Flagstaff to Pine Archives - Yeti Hikes

Arizona Trail Day 19: Pine

Yeti — Fri, 28 Oct 2022 19:20:03 +0000

12.2 miles
332.2 AZT mile marker

The wind continued all night, though slightly lessened in the morning. During the night there were small sticks and pine needles frequently falling and hitting my tent. I put my ear plugs in, but the tent was still blowing around quite a bit. I got some sleep but not a ton.

We packed up carefully in the wind, it was trying to blow my tent away taking it down. Then when we started hiking, about 0.1 miles past camp, the wind completely died. Apparently the valley we were in was some sort of wind tunnel since there was no wind to speak of the rest of the day. There weren’t tent sites past the valley though, so we just had to stay in the vortex.

I passed Breaks shortly after camp when we layered down from no longer having wind. The trail continued on below the Mogollon Rim, winding in and out to go around buttresses in the formation, sort of like at Bryce Canyon. There were ever changing views of the fantastic rim, along with a wide diversity of lush vegetation. The trail was mostly red dirt and rock which was far different from the days on the plateau. Some of the rock even reminded me of a layer that I like in the Grand Canyon, and I wondered if it was the same layer at this distance away.

The trail was being redone and alternated between brand new, work in progress with machinery still on it, and old and rocky. I saw the cutest little bulldozer I’ve ever seen. The new sections of the trail were nicely laid out and easy walking.

It got warm with less tree cover than on the plateau, but not warm enough to slow me down. I had town in my sights, and that is always a driver. After interminably long very shallow switchbacks, I arrived at the Pine trailhead, and did the short walk into the town of Pine.

I stopped at a brewery for lunch and a beer, and to use their slow WIFI, then did the rest of my chores in town including printing a copy of my ballot and mailing it in so I could still vote, even on the trail. One nice thing about WA. Everywhere there were elk around town grazing feet away in people’s front yards.

I met another hiker, Fire at the grocery store where I resupplied. He, Breaks, and I were waiting to meet a local who would be hosting us at her place since there isn’t good accommodations for hikers in town. While we were waiting, a car zoomed into the parking lot, and aggressively drove around it, spooling his turbo. Fire called the guy out when he walked into the store, and they almost got into a fight. The guy went into the store, came back out, went to his car, and grabbed a gun and started walking back towards Fire. Fire ran into the store, and the store called the police. The guy took off in the car.

Shortly after that, Shannon who was hosting us arrived and took us off to her house for the night. It was actually my first time in a vehicle since I started the trail. I was glad to be away from the store in case the guy came back. I’ve never seen someone actually pull a gun before.

We completed town chores at Shannon’s house, laundry and showers, and we cooked up dinners since we had access to a kitchen. I had a ribeye, potatoes, and asparagus. It was great to have some real home cooked food after being out here for almost 3 weeks.

I planned my next couple sections of trail since stove fuel is unusually hard to come by out here and different resupply options have pros and cons. I will wait a few days before making my next decision since I have some time. It’s nice to be in a normal house, but I’m also anxious to see what the trail has in store heading south since it is a brand new type of terrain south of the Colorado Plateau.

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Arizona Trail Day 18: Mogollon Rim

Yeti — Thu, 27 Oct 2022 19:20:03 +0000

22.5 miles
320 AZT mile marker

It got a little colder than I expected last night, with some frost in the open fields. I was walking to Breaks tent to make sure she was up when I scared up a herd of large elk. They weren’t very far away, but I didn’t have my camera at the ready. After they disappeared, I could still hear them bugling.

I took off before Breaks with a nice brief uphill to get me warm. It was the normal uneventful pine forest to start, but that would soon change. After 5 miles, I dropped down into a shallow valley and crossed an actual flowing stream! I wasn’t aware that so much flowing water was allowed in Arizona outside of the Grand Canyon basin.

After traversing some more forest, the trail dropped down into another valley, and followed another flowing stream. So much water. The trail crisscrossed it several times while following it upstream. There were even other feeder streams going into it. I’m not sure where all this water came from. Needless to say, I never carried more than a liter today apart from the last stretch to my dry camp.

It was so nice to have a change in scenery and some character to the land rather than the flat forest it seems like I’ve been walking through forever. But I knew that the best was yet to come.

