The Grand Enchantment Trail, Volume Three: No, I’m Not Addicted… Really

[Brad Young]

Day One:


Well maybe he’s right. I keep telling myself that I’m just playing around and that I don’t ever really intend to finish this thing. And yet here I am for a third year, putting more milage on The Grand Enchantment Trail. And he’s even with me. Maybe this thing is addictive.

The first try this year got aborted though. It wasn’t even a try. A hold broke on a route in Josh while I was climbing on the way out here. I lucked out with only a badly bruised heel and strained arch. But I had to give it a month to recover.

We’re back now, in mid-March, and I’m not only starting to wonder if he’s right about addiction, I’m starting to believe that he seriously likes this trail too.

Vicki, I and the dogs arrived at the trailhead the night before. Jon finished his drive the morning of our first hiking day:







It’s just under 25 miles to the next trailhead and although I’ve done that in a day before, not in still-kinda-unknown country and not without being in really good hiking shape. So, we’ll begin this trip with two days and one night out. But 13 or so miles doesn’t take all day. A late morning start for day one it is:







Conditions are fairly cold, and weather is expected later. But one disadvantage of coming out this far to hike is that time is limited and we need to go:







Flats at the start lead up to a series of visible “hills.” Will these feel like hills when we’re actually up-bound? The guidebook mentions something about one particular rise called “The” Hill:







Sure enough, switchbacks gain elevation:







Here’s a view back to the trailhead, to Vicki, and to the enormous Ray Mine (this highway 77 area is, after all, “the copper corridor"):




Once up high, we stayed there for a while, basically running semi-connected ridges:










A view back north to Battleaxe Butte reminded us of last year’s trip:




Actually, the views all around were expansive. Including at the Highway 77 town of Kearny and the enormous Hayden copper smelter towers:










We thought we were on “The Hill” but couldn’t quite tell. And then we saw our descent switchbacks and realized that there wasn’t “a” hill, but instead a series:




We did the descent and started out on flatter terrain, only to look back and see why this hill was called “The."  From the south it stands out from everything around it:













Clouds continued to build as we hiked. It stayed (pleasantly) cold:




Food and water all around:




Distant rain:




Down one more wash and then up and out of it and… wow - nothing but flat desert ahead:













By now we were getting some spitting from the clouds. Rain jackets and crossed fingers. The hiking was pretty easy. We both wanted to finish the day over halfway through our milage. Neither of us wanted to get soaked though. The girls are close to waterproof and seemed happy just to be along:







Spitting turned to sprinkles and it was 6:00. Time to look for a place to bivy? Yeah. But all the plants in the desert seem mean (see also the first trip report in this series). What to do? Well, this isn’t virgin desert out here. Many years ago roads were carved for ranching, mining or other uses. And although most of these roads aren’t used now, scars remain and for our purposes, road scars are flat, sandy and brush-free:




It finally started to rain. Five minutes later we found just the right place for the night:







We mostly won the race between getting soaked and getting shelters set up….

[clink]

 I have been looking forward to resuming this trail with a degree of anticipation comparable to a high schooler heading off to basic training. Chest out, brain telling me that my soft ass is going to get a royal kicking.

 Beautiful and cruel country, this desert. Then there are Brad’s jokes, confirming my insanity(I repeated his cow pie joke to clients and other normal people upon my return to civilization).

 Brad texted me the lat and long of this year’s trailhead. So simple to poke the text with a finger and maps takes control of directions, finally I am starting the 14 hour drive about 22 hours before our set meeting time. A few of diversions and 3hours of sleep later I managed to arrive 30 minutes early, and fairly well packed.
My lats now descend into healthy love handles and it is a long drive.

 I will be there next year, despite many more than twelve steps to go.

