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| Hiking | 15.30 Miles |
429 AEG |
| | Hiking | 15.30 Miles | 4 Hrs 57 Mns | | 3.09 mph |
| 429 ft AEG | | | | |
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| no partners | | I started off in Scottsdale from the plaza at Indian Bend and Hayden Roads. From my parking spot there it was a short walk over to the canal. There are actually 3 different trails adjacent to one another here. The canal path, the paved path that is marked as the MT, and the golf cart path for the golf course. After a half mile or so, the MT path merges into the canal path on the north side of the canal. At Pima Road, the MT officially crosses over to the south side of the canal, where it stays for the remainder along this canal all the way to Granite Reef. There is a bridge just before the river crossing, so if you decided to walk along the north side, you could cross over in time without any significant backtracking involved.
This section provided the best views so far in the east valley  . There's a lot of infrastructure in your immediate vicinity (power lines, landfill, road crossings), but the majority of the time there are good views of the McDowells, Red Mountain, Superstitions, Four Peaks, Camelback, Piestewa, Estrellas, etc. It's interesting to see all these mountains from different angles than you normally do driving around the valley or from the usual parks. There were clouds off to the east all morning, obscuring views of Four Peaks and Mt. Ord.
After crossing under the 101, the canal goes by the farm fields on the reservation for a few miles. During this section, there are asphalt millings that have turned back into a semi-pavement. There is a transition by a kind of dam in the canal where all the millings are gone and it's all dirt. Sometimes this gets a little rocky and gravelly, but nothing too bad.
Soon the traffic from the Beeline Highway was audible and visible. It was still a good 2 miles or more before the canal crosses the highway since it kind of parallels it as it makes its way around the landfill. The landfill didn't smell bad today. Not great scenery, but as a civil engineer, it did hold some interest for me to see a kind of behind the scenes view of the infrastructure there. 
After crossing the Beeline, it's as close to wilderness as any portion of the MT outside a county or city park I've seen yet. Red Mountain is much closer and comes into view very nicely. I think this was the closest I've been to it, and the views are really nice as you get pretty close. It was also interesting to think how far away it was at the start of my hike in Scottsdale. It was surprising that I was able to get there as quickly as I did (4.5 hours) . The light and shadows on the mountain made for great views, but the battery in my camera died, of course ](https://hikearizona.com/dex2/images/smilies/eusa_wall.gif "Brick wall") .
I was a little nervous about being able to cross the riverbed with Gilbert Road recently being reduced to one lane to let water run down the Salt River. As I got nearer to the dam, I could the river below and it looked pretty wide and deep  . once you get to the crossing, however, the flow was actually only a trickle that was able to fit under a series of small culverts under a concrete road bridging the gap.
Finished up by 10:30am, just under 5 hours total. My wife met me on the Bush Highway since Granite Reef (and most all Tonto NF sites) is (are) closed. Got back to my car and grabbed some takeout lunch for the family on my way home. |
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