Rain
Monday, January 24th, 2022: Hikes, Mogollon Mountains, Rain, Southwest New Mexico.
Distractions at home have been preventing me from reaching my weekly target levels of hiking, and last Sunday’s hike, on an unfamiliar trail near the heart of the wilderness, didn’t provide the elevation gain I needed. So this Sunday I was looking for something that was still relatively low-elevation – to avoid deep snow – but with a lot more elevation gain. I decided to revisit my favorite trail over on the west side. It’s a hard trail, but if I could make it far enough, it would yield over 4,000′ of gain.
The day’s forecast was partly cloudy, with no precipitation, and a high in town of 46 degrees – a little colder than we’ve been having recently. The rest of the week was forecast to be clear – sadly for our drought, no rain or snow on the horizon.
Those partial clouds were moving over from the southeast as I started down the trailhead into the canyon of the first creek. And surprisingly, I could see some serious snow clouds several miles to the south.
Given the forecast, I’d dressed for cold but not for rain or snow. And given our mild winter so far, I’d forgotten the lifelong lesson that weather in mountains is unpredictable. But the sky over the canyon ahead was still mostly clear.
What worried me more, initially, was the roar of the creek. I wondered what the crossing would be like. When I got all the way down the rocky trail, I was able to find a couple sticks and some partly-submerged stepping stones that managed to keep the icy water off the uppers of my boots.
The first thing I found heading up the steep, shaded trail on the other side was a dusting of sleet, apparently from last night. And as I climbed the 1,400′ slope to the peak of the rolling plateau, I could see snow clouds moving over the head of the canyon and dropping snow that gradually hid the high ridges beyond. I was still hoping the weather would avoid me, but I figured I was now in for an unusually cold hike.
The next thing I found, as I approached the peak, was another swath of vegetation butchered by the backcountry horsemen in the name of trail clearing. Since this trail had already been cleared by previous volunteers and was in good shape the last time I’d been here, I could now see that what they were doing was selecting cleared trails and widening them into wilderness super highways.
As I started across the rolling plateau that fills the divide between two major creeks, I could see snow clouds and falling snow hiding peaks and ridges all over the mountains, from north to south. And I saw how the backcountry horsemen had left, in many places, a nearly continous berm of slash piles beside the trail that would act as fuel for future wildfires, channeling fire along trail corridors, allowing it to move freely for long distances through the mountains.
Particularly sad was how they targeted beargrass and yucca, beautiful native plants that apparently scratch their horses’ legs – so they chop them to the ground wherever they can, far back from the trail.
When I finally reached the last saddle above the canyon of the next creek, cloud cover was complete, but I’d still only encountered very sparse flurries. The initial hike led through some 6″-8″ snow drifted in the narrow drainage at the head of the descent, which began dampening my boots, which I’d learned were not waterproof. But my feet were still keeping warm. I eventually moved out of the snow-covered drainage onto the steep, seemingly interminable, rocky switchbacks that led more than a thousand vertical feet down to the tall ponderosa forest of the creek’s tall banks.
The horsemen hadn’t worked the switchbacks – there was already a broad clear corridor in that stretch of trail – but they’d clear-cut the dense creekside willows at the crossing. Unfortunately, with the creek swollen from snowmelt, there were no stepping stones for hikers at the crossing, and I had to work my way up the remaining willow thicket about a hundred feet to find a crossing point.
I still had an hour before I had to turn back, and I assumed, from their note on the trail log, that the horsemen had cleared the stretch of trail up the other side of the canyon. This was the only stretch that previously had some hard to follow stretches that slowed me down a little. Maybe I could get farther now – maybe even make it to the third creek?
But as I started up the trail, which alternated between dense bunchgrasses, steep rocky slopes, and thickets of oak and mountain mahogany, large flakes of snow began to shower down in earnest. I kept pushing and found, again, broad corridors where the horsemen had clear-cut living shrubs and piled them alongside the trail. They hadn’t improved navigability for hikers at all, and they continued to target yucca and beargrass, ignoring deadfall in favor of killing living plants.
My time was up when I reached the saddle above the next creek. No matter, I was content to turn back because I knew my elevation total for the day would be good.
The snow gradually ended as I worked my way back toward the second creek, but now I had a new problem. The snow had melted on all the bunchgrass in the trail, and my heavy canvas pants were getting soaked. I had lightweight thermal bottoms in my pack, but the temperature was still only a little above freezing, and I hated to stop and take the wet boots and pants off to put them on.
My feet were now wet inside the boots, and I knew that eventually I’d have to change into the spare pair of wool socks in my pack. Fortunately my hands stayed dry and warm inside my wool glove liners. I made it back down to the creek, bushwhacked to my crossing point, crossed easily, and headed up the endless switchbacks on the other side of the canyon, hoping the climb would generate enough body heat to keep my extremities warm, maybe even enough to dry out my heavily soaked pants a little.