I came to the edge of the Colorado Plateau and I stepped off it.

In this area, the Colorado Plateau is bounded by the Mogollon Rim, which is a huge escarpment marking the edge of where the plateau was uplifted. It is steep and rocky cliffs much like the Grand Canyon or other canyons in southern Utah.

I headed down a steep trail leading from the plateau with all sorts of new scenes opening up in front of me. I can’t describe how grateful I was to have this dramatic change in landscape. I was constantly taking pictures, probably more than the last few days from Flagstaff combined.

The vegetation also changed. It was like a verdant desert landscape. Almost the entire ground was covered in different plants and grasses. Such a change from just hundreds of feet up.

I moved more slowly now, taking everything in and thoroughly enjoying it. I love dramatic landscapes, so this really spoke to me.

It got a lot warmer too, approaching hot (for me). However, there was the now ever-present water running along the trail for me to grab when I wanted it.

After the trail went down the steep part of the rim, it started to traverse on an ancient route. It wove in, out, and around, giving me ever-changing views of the rim and flora in different microclimates that I passed through. Still lots of water too, maybe every mile or so. Some sources weren’t even marked in my guide.

I went along the rim for a few hours when it began to get cold and windy. The wind was coming down from the colder plateau above me. I came to the last water source of the day and got water for camp, but it was another couple miles before I could find a spot to pitch. IT was super windy in camp, with the wind roaring through the trees above me, and still quite powerful at ground level. I’m not sure how I got my tent up so easily.

As it was nearing dark, Breaks rolled in. I wasn’t expecting to see her since I thought she was going to camp sooner, but always nice to have company. However, we pretty much just set up camp and dove into our tents for cover to avoid the wind. So powerful. I think it will be and ear plugs kind of night tonight.

It was such a great day and welcome change in scenery. If the trail had continued on the same, I might have quit it out of boredom. I’m hopeful that the landscape wil be more dynamic now, and I’m excited to enter some desert landscapes soon.

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Arizona Trail Day 17: Flat Forest Continues

Yeti — Wed, 26 Oct 2022 19:20:03 +0000

21.9 miles
297.5 AZT mile marker

Nothing came of the glowing eyes at the pond overnight. There were a couple animal noises and a loud screeching near dawn (probably an owl), but the animals left me alone. There was a picked clean cow carcass less than 100 yards from my camp, but it wasn’t too recent.

It got below freezing last night, as evidenced by frost on grassy areas and icy trail, but it was not nearly as cold as the last 2 nights. After a nice partial sunrise from my camp, I tried to take off in just my normal hiking clothes, but had to stop shortly to put on a shell upper layer to protect from the wind.

There were a fair number of bones along the trail today. I saw far more remains of dead animals than live animals (just a few cows).

The trail was once again flat ponderosa forest, occasionally opening up to a flat meadow or juniper/pinyon. There was a lot of cow ponds around, but they were all disgustingly muddy and obviously get heavy cow activity. My cow pond water source from last night wasn’t too bad, so I carried a couple liters of water out from it. It was a cooler day, so that lasted me most of the day thankfully.

I’m getting pretty tired of the flat forest. There is just very little to see. It was nice at first, but after hundreds of miles of just trees, it got old a while back. I need some more scenery to break things up, and didn’t realize so much of the trail would be buried in forest. However, that should change tomorrow when I start my descent from the Colorado Plateau.

Much of today was just grinding out the miles due to the lack of scenery. It’s not what I’d prefer, but all trail isn’t magnificent.

As I was walking down the trail, I noticed something moving at my feet. It was a tarantula that had its front leg raised and was jumping at me, as if it meant to attack. It was obviously easily avoided, but it was pretty odd how aggressive the thing was. I took a step back and poked it a bit with my hiking pole as any human would but didn’t get much response. Apparently it just wanted me, not my pole.

Later in the day, the trail dropped down into a shallow canyon, what a change! It was only about 100 feet deep and forested, but it was nice to be hiking down something different with more character. I was doing great on time because of the mile grind, so I took a good break in the canyon, and almost fell asleep on the pine needles in the warmth of the sun.

