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| Greasewood Mountain Pinalenos, AZ | |
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| | Greasewood Mountain Pinalenos, AZ | | | |
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Greasewood Mountain Pinalenos, AZ
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| Hiking | 4.34 Miles |
1,503 AEG |
| | Hiking | 4.34 Miles | 3 Hrs 32 Mns | | 1.71 mph |
| 1,503 ft AEG | 1 Hour Break | | | |
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| no partners | | Note: Thanks to Paul McClellan for the driving directions which I turned into a GPS route for easier navigation. See my trip report from April 1, 2026 for driving directions. It's a long drive and there are a lot of gates to go through. Jesse Johnson wrote a trip report indicating that Paul's driving route didn't work but it worked for me and I didn't see any areas where I could not legally drive. There was a gas line road along the way which seemed to run across private property but I had legal right of way.
After hiking Gairn BM, I drove from my starting point to the new starting point for Greasewood. Afterwards, I realized that I could have hiked to Greasewood BM from my Gairn BM starting point and it would have been about 8 mi RT with about 2,000 feet of AEG and I could have avoided the very long tedious drive over there.
Anyway, as I was driving toward my starting point for Greasewood, I passed a windmill and the road started getting worse after that. There were a few ditch crossings in a wash, but there were some nicer stretches of road past that. I decided to park at a flat area near a large juniper tree. From this point, the hike was only around 4 miles and it didn't make sense to drive any further. I had a very late lunch and thought whether it was better to do the hike in the morning or before dark. Since the first and last mile of the hike was all road, I felt that I had a good chance of finishing before dark. I ended up starting my hike around 4 pm.
I hiked up the road just under 1 mile and found an empty tank near a saddle which is where the road basically ended. There was also an empty trough here and a small butte up ahead that looked climbable. From here, I basically followed Paul's route going to Grease BM first, using a slightly different route near the end which ended up being class 3. Starting out near the tank, I had to do a short climb up to the ridgeline. From the ridgeline I could see that it curved around and led up to the 2 high points. The ridgeline was clear and easy to walk, probably grazed down by the cattle in the area.
After summiting the class 3 Grease BM, I found a registry that was placed there by my friend Michael Berry (Jan 2018). Including my entry, there were only 3 small notebook pages in over 8 years, which was less than I suspected. After signing I took photos of the pages and some photos from the high point, then headed down to the saddle and up to Greasewood mountain. It was an easy short hike getting down Grease BM and over to the higher peak as the Grease BM prominence is only 54 feet.
On Greasewood mountain, I found a registry going back as far as 2014. Jesse was the one who signed before me, almost a year ago. Hard to believe this peak had no activity in a whole year, but it is quite remote and that must be the reason why.
On the way down, I took a class 2 route around and down the side of Grease BM. I found some faint animal trails along the way. This was probably the worst part of the hike because the footing wasn't great and I was not on a ridgeline. Once I got back down to the lower saddle, it was smooth sailing along the ridgeline back to where I saw the tank down below. Once I saw that I knew where to go down to get to the road. I was down well before dark and knew that I had a little less than 1 mile of road to walk to get back to where I parked. I ended up camping near the tree and then heading out the next morning to go to the Stockton pass area where I would continue day 2 of my hiking.
SIDE NOTE ABOUT ROADS:
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After my hike I was trying to get to Stockton pass and the easiest most direct route would have been to exit the AZ state trust land to the West via Briggs Road. To get to W Briggs Rd, you would need to drive NW on Gas Line Rd to FSR 661, then turn left on Briggs Rd (unmarked).
But, I ran into a small problem...
I found a LOCKED gate at 32.456396 -109.910469, at Briggs road!!! I don't believe that Sandra Margaret Johnson has the legal authority to block access on W Briggs Road for people who want to get over to S. Brookerson Road. The road should have a legal right of way to the AZ state trust land. I'm going to investigate this further.
Primary Owner: JOHNSON SANDRA MARGARET
Parcel Number: 114-22-056
Site Address: 12747 W BRIGGS RD WILLCOX
Legal Acreage: 320.000000
JOHNSON SANDRA MARGARET
2348 N 56TH ST
MESA, AZ 85215-2608
At this point, I'm not aware of a way to exit the AZ state trust land West of Gairn BM and Greasewood mountains. It would have saved me about 40 miles of extra driving on high clearance dirt roads. If this land owner is illegally blocking this access, this violation will be recorded, submitted and the property owner will be fined.
Stats:
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Distance (round trip): 4.34 miles
AEG: 1,503 feet
Strava moving time: 2 hrs 33 mins
Strava elapsed time: 3 hrs 32 mins |
| _____________________
Michael Williams
IT Professional
Rocky Point Vacation Rentals
Ocean Front Condo in Rocky Point, Sonora, Mexico
www.beachfrontmexico.us
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