Moments in Dirt and Ink

Yuma BLM Click for map. There's lots of Granite Mountains around and this one probably isn't a very impressive specimen. It certainly isn't as grand as the various other things I went after while I was here last. It's still an excellent excuse for a walk with a little challenge along the way. I could probably drive a bit closer, but then I would miss some small sites along the way and it's really too close to camp to bother with that. Anyway, it would only get the easy flat stuff out of the way and the sky is quite beautiful after the rain yesterday. Best to stretch the legs and enjoy it. The goal, obscured a little by the desert vegetation. Ibex does still make itself known on the other side of the valley. Signal is some 20 miles away, but I think that might be it anyway. The first part is easy and flat and quick, but that is deceptive. As small as Granite is, it does have some foothills. Among the closest of these are some marked petroglyp...

Prescott National Forest Click for map. I stayed at Powell Springs Campground, which is a free campground deep in some ponderosas that only exist in the canyon area. Outside the canyon, the area is chaparral. A trail heads out the back of the camp and I plotted out a loop of travel along it and some connecting trails, then increasingly large roads. The last little bit to the campground road would unfortunately be paved, but most the roads are rough and narrow and unlikely to see much traffic. There seems to be no parking specific for the trail, just a small loop for turning around. There's also no sign for the trail, just the suggestion that road once went further. No markers for the trail at the end of the campground, but if road once went here it should be easy to find. Road did go further, and is pretty obvious as it crosses the creek and continues along it on the other side. The campground is surrounded by a fence and where the road encounters it, there is a s...

Prescott National Forest Click for map. I am off to a later start than expected. I had looked at the icy road just past where the snow plow stopped and found a parking spot, but a chat with a pair of women had managed to dare me onward. They had not even questioned my manhood or anything. They were simply encouraging. It didn't help that they were playing with their own 4WD and crawling up the hill in front of me, but for all I know that just meant I was a little lower down when everything started to slide backward. Then the poor Forest Service employees dealt with a little more than they bargained for when simply trying to clean the toilets and I was parked even further away in the picnic area across the highway. This location has the advantage of not being along the side of a road clearly marked tow away zone even if my parking had been well off of it. A little extra walking is no problem, especially when compared to trying to direct a short trailer while sliding backward...

Kaibab National Forest Click for map. The map says simply "Steel Dam Fishing Site", but the geocacher says it's the oldest and largest steel dam in the world. I resolved to go and see it and sorted out a looping route from exit 149. This does let me wander a piece of "Route 66", but I really should have used exit 148 for my starting point. The geocache description even says as much. From there, the dam is drivable in a sufficiently sturdy vehicle although all bets are off once the road gets wet as it is now. I wouldn't be driving it anyway. A piece of what was once "Route 66". Is it everything you expected? The desert is taking back US-66. Flat Mesa and other points southeast. There's supposed to be a mountain bike trail along this segment of US-66 with a second piece that drops off it near the edge of the forest, but I don't see that segment. Maybe they just like riding the old highway to bother with the other pie...

Kaibab National Forest Click for map. The weatherman was promising a day of possible rain followed by another of definite snow. I scuttled off and stopped 700 feet below the predicted snow level while the snowplows were mobilizing into position to be useful. I'm not sure how my position might be useful, but I'll at least get the nearby benchmark. I'd like to go up Bill Williams Mountain, but that's 10 miles back and 2700 feet above predicted snowline. And how did getting below the snow work? Well, when the sun went down, the rain turned to snow. Not as much as there will be for the second wave of storm, which will be a blanket of a few inches, but it's sticking a little. The road south off mile post 151 has had some improvement, at least this far. There's a road of sorts heading up my way, but it is just someone's camp site. It hasn't been used much and the dirt isn't compacted enough to make walking through the mud any easier. The m...

Coconino National Forest Click for map. I have fond memories of getting lost in the lava tubes of Lava Beds National Monument, but not in any dangerous way because there's a lot of openings to just pop up out of and navigate above ground to where you need to be. I mentioned that to one guy and he said I didn't need to go to the lava river, then. It's just one short segment. It doesn't even go anywhere. Such nonsense. It goes for almost a mile of lava cave goodness! The roads in are rough, but they are well marked for this particular destination. I was coming from the unusual direction and still got a sign to point the way. This is one of Flagstaff's most popular destinations and can see hundreds of hikers in a day. It might have something to do with the fact it's always cold, even in the summer. Annoyingly, someone has gone and locked both bathrooms. Maybe they've decided it is out of season. There's still two other cars besides my own, although ...