That climb is normally the hardest part of this trail, but a positive mental attitude made it manageable until I reached the narrow, congested, snow-drifted drainage near the top. It was snowing again, my wet legs were freezing, and my wet toes were starting to burn, so I stopped in the snow of a level stretch of trail in the dense riparian forest. I laid out my thin plastic tarp across the snow as a changing area and began to undress from the waist down. My camera was in its holster on my belt, so I moved it to the pocket of my shell jacket. I had to take off my gloves to untie the double-tied boot laces, and by the time I’d finished working with the wet laces, my fingers were burning with cold – always a scary thing, because it takes so long to warm them up again, and I was not sure I could even do that in these damp, near-freezing conditions.
But there in the dark, snowy forest, with fumbling fingers I managed to get my pants off, pull on the thermal bottoms and wool socks, force my legs back into the soaked pants and my now dry-socked feet back into the soaked boots, and double-tie the boots yet again.
I immediately pulled the glove liners back on, and with difficulty yanked my heavy Goretex ski gloves on top. Packing the wet tarp in a plastic bag I bring for emergencies, I continued up through the deep snow of the narrow drainage, flexing my burning fingers and toes constantly to improve circulation and maybe return some heat into them.
My toes warmed up fairly quickly, but I had to keep flexing my burning fingers continuously for another 45 minutes as I climbed to the saddle, dropped hundreds of feet into the next hollow, and again climbed hundreds of feet up the next rise of the plateau, where I was surrounded by a dense cloud that hid the surrouding forest, canyons, and mountains, with snow falling continuously.
All but one of my fingers had finally warmed up, with feeling returning so I could use them normally, when I reached a stretch where the horsemen had left a slash pile right on the trail. I figured I would get another picture of it, and discovered my camera was gone. Christ! What was happening to me? Was I losing my mind, or was I under some sort of curse?
I was sure I’d taken it out of the holster when I’d stopped to change, putting it in my jacket pocket. I was sure I’d scanned the ground around the trail after changing and shouldering my pack to leave that spot, to make sure I hadn’t left anything. I thought I remembered seeing nothing there that I’d left behind. I even checked my pack, but the camera wasn’t there.
The jacket pocket was recessed enough that I couldn’t imagine the camera falling out by itself, unless I’d taken a big fall, which I hadn’t. I’d simply lost my camera – this camera that I’d bought last summer, after weeks of searching, to replace the identical model which I’d dropped so many times it’d stopped working. I’d been developing a new protocol to protect the new camera, getting the holster for warmer conditions, training myself to use the wrist strap whenever I took it out to carry, moving it to the jacket pocket when the weather got cold. As much as I hated giving it up, I thought I could probably buy yet another replacement. Going back to find it, after suffering so much from the cold, having to climb all those hundreds of feet again on some of the worst stretches of trail, seemed inconceivable. And the extra time spent retracing my steps would mean finishing the last mile or two of the hike back to the vehicle in the dark – maybe even having to recross the creek in the dark. So I continued on the winding trail across the long brushy rise.
It was only a hundred yards farther that I realized I hadn’t only lost my camera – I’d lost the photos I’d taken so far that day. That was the last straw. Damn it, I would just have to go back and try to find that camera.
The thermal bottoms and wool socks had done the trick – although still wet, my legs and toes were now warm enough, as long as I kept moving. The middle finger on my right hand still had no feeling, but by the time I reached the bottom of the deep hollow, after an hour of continually flexing my fingers, feeling finally returned to that finger and all was copacetic.
Crossing that hollow, I suddenly remembered that the thin wrist strap of my camera usually hung out of the jacket pocket, and occasionally caught on passing branches. Whenever that happened, I would feel it – it would usually bring me to a stop until I disengaged the strap from the branch. But maybe I hadn’t left the camera in the snow of that drainage – maybe a branch had pulled it out of the pocket somehow, without me noticing?
The climb out of that hollow to the last saddle is the hardest part of this trail to follow – blocked often by major deadfall, deeply eroded, with many informal, unmarked detours. Heading up it, I remembered a steep passage where the old trail is completely blocked with a fallen dead tree with all its branches intact. When you’re ascending, the way around it – through a steep, narrow gap in vegetation – is fairly clear. But descending from above, you always end up on the old trail and have to clamber through the limbs of the fallen tree to reach the detour. That would be the logical place for a branch to grab my camera.
When I reached that spot, 2/3 of the way up to the saddle, I first saw the fallen tree blocking the old trail on my left. Then I peered into the shadows of the narrow detour, where I saw my camera, hanging against a rock, suspended from an almost impossibly delicate branch.
The glass display had been scratched in several places, and the edges of the metal body had been nicked from swinging against the rocks as it was pulled out of my pocket, but the camera still turned on. The display itself now had a jagged black line of missing pixels down the left side, but otherwise it functioned normally. And best of all, I didn’t have to continue climbing to the saddle and down through the snow of the other side.
I resumed the hike with fresh energy. My new camera protocol had been an experiment, and now I had information that would help me improve it. The camera was still just a tool – like my car, my computer, my power saw. It wasn’t the purpose of my adventures – it was just something to help document those adventures. I would never mold my behavior significantly around it – I just had to take reasonable care of it.
