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| | | Harquar-Little Harquahala Mountains, AZ | | | |
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Harquar-Little Harquahala Mountains, AZ
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| Hiking | 3.43 Miles |
1,123 AEG |
| | Hiking | 3.43 Miles | 4 Hrs 16 Mns | | 1.87 mph |
| 1,123 ft AEG | 2 Hrs 26 Mns Break | | | |
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| no partners | | The ‘Little Harquahala Mountains’ are south of Rte 60, north of I-10, and are southwest of the better known Harquahala Mtns.
I hiked up the mountain that is the high point of the range.
This mountain range is absolutely full of mines, adits, and a zillion prospects. From a little bit of reading, I now know gold and silver were discovered way back in the 1700s by the Spanish, and by the mid to late 1800s, prospecting was going strong.
Supposedly, the developers of the Vulture Mine (further east), were all ready to sink money into this mountain range, just when the Vulture Mine began to pay off.
I had two ‘hike plans’ ready to go, depending on the road conditions in the area. (With all the mining and prospects, there are a high number of roads, most in bad shape).
Plan A was to just hike.
If the roads near my mountain weren’t drivable, the hike would be an 8 or 10 mile hike, and by the looks of the number of deep washes to and from the mountain, along with the very ugly/boulder filled ridge-lines of the mountain itself, that distance would be plenty.
Plan B was to hike, and then afterwords, tour the mine/prospect areas in the car.
Plan B was “ if ” I could drive up close to the mountain using a combo of many roads.
Plan B won, as I was able to put together parts of three roads, and parked right next to the mountain. As a bonus, I parked about 70 feet from the azimuth mark. This made for a much shorter hike, with time left to do an ‘auto tour’ of the mining/prospecting areas.
So, I located the azimuth mark, right away, hiked up one of the many ridge-lines to the top, then chose a different set of ridge-lines back to the car. The ridge-lines down were really slow going, due to their narrowness, and the 7 or 8 ‘boulder-bumps’ along the way.
Bailing off the ridge-line was not an option, as very vertical scree was waiting to give me a ‘scree-ride’.
The benchmark atop the Little Harquahala Mountain Range high point is named, ‘HARQUAR’.
It and it’s two reference marks are in excellent shape, and so is the very seldom seen HARQUAR Azimuth Mark.
The summit log dates back to the 1980s, and all but two, of the usual suspects have logged in. Lilly & McLoud did not make a showing in the summit log.
Most of the entries were from the 1980s and 90s, with very few in the last 15 years.
After the hike, my ‘drive-tour’ of some of the mines and prospects was interesting. It included a cemetery with many grave-sites and headstones (actually wood), with one unmarked grave totally covered in smoothed out cement.
This area (north of I-10) is nothing like the area due south of I-10, that I have recently hiked in a few times. I like the terrain and mountains ‘down south’ much better.
My next hike (and my last for awhile), will be ‘down south’ of I-10 again. As I mentioned on a previous triplog, that area, out west, and south of I-10 is addictive. Hopefully, I won’t run out of mountains to climb, down there. 
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Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost
J.R.R.TOLKIEN |
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