I hadn’t gotten water from any of the muddy cow ponds I had been passing, so I diverted slightly from the trail to stop by a ranger station and get some water. I also used the water to flush the dirt out of my filter, something that is often needed out here with the poor water quality. Then it was just a short hike to another closed down campground where I had planned to camp. The water was off, but it had a dumpster, unlocked privies, and I even found a campsite with a large pile of firewood! Needless to say, that was my campsite.

I got in a bit early at 4, but 22 miles was good enough for today, and there was a chance that Breaks was going to catch up with me here. Shortly before dark, she rolled in. We each have our own free sites, since why not? We own the campground tonight.

I made a good fire using the empty cardboard TP tubes in the privy and enjoyed the ambiance of the fire for dinner and the night. Also nice to journal to the firelight.

The lack of scenery has gotten me down, but that should drastically change tomorrow and I’m looking forward to that.

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Arizona Trail Day 16: Bargaman Park

Yeti — Tue, 25 Oct 2022 19:20:03 +0000

20.9 miles
275.6 AZT mile marker

It got cold last night, low 20s probably. It was also humid and we were in a valley that trapped the cold air and moisture, so that made it feel colder. I was warm enough in my bag without my insulating layers, but I still couldn’t sleep most of the night; probably because I slept well last night. Can’t have 2 in a row.

Breaks and I timed our packing so we were ready at the same time. I threw my puffy in my pack at the last minute and we took off. There was first a slight uphill which was nice to get us moving and warm. The trail wound through more pine forest. We lost it a couple times early today; once in a recent logging area with the trail obliterated and no flagging, and another time when we must have walked too far down a dirt road past a trail turnoff. We used our GPS to get back on track both times.

A few miles in, Breaks ducked off trail to go down to Mormon Lake to resupply. She thought it would only take an hour round trip, but we decided to meet further down the trail since I didn’t want to wait with it still being cold and there no much chance of drying my frozen tent with the sun still low.

I got water at a spring which was iced over. It took some effort and hitting the ice with a big stick to get it to crack. There was about ¾ inches of ice on the water which was surprising. I wasn’t expecting so much. I grabbed some ice water and continued down the trail.

The trail followed a couple old rail lines like yesterday, though they were not always as apparent. I saw some mule deer running away a couple different times. There was a lot of water around the trail in cow ponds and swamps, but I had enough nice spring water to skip it.

The trail was mostly just forest, and I booked it through and go to the cow pond Breaks and I had agreed to meet at. Right when I got there, she messaged me that she ran behind with her resupply and was 9 miles behind me. She wouldn’t be able to make it to where we had planned to camp for the night. She encouraged me to continue on since she was so behind.

It was still early afternoon, so after a long, relaxing and filling lunch by a cow pond, I continued on. I had plenty of time to finish my day, and took it easy, getting to the next cow pond at 4:30. The pond had reasonable clear looking water despite the ring of cow patties surrounding it and hoof marks in it. I wasn’t going to look too hard for cow patties in it. That’s what my filter is for.

There was a great campsite next to the pond in the trees with a tent wind break, plenty of flat spots, and a fire ring. There was even a bunch of nearby downed trees. Since I was early, I gathered some firewood and set a fire well before sunset to consume my supply and bask in the ambiance. This was my first fire of the trip since I don’t want to start a fire away from water and it takes effort at the end of a long day of backpacking. I really enjoyed the fire, especially since I’m solo tonight. I’m stuffed from lunch and dinner which is rare for me. I even have more lunch food I should have eaten and am behind on.

Tonight is not nearly as cold as the last 2 so far, and it’s not supposed to be as bad. I saw a bunch of glowing eyes at the pond right before I went to bed. No idea what they belong to and I didn’t hear any noises. Probably fine.

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Arizona Trail Day 15: Lake Mary

Yeti — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 19:20:03 +0000

21.8 miles

254.7 AZT mile marker

It was cold last night and I woke to frost on my tent, but it didn’t feel as cold as it was supposed to be. I slept pretty well and was warm enough without using my insulating layers, so I should have enough to stay warm this trip.

We camped on the edge of a mesa, before the pine trees gave way to more open terrain. It was definitely colder when we stepped out onto the mesa, so we made the right choice in staying in the trees.