One thing that makes this my favorite trail is the views from the rolling plateau. The snow had finally stopped, but as I recrossed it, the entire landscape round me was hidden under clouds. Storm clouds had spread across the west and I could barely tell where the sun was in its descent to the horizon.
Hidden though it might be, the sun was clearly setting by the time I started down the switchbacks into the first canyon. There was just enough light left to cross the creek, and then on the final ascent to the trailhead on the mesa, I tested my night vision as long as I could, finally strapping on my headlamp for the last extra-rocky stretch.
The road down the red clay surface of the mesa, which had been frozen in the morning, had turned to wet cement during the day, and raised a deafening splatter against the underside of my vehicle. I switched into 4wd low to avoid sliding off. And my fingers, on the steering wheel, became numb yet again.
This is something that’s been happening occasionally, for as long as I can remember. There’s nothing I can do about it, but it gradually fades away over a half hour or so. After the scary incident on the hike, I began wondering if the occasional numbness could be related to the sensation I feel when my fingers or toes get cold. Other people say their extremities get numb when cold, but mine burn as if they were on fire. It’s really scary – I’m always convinced I’ll get frostbite and lose my fingers – and I have to work really hard to get rid of it.
So I looked it up when I got home, and discovered, after all these years, that I have an authentic medical condition called Raynaud’s disease, or syndrome, or phenomenon. It’s rare and the cause is unknown to science. It simply means that the blood vessels in your extremities contract in response to cold or stress, cutting off the blood supply and causing numbness or pain. There are no effective treatments – you just need to try to avoid stress and cold temperatures. As if!
Monday, July 25th, 2022: Hikes, Mogollon Mountains, Rain, Southwest New Mexico.
I always assumed this is my favorite hike because of the views – especially the view of the first canyon, lined with spectacular rock formations. And because it takes me to a place that feels remote, wild, liberated from the cramped, petty world of men.
But today, on my return hike, I realized that one reason why it feels so remote, is that the route passes through a dozen distinct habitats, topographically different and memorable places, each of which is like a chapter in the story.
I didn’t photograph all of these places today, since I’ve photographed them all abundantly many times before on previous hikes. Like it or not, this dispatch is more textual than visual.
I’ve also noted, after previous hikes, that this is one of the most difficult hikes I do. Since I’m currently weakened, recovering from illness, I didn’t know how far I would get. The hardest part is the climb out of the second canyon. Before tackling this trail, I mostly stuck to peak hikes, where you do all the work on the morning ascent and are rewarded by an easier afternoon descent. It still surprises me that I’m willing to descend that brutally steep and rocky trail early in the day, knowing I’ll have to climb back up it later, when the day is potentially hotter.
Our monsoon seemed to be returning after a hiatus, but this morning was still clear, sunny, and hot. I wore my waterproof boots and carried the waterproof hunting pants in my pack, hoping to get some rain later, but I was already drenched with sweat within the first mile.
Like other trails on the west side of our wilderness, this one starts by descending into a canyon, traversing down its west wall for about a mile up canyon. These canyons have steeper walls than most – sheer cliffs in some places – and the mostly exposed traverse through pinyon, juniper, and scrub oak forms the first chapter of the hike. As you traverse up canyon and descend toward the creek, more of the view ahead is revealed.
At the bottom you enter the riparian forest, with ponderosa pine forming the canopy and dense scrub willow lining the creek. In this very narrow canyon there’s no floodplain, and after crossing on stepping stones to the east bank, the trail continues upstream through the lush riparian forest for another third of a mile.
The third chapter consists of the thousand-foot climb up the eastern wall of the canyon, on a series of long switchbacks that progressively reveal more and more of the spectacular rock formations farther up the canyon. The slope above and below the switchbacks is often sheer, so the view is vertiginous.
At the top of the switchbacks, the trail cuts east into a shallow hanging valley lined with evocative rock formations. In pinyon-juniper-oak forest again, you work your way up to the head of this hidden valley, where finally you emerge onto a sort sort of saddle with a small rocky peak looming above.
The climb to that peak, on dozens of short switchbacks in loose rock at an average grade of 30%, is one of the hardest parts of the hike. Fortunately, it’s only 400 vertical feet! But when you get up there you have the most expansive views of the entire route: north to the crest of the range, east to the heart of the wilderness, west to the mountains of Arizona. This little peak forms the western edge of the rolling plateau you cross to reach the second canyon.
But even this central plateau is divided into distinct, memorable chapters. First, the long, mostly level walk on a surface of shattered white rock, winding between low scrub oak and manzanita and open patches of short ponderosa, mostly exposed with 360 degree views, feeling like you’re up in the sky although the elevation is only 7,200′.
Then you descend on ledges into a hidden valley, a couple hundred feet deep, where you cross a long patch of soft red soil, enter a dense ponderosa forest, and eventually begin climbing up a chaotic, deeply eroded slope which forms the next, and ugliest chapter of the hike.
That slope takes you to the rim of the second canyon, where you face the impossibly steep wall of Lookout Mountain, a long, nearly level ridge whose western wall consists mostly of 2,000′ tall talus slopes.