 TBC-
 

[Brad Young]

Day Two:


It’s never fun to wake up with wet gear. But the gear had served its purpose; we all stayed dry and warm (except for condensation which can be considerable with one person and two dogs, or even in a bivy sack/mini-tent):













Although our stuff was damp, and so was the desert, the prediction was for “clearing.” The day’s hike promised to be quite nice:







Up and around a side hill and canyon (very pretty) before crossing under the huge power lines we’d been seeing for miles:
















A little supplementary breakfast on a knoll, and then… another eight miles of basically flat desert (with some downs and ups out of occasional washes):










Hiking through this area struck me as the desert equivalent of what we call “forest marching” on the PCT. More of the same and more of the same on the way to a goal (continuing to make milage on the trail). It isn’t very exciting, but it can be satisfying.

It’s a telltale sign of such hiking that a clump of boulders deserves a special name and designation on the map (“The Boulders”):










A break at the gas pipeline road:




Clearing now, we’re slowly stripping off layers:










We spot the trailhead and then Vicki (she's the little white dot, up and left from center):




And the dogs spot Vicki too:










We drop packs off at Jon's truck and walk another two-tenths to another road crossing and we’re done for the day. A very interesting 25 or so miles with very not-hot conditions. And the National Weather Service tells us that nice temperatures and clear skies are to come:

[Brad Young]

Day Three:


The themes for today’s hike were cholla (and cholla and cholla) and desert washes. We also finished the 70 or so miles in which The Grand Enchantment Trail is also the tread of The Arizona Trail, departing the more-used A.Z.T. for the last time.

As with lots of trail in this country, we started out hiking a section of road. In this case, toward Antelope Peak (which had been visible for much of yesterday’s hike and would be visible all the way through tomorrow’s):



















As we departed the road to circle around Antelope Peak, we started to encounter A.Z.T. hikers:







And cholla. I’ve never seen literal forests of cholla. But that’s what we hiked through for miles today:







We saw some of the largest “clumps” that I’ve ever seen too:







No shade for breaks:




It didn’t take long for us to leave Antelope Peak well behind (the subscript for this shot is "Seriously? Fix Your Ear"):




The Mount Lemon massif started dominating views to the south. Talk to any Tucson climber and Mount Lemon is a huge part of that community’s climbing. Lots of rock, lots of elevation, lots of mountains:




Map Check:







Soon we could see to and over Putnam Wash. The G.E.T. leaves the A.Z.T. in Putnam Wash and then follows it straight east to the San Pedro River and then the highway:










The wash sounded large and wide in the guidebook description. It definitely looked that way too on the ground. Here’s where we reached it:




Here’s how it walked:










More A.Z.T. hikers, upbound:




At this point, Jon told some fanciful tale to these innocents about me being his grandfather. I’m glad he thinks that I am so wise. But yeah, no-one’s gonna believe that story, gramps:




Reaching the A.Z.T./G.E.T. junction:




And more wash (six miles of walking in it altogether). Obviously, the wash is also used for driving too:






Conditions were dry and somewhat warm. But then we came around a corner and found a section where another large wash, Camp Grant Wash, joined Putnam and conditions were, for a while, gorgeous and wet (definitely the dogs’ favorite part of today’s hike):



















The water-flow slowly turned to a trickle, then dampness and then dry again. We entered a narrower part of the wash:










Shade now, and cooler rocks:










And then the wash opened up fully. We could see the railroad bridge, greenery along the river, the area of the highway, and clear across that to the other side of the canyon:










Some circuitous walking to avoid crossing private property, and we arrived at the San Pedro “River.” Perhaps I should be nicer to the feature, it does flood heavily at times. But it didn’t seem like much of a river today:







The difficult part of this day’s hike came next. Along the river for almost a mile, mostly not sure if we were doing anything other than heading in about the right direction. Then over a steep and loose embankment guided by dead reckoning and squirming through barely clear paths to a point where we could move over public lands to a public road (and then take that to the highway and the end of Section 6):










The last of our water:




The hour was getting late:







Vicki was staying in a small RV park/campground located one quarter mile across Highway 77. We arrived with plenty of light left, but not much energy:







Dinner and visiting made up the rest of a very pleasant evening:

[Brad Young]

Day Four:



Today’s walk promises to be the last of the open, low desert for a while (it ends at the start of Aravaipa Canyon, said to be one of the prettiest hikes in Arizona). We begin from the campground, directly onto paved Aravaipa Road (it’s pronounced by locals: “era-vipe-ah”). We walked along this for two miles:










The next “trail” section is two miles of lightly-used dirt roads on state property:










Brandenberg Peak is visible the whole day. The hike will end under its south side:




Antelope Peak from yesterday:




Eventually we leave the old roads and enter a wash. It’s a pretty narrow wash, but it was also clearly used for driving at one time:










Temperatures climb:







The Grand Enchantment Trail follows an old road up this wash and then out of it. The old road then crosses several sub-washes as it works up to a shoulder of Brandenberg Peak. And maybe a better phrase is faint remnants of an ancient road, since whatever was here (in the 1940s or 50s??) is long, long gone now.

Here’s the first exit from the wash onto the ancient road - there’s a five foot(!!) difference in elevation now between the bottom of the wash and the remnant of road bed:







At least these scars of old roads make for brush-free passages:







The girls find water puddles just about anywhere. They then get wet and (why?) try to shake off all the water:




In and out of washes, all with massively eroded old remnants of road:













Lots of old ranching equipment near Carrico Spring tell us that someone, some time, tried to make this cattle country. It’s hard to understand though how a person could make a living in such marginal conditions while spending money on huge steel water-traps, piping and road construction (and obviously, eventually someone was not able to make a living - it's all abandoned now):













More semi roads in and out of washes:




This large tortoise shell is now completely hollow:




We’re soon able to see the last of the old road, where it climbs steeply onto a shoulder of Brandenberg:







Looking back down, over the ascent wash:




Now on the highest ridge of the hike:










What seems like a rare “built” section of Grand Enchantment Trail followed. This linked the ridge to the small wash below it:







Big cliffs lined the southwest side of the peak:




A rare and really horrible incident occurred while the four of us were making our way down the section of trail. Digby had the worst cholla incident I’ve ever seen. As happens once in a while, she got a big clump stuck on her leg. But before Jon or I could get to her, she’d bitten it to try to get it off and now had a table grape-size clump of very spiny cholla imbedded inside her mouth, under her tongue and in her lips. Jon and I spent more than 20 minutes holding and fighting her while I tweezered the shit out spine by goddamn spine.

None of us enjoyed this and for obvious reasons we have no photos to share.

The built trail led to a very pleasant, easy-walking wash:










And this led shortly to Aravaipa Road:










The G.E.T. then passes up this road, getting into increasingly beautiful country for an additional three miles:













Both of us humans were captivated by this paving-block section of road:







The girls had one chance to get into the creek:







Soon, Vicki came up on us on her drive to the end of the road and the trailhead. Both girls had had it with the hot-on-the-feet dirt road by this point and accepted a ride immediately when offered:




   


We passed under this rock formation, seemingly untouched and waiting for a climber with Pinnacles or Pinnacles-like experience to do its first ascent:




The road, and this trip, ended then at the Aravaipa Canyon Trailhead. The next 12 miles of “trail” are walking the distance up that canyon, along a wonderful creek, between massive cliffs; again, reputedly one of the prettiest hikes in the state. This is a hike that is so popular that entry is by a very strictly enforced permit system - 20 entries from the east and 30 from the west each day. And while we had a permit, it was for February, and not March, meant for the trip that we cut short when I got whacked when a hold broke in Joshua Tree:
















Here’s the official BLM web site for Aravaipa Canyon(with example photos):

https://www.blm.gov/visit/aravaipa-canyon-wilderness

So, for next year: Aravaipa Canyon here we come.