Coconino National Forest Click for map. I seem to be collecting fire lookouts, but the inclusion of Wing Mountain on the list of Arizona lookouts on Peakbagger wasn't what got my notice. It was the simple fact that the quad west of Humphreys Peak is named for Wing Mountain. I'm a bit suspicious about it being a lookout because there is not so much as a trail going up it, much less a road that is common for such things. People who have climbed it seem to have just picked a side and gone for it. I picked the side where there is a shoulder called Little Wing Mountain so I could climb and get the benchmark, then move nearly halfway around the crater to the high point. It is a side that looked highly climbable from afar, which seems like another plus. Forest road 222 (Wing Mountain Road) in seems generally maintained, but 519 only happens to be passable for my little car by a bit of luck. I park at 9230C where someone has had a camp site. It is a little way down the hill fro...

Coconino National Forest Click for map. Old Caves Crater boasts a different sort of ruin, from people who made their homes among the small "caves" of gas bubbles in the old lava rocks. Unfortunately, some of the different character of this one is "heavily disturbed", as the kiosk at the start warns me. This was the last known Sinagua settlement in the area, but there are a couple more "excavation-quarry settlements" like this one in the area to the east. Anyway, it's a short trail, so no harm in going to see. I'll tag the peak, too. The settlement is quite close to the top. Kiosk full of information and a trail register full of people who probably won't be getting lost. It's a wide path through the cinders surrounded by ponderosa. There seem to be quite a few extra paths as well. It's generally clear which is the official one. There are signs for the loop around the bottom to the west and later the one to the east. I fol...

Picture Canyon Natural and Cultural Preserve Click for map. Picture Canyon is a little bit of open space developed jointly by the City of Flagstaff and Arizona State Parks. It boasts cultural artifacts and plenty of birding. The Tom Moody Trail makes a loop through the area to take in some of these. It sits at the edge of a couple bits of industry and my nose can't help but tell me that one of those is sewage treatment. Um, I mean "waste water". That won't dominate the whole area, but it is noticed in the wetter spots. A place to start with some parking. Signs include an area map. Ground zero for the stink up ahead, but certainly not the source. That is throughout the city. Trail heads toward the smell past an "outdoor classroom" that is benches and a semicircle of educational signs, then the loop splits. I head left away from the smell and into the trees, but also away from the cultural artifacts. It's an old road through gentle hil...

Coconino National Forest Click for map. I almost went for O'Leary Peak instead of the wanderings I did on the fee free day, but it is actually just outside of the monument and requires no fee, so I came back for it. It didn't take long. Today I'll make my way to the lookout, which has road all the way up, then decide what I feel like stopping by on the way down of the various smaller peaks near the road. Three other cars have beaten me here. Gate and trail sign on the road to the lookout on O'Leary Peak. The road rolls a little, first dropping and then rising, as it wanders the forest toward the base of the volcano that holds the lookout. Trees and cinder and only the slightest undergrowth stretch out every way. It swings northward as it comes to the edge of the Bonito Lava Flow. Little signs march along the imaginary line between forest and monument as it cuts through one corner of Sunset Crater National Monument. Quite the nice road up to the looko...

Coconino National Forest Click for map. There is not really anything about this spot, one of the 600+ volcanoes in the area, to set it apart. I wanted to find five geocaches today and it has five challenge caches I qualify for ringing its top. Although unnamed, its crater bears the name "Walker Lake" on the USGS map. A road once circled this little pond, but vehicles are no longer allowed. The roads to it are a little rough, but I could have driven my little car a bit closer. There just didn't seem to be any point to it since I have time and walking is good for me. The forest low down on the plain seems a little dark and brooding, but it brightens once I get climbing. It's not that far. Following the road in the trees and almost to the top. Faint paths break off right and a little later left as the road reaches the lowest spot on the lip of the crater. The track seems to vanish just past the top, but the rest of it can be seen below and circling the la...