From this trail, Lookout Mountain is your theatrical backdrop as you begin to descend more than a thousand feet, in stages, into the second canyon.
The first stage is down the gully of a dry, vegetation-choked hanging drainage that you can’t see out of. This gets tighter and tighter, finally leading to a patch of shady mixed-conifer forest with such a shallow slope that it feels like a plateau.
The trail skirts this ledge and begins the final descent into the second canyon, which you dread, knowing you’ll have to climb up it on the way back. This part of the trail consists of loose rock with an average grade of 30%, zigzagging back and forth through a mixture of scrub oak and ponderosa along which you judge your progress by peeking through gaps in the forest at the wall of Lookout Mountain across the canyon.
Finally, again peering down through gaps in the forest and scrub, you spot more level ground below – the shady pine and fir forest above the elevated floodplain of the second creek. This is a huge relief!
That forest steps its way down to the grassy meadows of the elevated floodplain, where Lookout Mountain looms above at its full 2,000′ height, and you can barely hear the creek flowing below.
The trail continues steeply down to the willow thicket lining the creek. I was so hot and sweaty at this point I was looking forward to stripping down and taking a dip, but the wide creek is too shallow at this point, and when I took off my boots and socks, I realized that I had to keep the biomechanical tape and felt on my left foot and ankle – I’d need them on the return hike, and I wasn’t carrying spares. So all I could do was soak and rinse out my sweat-drenched hat and shirt and hope those would cool me a little.
Plus, monsoon clouds had been gradually building over the wilderness, stirring up cool breezes over the creek. So I spent the better part of an hour creekside, vowing to add spare tape and felt to my pack so I could immerse myself on future hot-weather hikes.
By the time I faced the brutal climb out of the second canyon, clouds had extended over it, giving me welcome shade. But in my compromised physical condition, it was still brutal and seemed to take forever – up the precipitous, rocky, seemingly endless switchbacks, up the claustrophobic, vegetation-choked drainage, and on the final climb in loose dirt at a 40% grade to the saddle at the top, where you face the steep descent on the chaotic eroded slope into the shallow hidden valley. Reaching that saddle felt like a major step forward in my recovery! I might not be able to hike as fast as I could a few months ago, but I could plod my way up the steepest slopes.
From there on, I had alternating sunlight and cloud shadow. Hoping for rain, all I got was occasional breezes and the sound of distant thunder from the east.
After crossing the plateau of white rock and scrub, I reached the little peak with the expansive view west, where I could see storms forming far away. Down another steep slope in loose rock, and out the hanging valley to the start of the switchbacks that descend back into the first canyon. It was a long descent, getting hotter the closer I got to the creek, simply due to reduction in elevation and the hothouse microclimate of the narrow canyon bottom.
The final traverse out of the first canyon seemed especially hot and endless. It wasn’t until an hour later, as I drove up the hill entering town, that I finally encountered rain, and by the time I got home it was a downpour.
The Rainbow at the End of the Swimming Hole
Monday, September 19th, 2022: Hikes, Mogollon Mountains, Rain, Southwest New Mexico.
I wasn’t looking for a swimming hole. And I certainly wasn’t looking for a rainbow. I wasn’t even that excited about going for a hike, although I knew it would be good for me.
The night before, I’d pretty much decided to do my old favorite nearby trail, but it’d been less than two months since I’d last hiked it, hence my lack of enthusiasm.
The day was supposed to be partly cloudy, with rain possible in the evening, and there would be creek crossings. So I had to wear my waterproof boots again, and pack my rain gear – as with every damn hike since late June.
It was cool enough in the morning that I had to wear a jacket, but I stopped halfway through the one-hour drive to take it off.
This is the hike that drops into the first canyon, crosses the creek, climbs 1,400′ on switchbacks to cross a rolling plateau, and finally drops 1,200′ into the second canyon. And although I think of it as my favorite nearby hike, it’s one of the hardest on my list, because of the several very steep, rocky sections that are especially brutal now with my reduced lung capacity.
Recent hikes had been fly-free, but they reappeared with a vengeance in the first canyon bottom, and kept swarming me all day, so I had to view everything through my head net. Fine, it in no way obstructs my vision, but it does get sweaty, and this was another sweaty day.
Unusually, there was another vehicle at the trailhead, a bashed-in Kia Soul from Wyoming all plastered with outdoorsy stickers. But the only tracks on the switchbacks out of the first canyon were from horses – the Wyoming visitor(s) had gone up the abandoned canyon trail.
The horses had been here some time ago, and I knew it had to be my nemeses, the shrub-and-tree-hacking Backcountry Horsemen.
One alternative I’ve long considered here is to bushwhack up the high ridge between the two canyons, instead of dropping into the second canyon. The ridge is steep and punctuated by dramatic rock formations and talus slopes, so it’s probably extremely challenging.
Crossing the plateau, I kept eyeing that ridge. It would give me great views, and a return hike that would be all downhill, as opposed to the brutal climb out of the second canyon.