The ground was still wet from the storm that passed in Flagstaff, but it was frozen solid allowing us to crunch over it. Otherwise it would have been a muddy mess.

We set out across the mesa where we would be for most of the day. We quickly came to a dry lake and had some good views back to the snowy San Francisco peaks, but we kept moving due to the temperature. I like to hike cold, which doesn’t allow me much room to stop sometimes or I would get too cold. With the temperature being around freezing, all I was wearing to hike were my normal clothes plus a shell and gloves.

We passed an observatory and saw a big herd of elk, running to get away from us. Shortly thereafter, there was the skeleton of an elk that had tried to jump one of the many cow fences and got its leg caught and died right there. There wasn’t much left of it. Too bad.

The day warmed up a little; it was probably in the 40s for much of the day. However, that turned out to be a bad thing. The formerly frozen trail turned to mud. Not squishy mud, but clay mud that stuck to our shoes. More stuck with each progressive step until there was a massive ball of mud we were dragging along on the bottom of our shoes. My shoes were able to shed the mud after it got big enough, but not so for Breaks; she had to constantly stop and manually clear off her shoes. It was definitely not an enjoyable part of the day.

There were 2 long stretches of trail that were bad with the mud, but thankfully it was not the whole day.

For a good part of the day, the trail followed an old railroad grade. Some of the old ties were still there which is unusual. It always amazes me the amount of work people put into some of these projects 100 years ago with a lot less of the machinery we have today. It must have been a ton of work to put the railroad together, and it was only used for a few years before it was abandoned when it became unprofitable.

We had a good long lunch break where we thawed and dried our tents, which is becoming an almost daily occurrence. As long as I can hop into a dry tent at night though, it’s all good.

We wound around Mormon Mountain at the end of the day and set up camp in a closed Forest Service campground. Though it is closed, there is one open privy and a dumpster which is luxurious. There is a flowing stream through the camp, which is bizarre out here, and one of the only flowing water sources I’ve seen out here. Nice to get water from that instead of a muddy cow pond.

We strategized on how to get to the next town before our food runs out and we came up with a plan.

It is cold in the camp, probably around freezing just at dusk. It should be another cold night; it feels like it will be colder than last night. We’ll see how it goes.

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Arizona Trail Day 14: Walnut Canyon

Yeti — Sun, 23 Oct 2022 19:20:03 +0000

11.8 miles

232.9 AZT mile marker

I slept the best since I’ve been on the trail last night, all through the night which was great and restorative. It stormed and was really windy during the night, and it was great to not be out in that. There was some hail a couple times in the morning, and the wind just kept howling.

I was meeting back up with Breaks to head out of town, but we were starting later in the day which would give the weather some time to clear out. We met for a late lunch at a beer and cocktail bar for some really good burgers before heading out around 2.

We had a little bit of road walking to get back to the trail but it went quickly and it gave us a chance to see the now much snowier San Francisco peaks.

We rejoined the AZT urban route and got back into the ever present ponderosa forest. It was the same as the other forests we’ve been travelling through, but when we came to the intersection with the full AZT again, we were in a rocky canyon with probably the best cliffs we had outside of the Grand Canyon. It was a cool place, and I was happy to get into something more scenic and be in a canyon again in this beautiful part of the country so famous for them.

We shortly climbed out of the canyon, unfortunately, and again wandered ponderosa forest, weaving back and forth. You would have thought we were going in circles from all of the flat switchbacks.

We decided to hike until nearly sunset to make up for the late start and to make a good water source reachable to camp at tomorrow night. Our packs were heavy today heading out of town with the food resupply and water for about a day. There isn’t much more than muddy cow ponds as water sources for a while, so I opted to just carry more good water out of town. I’m not against using that water since I have a settling agent to remove most of the sediment and a filter, but all of the hikers are finding that the filters need constant attention and backflushing to get rid of all the sediment that clogs the elements. It is a lot of work and not easy to do.

We got the last camp spot before heading onto a more open plateau, hoping that camping in the pines will provide some shelter and maybe help our tents not freeze with condensation. It is still a little windy and almost freezing before I’m even going to bed. It’s supposed to get to the low 20s tonight. We should be fine but you just have to be more conscious of not letting your water or water filter freeze up and crack on you.

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