it better. It wasn't too bad, especially since we did this downhill, but it does add the element of challenge a little.
Saw nearly 50 elk on the ride in up to the powerline, but none after that. |
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