But when I reached the decision point on the saddle overlooking the second canyon, I chose to go down. A guaranteed dip in the creek seemed a decent trade-off for the harder return.
The horsemen had gone crazy on the trail down into the second canyon. This trail had been clear of brush to begin with, so they’d widened it into a 10′-15′ clear-cut corridor. But there was nothing they could do about the loose rocks and 30% grade. Despite all the effort they’re putting into it, it appears to me that the only people using this trail are the equestrian trail crew and me.
The hike to the canyon bottom isn’t long enough for me, but the continuation up the other side is too long for a day hike, so by the time I reached the creek, I’d decided to give the old, abandoned trail up the canyon another try. Last summer, on a much hotter day, I’d gone about a half mile up and found a tiny, debris-filled swimming hole.
Today, I discovered the horsemen had hacked their way to that same place, then given up. So I used my bushwhacking skills to trace the old creek trail farther up, helped by occasional cairns and pink ribbons.
On the way, keeping track of the creek in gaps between trees, I noticed a possible swimming hole. And when the trail finally ended in a debris flow, I headed back there.
I’ve been to some great swimming holes, but this one has to make the all-time list. There isn’t a pool big enough to actually swim in, but it has bathing completely covered.
For over a hundred feet, the creek flows over bedrock – the ubiquitous white volcanic conglomerate – and over time, it has carved tublike hollows on its way down a gentle grade. The upper stretch is flat, then it pours over a little falls into the first pool, which leads into the second, which is bathtub-shaped and about 4-1/2′ deep. The overflow goes over another flat stretch and into a larger pool that’s at least 6′ deep.
When I stopped downstream in July, the water was barely cool, but now it’s actually cold! Too cold to stay in – probably in the mid-to-low 40s. This amazed me, since our night-time temps in town haven’t dipped below the high 50s yet. But the source of this creek is all above 9,000′.
After my first dip in the bathtub pool, I noticed there were fish in there. When spooked, they would spill over the flat stretch into the downstream pool, then shimmy their way back up.
I only stayed long enough to rinse my sweaty clothes and take a couple of icy dips, but when I started to dress I discovered my Raynaud’s syndrome had kicked in for the first time since last winter, and my fingers were yellowish-white, numb, and tingling, barely functional. And it was getting cooler in the canyon – the high fishscale clouds of morning had been underlaid by thunderstorm clouds which were spreading and casting occasional shade.
The one-mile climb out of the canyon was as bad as expected, and took an hour. Most of the way up, there was a voice in my head whispering “Just give up. Just lie down and die. This is not worth it.” This is the price you pay for the dip in a wilderness swimming hole. My fingers didn’t get back to normal until after I’d gone most of the way back up.
My right knee had been complaining on downhill stretches, so after re-crossing the plateau I strapped on my knee brace for the descent into the first canyon.
With my stop at the swimming hole, and especially with having to go slow on the steep sections, it’d ended up taking me 9-1/2 hours to go 14 miles, with 4,100′ of accumulated elevation gain. And there were more delays on the drive home.
I’d no sooner started driving the badly eroded ranch road down the mesa – with the sun lowering behind distant cloud layers toward Arizona – than I noticed a partial rainbow over the mountains to the south.
I could see rain obscuring the far south, where I was headed, and as I continued down the mesa, the partial rainbow acquired a faint double.
Where the road drops down off the mesa there’s a good spot for a scenic view of the river valley and the south end of the wilderness, so I pulled over and got out. And saw the whole rainbow, arching over the valley!
From then on, it was a show of clouds and light, even after dark, and I drove home through scattered showers. I got home way later than usual, for dinner and a shower, but it was worth it.
Monday, October 3rd, 2022: Hikes, Mogollon Mountains, Rain, Southwest New Mexico.
What a day.
When I got up in the morning, my two choices were to drive to Arizona for a hike that didn’t interest me, or to revisit a hike closer to home that I’d done only two months ago, and take a branching route that had never interested me. I chose the latter.
This was my third drive up the west side of the mountains in three weeks. Last week, I’d discovered there’d been catastrophic flooding on the west side that had taken out the canyon trails. Today’s trail didn’t follow a canyon, but the access road did cross the biggest creek in the range. I didn’t think the crossing would be a problem, because the creek had a very wide channel there, and the water level would be low enough for my vehicle by now.
Approaching the creek, the dirt access road enters a shady sycamore forest, emerging abruptly into the light to descend a steep bank into the creekbed. It’s a good thing I was driving slowly, because the road ended suddenly in a four-foot drop-off, and the creek, which had previously been about 15 feet wide, was now more than 60 feet wide. A huge amount of water had come down, recutting the whole broad channel. I assumed the ranch on the other side of the creek had another access road, because they weren’t going to be using this one for a while.
Nor was I. My choices of local hikes were rapidly diminishing, and it could be years before most of those trails were salvaged, if ever. I turned around and drove out to the mesa road, where I stopped to ponder my options to redeem this ill-fated day.
There was really only one that didn’t add a lot of driving. I could continue up the mesa and re-do the hike I’d done only two weeks earlier, that had ended at a swimming hole. I hated to repeat a hike I’d already done so recently. And it would involve a creek crossing that had surely been devastated by flooding, but at least the creek would now be low enough to cross.
And there was a possible way of putting a new spin on that hike.
The day had started clear and cool, but the forecast was for partly cloudy skies and a chance of rain in town, which meant I had to dress for rain in the mountains. Dark clouds were massing over them as I drove north to the next trailhead.
And at the bottom of the long traverse into the canyon, I began to glimpse fallen trees and a new debris flow in the bottom. The flood had pushed shattered trees way up the bank on each side.
I crossed the rushing creek and found a logjam hanging six feet above the current creek level on the other side – that’s how high the flood had reached here.
Drifting clouds kept changing the landscape from sunlight to shadow as I climbed the long switchbacks, turned into the long hanging valley, and trudged up the steep trail of loose rock to the little peak at the start of the rolling plateau. There, the broad vista of the western edge of the wilderness spread before me. But it was the ridge in the middle of that view that interested me.
As I continued east across the plateau, I had my eye on the series of rock outcrops and peaks that punctuated that ridge. For the past two years, on every hike along this trail, I’d dreamed of bushwhacking up that ridge. It seemed to offer views into the deep, rugged canyons on both sides, but it clearly had very steep sides, which would need to be traversed to bypass sheer cliffs, and some of those slopes included dangerous talus.
All summer, while recovering from my illness and finding my lung capacity reduced, I’d avoided the challenge of bushwhacking, while sticking to trails I believed to be in good shape. But today, I was finally in the proper mood. I’d made a false start and the day was too advanced to try one of my marathon trail hikes, so why not go exploring off trail?
The best approach to the ridge was hard to judge. The north edge of the plateau seemed to lead more or less directly up that ridge, but the lower part of it was densely forested, and that forest could hide a lot of arduous ups and downs.
Previously I’d assumed the best way up would be to follow the trail to the saddle above the next canyon, then turn left and bushwhack up a low ridge that seemed to lead directly to the higher ridge.
But now, after descending partway into the hollow below the saddle, I realized the trail would add a lot of distance that I might be able to avoid by taking a short cut from here, completely avoiding the saddle and its low ridge.
This did involve crossing an intervening gully, and traversing around a rocky bluff, but what surprised me was how quickly I could gain elevation when I didn’t have a trail to follow!
My lung capacity was still limited – I had to stop a lot to catch my breath – but for most of the hike to the ridge, I was just hiking straight up the slope, which varied between 30% and 45% grade. That gets you a lot of elevation, and some great views!
The rock underfoot was also rapidly changing, from pink to orange to white. I hadn’t thought about it much at the start, but one of those distinctive outcrops became my first milestone, and it turned out to be even more interesting than I’d expected.
Just before reaching the big outcrop, I came to a little ledge featuring a couple of wind-sculpted junipers – a dead one and a live one that offered enough shade for me to rest a while and enjoy a snack.
Afterwards, continuing toward the first peak of the ridge, I noticed what seemed to be a cave on the up side of the outcrop. Sure enough, some hiker in the distant past had stopped there, accumulating a pile of firewood that seemed excessive, considering no one else had reached this spot in ages.
The peak I reached afterward had some great views of storms developing over the region, but it was only a temporary stop. I had my eye on two little peaks higher up that blocked my way to the long “hogback” in the middle of the ridge, which bore an attractive fringe of tall ponderosas.
Unfortunately, the first of those two little peaks turned out to consist completely of talus – large, sharp, loose rocks – colonized by dense thickets. And while I was fighting my way through that, a light rain began to fall. Hanging to the branches of shrubs on that perilous talus, way up in the sky, I climbed precariously to within a few yards of the peak, then scouted a few dozen yards to left and right for an easier route around, only to conclude it was just too dangerous to continue.
My way up the ridge was blocked.
I hadn’t gained the desired view into the big canyon to the north, but I wasn’t really disappointed to turn back. I’d bushwhacked over a mile on steep slopes, climbing a thousand feet above the trail, discovering a shelter cave. Not too shabby for an old guy recovering from a long hospitalization.
As I scanned the landscape around me, I noticed a flash of white farther down the ridge – it was a white-tail deer bounding from rock to rock, mostly hidden behind tall scrub oak. I was really surprised to see it atop this steep, rocky ridge – not typical deer habitat.
I fought my way down to the rise above the rock outcrop, and paused for a few minutes to consider my return route. The way I’d come up was known, but there was also the possible route to my right, down the arcing extension of the ridge I stood on, which seemed to connect to the rolling plateau in an area of dense forest and shrubs whose topography was unclear. It was a hard choice, but in the end my mood spurred me into the unknown.
The first part of it, down an open slope of grass and low shrubs, went incredibly quickly – I could even run down in some places. But when I reached the trees, it got more complicated.
I somehow managed to avoid gullies, but near the bottom, I found myself in open forest blocked by a maze of scrub oak, mountain mahogany, and manzanita that I just had to push through for a long distance, trying to hang onto my sense of direction to avoid missing the plateau.
Hence it was a big relief when the shrubs suddenly opened ahead of me, revealing a cairn and the plateau trail.
Clouds were still moving all over the landscape, alternately threatening rain or highlighting slopes and rock formations, as I returned across the plateau. And the flies, which had deserted me up on the high ridge, began to swarm me again.
About a third of the way down the switchbacks into the first canyon, some serious rain began to fall, but it cleared before I reached the bottom. And the climb out of the canyon to the trailhead, which usually finds me sore and exhausted, seemed a lot easier than usual.
I couldn’t remember a recent hike that had made me this happy.
Monday, January 9th, 2023: Hikes, Mogollon Mountains, Rain, Southwest New Mexico.
Severe back pain had forced me to skip last Sunday’s hike, so I was eager to make up for it. But we’d also had more snow, and I knew the high elevations would have from one to two feet. In addition, warming temperatures would be adding a lot of snowmelt to the creeks, making crossings difficult or impossible.
I decided to return to my old favorite on the west side, the hike that crosses a canyon and a plateau before dropping into the second, bigger canyon. It tops out at about 7,200′, so any snow that hadn’t already melted should be manageable.
I knew the long ranch road up the mesa would be slow, with deep ruts, mud, and puddles in low spots. When it’s dry and graded you can get up to 50mph, but in winter or the monsoon it can be undriveable without 4WD. As I headed up in early morning the mud was mostly frozen, but it was the roughest and slowest I’d ever seen.
Still, the snow-covered crest of the range, ahead, drew me forward.
Approaching the trailhead, I spotted something red through the branches of a juniper, and a pickup truck appeared, with a tall guy loading some gear in the back. I got out and wished him a good morning while shouldering my pack. It was warm in the sun but I knew the canyon bottom would be shaded and below freezing, so I was wearing thermal bottoms and kept my storm shell on.
According to the trail log no one had been here for more than two weeks. Most visitors only venture a little over a mile to the first creek crossing. A few try the canyon trail beyond that, and even fewer continue up the switchbacks like I do.
On the way down into the first canyon I could hear the creek roaring, far below, but the sound of water is exaggerated in canyons, so I didn’t worry until I got a glimpse down into a bend, and involuntarily exclaimed. It looked flooded.
I always stop a half mile in to stretch, using that first half mile as a warmup. That’s where the other hiker caught up with me. He was in his early 20s and loaded for backpacking. I asked and he said he was planning to be out 3 or 4 nights, and as I guessed, he was headed for the big creek, the third canyon along this trail. We chatted a bit but he was anxious to move on.
Shortly after that, I got overheated and had to pack up my jacket.
When I reached the crossing, it was higher than I’d ever seen it – at least a foot deep, too high for my boots. But a trail crew had built a dam upstream, with flat rocks the ice-cold water was rushing over – a sort of submerged walkway for hikers. Without that, I would’ve had to give up on this hike.
When researching my waterproof boots and gaiters, I’d read a review by a hunting guide who said they’d kept his feet dry after months of running through creeks. I couldn’t run across this creek – it was at least 12 feet wide and the bottom was lined with big loose rocks. But I’d find out how good my gear was at keeping my feet dry across that dam.
The rock dam was loose and precarious, but steadying myself with a couple of sticks from along the bank, I made it across. The current had driven the water inside the gaiters and about 5 inches up my boots – another couple inches and they would’ve been swamped. But my feet remained dry inside.
It was really cold in that dark canyon bottom, but I knew climbing the switchbacks would warm me up and dry out my boots.
Past the crossing there’s a branch trail that goes up the canyon, requiring many more creek crossings. Continuing on the main trail I followed the young backpacker’s tracks onto the switchbacks, noticing another large footprint that was over a week old. The climb to the plateau is in two main parts – the switchbacks out of the first canyon that gain about a thousand feet, then beyond the ridgetop, the very steep, rocky section that climbs the remaining 400′ to the little peak at the western edge of the plateau. That’s where I found the first snow, and the backpacker’s tracks disappeared.
What the hell? I backtracked and tried to find where he’d turned off, but the ground was too rocky to hold sign. So I continued onto untracked snow, and wondered what he was up to. There’s really no place to go from that peak, other than on the trail. It’s atop a band of rimrock, the uppermost of several layers that continue all the way down to the third canyon. If he was trying a shortcut to the third canyon, he’d have to circumvent cliffs a hundred feet tall, ending up stuck in a maze of box canyons and brush all day, and be lucky to even reach the creek by nightfall, with the trail another mile or two upstream past several more flooded crossings.
Crossing the plateau in the sun, I had to stop yet again to take off my thermal bottoms, and eventually my sweater. I saw the two-week-old footprint there in thawing patches of dirt, but by the time I’d crossed the valley at the east end of the plateau and climbed to the saddle above the second canyon, his footprints had disappeared. I was the first hiker in a long time to enter that second canyon, and as expected, the initial descent held the deepest snow I would find all day, so I had to put my gaiters back on. This was turning into a day with a lot of stops!
Despite the initial snow, the steep descent went quickly. I kept my gaiters on because I was hoping to use them to cross the next creek. But I should’ve known better.
The second creek drains a much bigger watershed, and was running at twice the volume of the first creek. I scouted upstream, where it gets rockier, but couldn’t find anyplace to cross without swamping at least one boot in ice-cold water.
Still, it was great to see and hear so much snowmelt barreling down! I climbed back up the bank and continued on the canyon trail, hoping to find a way across at the next crossing, a half mile upstream. But of course that was just as flooded.
Despite being stopped by the second creek, I was feeling pretty good. It was a beautiful day. I’d had to stop so many times, I wasn’t even trying to push myself – I was just enjoying my remote, wild surroundings. I wasn’t even daunted by the long, difficult climb back out of the canyon – I would just take it slow.
And a few hundred feet above the floodplain, I was relieved to meet the backpacker on his way down. “Where the hell did you go?” I exclaimed.
He laughed, looking a little embarrassed. “I just stopped on that little peak, to hang out for a while.” I cautioned him about the flooded creek, but he said he had sandals and didn’t mind getting wet. Again, he seemed anxious to keep going.
I continued to wonder why he would start a backpack by stopping for three hours, only two miles in. But when I reached that peak myself, and my phone suddenly registered a voicemail, I realized that he’d probably stopped because that was the only place in the area where he had a signal. He was probably doing business on his phone, or catching up with his girlfriend.
His nonchalance about crossing ice-cold creeks up to his knees was what really made me think. I realized that with my Reynaud’s syndrome I’ve become paranoid about getting my fingers and toes wet in cold weather. But my problem with creek crossings goes back farther, because with my chronic foot inflammation, I can no longer go barefoot, and need to use custom orthotics at all times. And sandals and water shoes are not made to accomodate orthotics.
I thought back to the primitive skills course I’d taken in my late 30s. We students all wore serious hiking boots on that 2-week backpack covering about 120 miles, but the three young instructors all wore sandals the whole time, while walking farther and carrying much more weight than we did. Ben, the youngest, wore flat leather “Jesus sandals” with no arch support, and I tried to emulate him afterward. That may have been what injured my foot to begin with and set off this condition.
Cody, another intern on that course, went on to become a prominent aboriginal skills instructor, and became famous for trekking all over northern Arizona, all year ’round, in a t-shirt, shorts, and bare feet. You people whose feet remain strong, and who can endure river crossings in snowmelt, don’t know how lucky you are!
That young backpacker became the hero of my day, setting out in January, embracing multiple crossings of the third snowmelt creek, which would be four times as big as the first. I wished I could do that, and gave serious thought to the waterproof, insulated socks that are now available. Surely my foot could tolerate short episodes in sandals with good arch support. Sure, it would mean a lot slower hikes, with all the changes of footwear and drying out of gear, but I might get over my fear of cold water.
My back pain had been on the edge of triggering all day – I’d had to maintain perfect posture, squatting instead of bending at the waist, being scrupulously mindful of the angle of my lower spine. And when I reached that little peak and began descending from the plateau, I developed a sharp pain in my right knee. It was the same knee I’d had trouble with a couple months ago, but this was different pain, probably sciatica from my back episode. I strapped on my knee brace, but that barely helped so I took a pain pill.
I could handle gentle slopes, but at every steep section I cried out involuntarily. I had to go really slow and keep my leg as stiff as possible. I was not looking forward to the creek crossing, but needed to get there before dark, and the sun was definitely setting.
Finally I reached the frigid canyon bottom and the creek crossing, which was even more flooded from the day’s snowmelt. To prepare for the possibility of slipping and falling in the water, I packed my warmest clothes and camera in a plastic bag inside my pack. I pulled on my lined Goretex ski gloves and gripped two stout sticks, and crossed the flooded rock dam with no problems.
But my problems weren’t over. Starting up the rocky trail, I simultaneously developed cramps in my left foot, right quad, and left hamstring, and it was all I could do to keep from falling over. After the cramps subsided a little, I dug a packet of electrolyte supplement out of my pack and mixed it with the last of my drinking water.
My knees were really tired at this point and I couldn’t keep the sharp pain from being triggered, even on this ascent, so from time to time I cried out involuntarily – it was like someone was pounding a nail into my knee. What a mess!
But the pain meds were doing their job – the pain had moved into my backbrain, and my forebrain believed it had been a wonderful hike. It was dark by the time I reached the vehicle, and I had to drive slow all the way down the chewed up mud of the ranch road.
I stopped at one point to retrieve a spare water bottle, and when I got out of the vehicle both legs cramped up again. What a day! After waiting another five or ten minutes for the cramps to subside, I finished off my water, resumed driving, got up to 40 mph, and then suddenly there were two huge cows right in front of me in the road. I slammed on the brakes, went into a skid, and they finally reacted, heaving awkwardly out of the way at the last minute in typical cow fashion.
Sound of first creek from about 700′ above: