Monday, August 28th, 2023
Sunday, April 16th, 2023: Black Range, Hikes, North Star, Southwest New Mexico.
Another warm, clear Sunday. I wasn’t sure if the snow had melted yet from my favorite high-elevation trails. But studying the map for the trail I’d aborted last Sunday, it looked like I might be able to use it to reach a 9,700 foot peak farther east. At almost 19 miles out-and-back it would be a long shot, depending on trail conditions and my endurance. But the map showed it as part of the CDT so I figured it would be in good condition.
On the drive east, a deer suddenly raced across the highway in front of me. Then another followed, slamming into the side of my vehicle. I slowed and pulled over, glancing in my rearview mirror. The deer that had hit my car was rolling on its back, kicking its legs. Then it jumped to its feet and ran off, following the first deer, as if nothing had happened. More deer followed, all racing across the highway in single file. It was like a lottery to see which of them would get hit. And it was only a little over a year since my last, and first, deer collision. Fortunately for me, there was little damage this time.
The first trail – shown on some maps as the “old CDT” – climbs almost 1,500 feet to a saddle where other trails branch off. Nearing the saddle I met an older couple with an off-leash dog. The dog barked hysterically at me, and as usual they struggled to leash and subdue it. I asked them if they were enjoying the hike, but they ignored me.
I had three choices at the junction. The left-hand branch was the branch I’d hiked last Sunday – from the opposite direction. Straight ahead a trail went down the drainage, and a sign marked it as the “New CDT”. Interesting. The right-hand branch I planned to take, shown on my map as the CDT, had faint tread traversing the slope, but whoever had put up the “New CDT” sign had blocked this trail with logs.
I started up it anyway, but it turned out to be a disaster. Frequently blocked by deadfall and blowdown, with many places where there was simply no sign of a trail. I continued as best I could, but after 3/4 of a mile I came to a broad, shallow valley where the trail completely disappeared. I cut for sign in a circle about 100 yards in diameter but found nothing. The trail shown on the map as the CDT simply didn’t exist on the ground.
So I returned to try the “New CDT”. It started okay – a couple had even gone down it before me – but it rapidly turned into an erosional gully with no sign of a trail. The farther down I went, the worse it got, turning into a debris flow choked with fallen logs. So this is the new CDT? Good luck, through hikers! Again, I fought my way 3/4 of a mile down before giving up and turning back.
I still had a couple hours left for hiking, so I decided to go up the left-hand branch a mile or so – the one I’d hiked last Sunday – just for the exercise.
Back home, I checked the official CDT website. They show the trail that no longer exists as the official route. This year’s crop of through hikers will likely be really confused. If they take the “New CDT” they’ll end up fighting their way down a flood-damaged canyon with no surviving trail, adding 15 miles and several days to their trip. I hope they’re carrying enough food!
Monday, April 24th, 2023: Chiricahuas, Greenhouse, Hikes, Southeast Arizona.
It was late April and I figured my favorite high-elevation trails would be sufficiently snow-free. But a combination of snowmelt flooding and blowdown in this windy season had left so many inaccessible. Plus, I was losing too much productive time to hiking and chores, so I needed to stay within the local area – leaving only one good option, the crest trail east of here.
The day was going to be warm but partly cloudy, and up on the crest it should be cool. Getting an early start, I drove 12 of the 40 miles east, only to be reminded that the highway over the range is closed – cracks in the roadway indicate a potential failure, our climate taking its toll on the works of man.
Another option, closer to town, would take me through exactly the same kind of terrain I’d been hiking all month. The early start meant I now had an on-time departure. So I decided to violate my better judgement and drive over to Arizona after all. I would decide on a hike once I got there.
To my dismay, when I entered the range, I found cars and people everywhere. But there was no turning back now, so I decided to take the most remote trail, which involved a very rough high-clearance 4wd drive up a rock-lined canyon. Hopefully that would discourage the riff-raff.
But I found two cars parked at the turnoff – hikers walking up the canyon since their vehicles wouldn’t handle it. And approaching the most difficult section, I saw a well-dressed, distinguished-looking older man, standing in the road ahead, staring and frowning at me. I smiled and waved, but he just kept frowning back, refusing to move. It was really hard to drive around him safely, but I smiled and waved again, while he kept staring and frowning.
I parked and started up the trail. After a quarter mile, I met a twenty-something guy coming down, carrying binoculars but without a pack. I asked if he’d gone to the waterfall, and he said he was looking for birds. Of course! All these people were birders, here for the big spring migration! That’s why the old guy in the road had been pissed at me. Birders treat everyone else as an obstacle in the way of their competitive obsession.
But this was good news for me – birders aren’t hikers, and would stay within a mile of their vehicles. I had the wilderness to myself.
The winter of pain and trail closures had weakened me, so I felt slower than usual. And even on the lower, eastern segment, our windy season had snapped living pines and firs that now blocked the trail.
Blowdowns continued when I reached the hanging canyon – our prevailing southwest winds funnel through here from the saddle above. And just below the crest, a 100-foot-tall fir had been snapped off right next to the historic Forest Service cabin. It was a miracle the log cabin hadn’t been crushed – the tree fell less than a foot from the corner. But its branches damaged the roof, which will need repairs in the next month or so to avoid water damage.
I’d been climbing with my shirt unbuttoned, but the saddle is a wind tunnel – when I reached the crest I encountered a bitter gale and had to pull on both my sweater and shell jacket. Clouds were building and casting cold shadows too. But I fought my way south – I thought I had just enough time to reach the saddle I’d hiked to six months ago, when our monsoon was transitioning to winter snowstorms.
The last stretch of trail was where I found the most remaining snow, plus more blowdown – and this is the rockiest part of the trail. In my weakened state, I’d been slipping, stumbling, and even falling a few times so far, narrowly avoiding injury. I found a couple of faint bootprints on the upper trails, but their treacherous condition is discouraging most hikers.
On the way back, I thought about how, through a combination of our ecological ignorance, hubris, and a changing climate, nature is systematically destroying the works of man. From the eastern highway to trails and a wilderness cabin, my whole day told the same story. And these aren’t skyscrapers and palaces we’re talking about – these are basic infrastructure even the most environmentally-conscious of us take for granted. Like it or not, none of it’s sustainable.
The descent was really hard on my knees – more evidence the long winter weakened me. I was hobbling by the time I reached the vehicle. And to add insult to injury, the birders were running the cafe staff ragged – I had to wait an hour for my order while they were deliberating over their fine wines. And they’d taken all the rooms at the lodge, even on a Sunday night. I had to drive all the way home in the dark, arriving exhausted at 10pm – having put in a 14-hour day to accomplish a 7-hour hike.
Monday, May 1st, 2023: Hikes, Mogollon Mountains, Rain, Southwest New Mexico.
Still trying to rebuild my strength and lung capacity after a frustrating winter, I planned to do a nearby hike on a trail I knew would be in good condition. But I’d seen road cyclists all over the area, and a last-minute check showed that the road I needed would be closed for our annual cycling race. So I fell back on my old favorite trail, an hour away on the west side of the mountains.
There was a brand-new city SUV, a Toyota Highlander, parked at the trailhead, and the trail log turned out to be unusually entertaining. On April 17, a party of two from Missouri had taken up four rows with an extended rant using a red pen that they’d obviously brought for situations just like this. According to the Missourians, the wilderness map shows a good trail here, but the trail is actually “very dangerous for backpackers” and “constantly giving out when you walk on it”. They reached the second creek, where another trail branches off, but found “the trail does NOT exist anymore for the past 50 years” and therefore they “tore off the sign”. Adding insult to their perceived injury, they found no Rainbows or Gila Trout in the creeks, and they admonished the Forest Service to “get out the trucks and start cutting some trails!!!”
The next log entry, a week later, simply said “Trail is great! Grow a pair of ovaries” with an arrow to the previous comment.
Shaking my head, I started down the trail into the first canyon. The Missouri rant was so over the top, I figured there was a good chance it was a prank. I’d made a prank entry myself last year after someone else had criticized the trail condition. This is a trail of contrasts – unlike most other trails in our wilderness, it’s been easy to follow and clear of overgrowth, deadfall, and blowdown throughout the three years I’ve been hiking it. But its route involves very steep ascents and descents that make it inherently the most challenging hike I do.
I knew it was going to be a hot day – record heat was forecast throughout the Southwest, with temps in the mid 80s in town. I already had my shirt unbuttoned before I reached the canyon bottom, where I expected the creek to be in flood – hence I’d worn my waterproof boots. I strapped on my gaiters just to be safe, but keeping my balance with a couple of handy sticks, I was able to use stepping stones without slipping or submerging my boots more than about two inches.
The trailhead log showed 18 visits in six months, and most of those were day hikes which typically end after only a mile, here at the first creek crossing. Even the backpackers often get no farther than the campsite less than a half mile upstream. But I was here for the full workout, as much as 17 miles out and back.
The flies started bugging me as soon as I began climbing the switchbacks and started to sweat, so on went the head net, which I kept lowering and raising as needed for the rest of the day.
Up on the rolling plateau between the first and second creeks, there’s enough loose dirt to read tracks. Equestrians had been up here months ago, but there was only one recent human track – some kind of sneaker. And at the west end of the plateau a dog – a big shepherd mix – appeared, barking, followed by a trail runner, a big girl who looked like a college student. She raced past me as I asked how far she’d gone – “to the West Fork!”. She was the Toyota driver, and I wondered if was her parents’ car – it would be a spoiled college student who owned a fancy new vehicle like that. Most surprisingly , I didn’t notice her carrying any kind of gear – she might’ve had a small water bottle in her hand, or not. I spent the rest of the hike marveling at someone who would run more than 11 miles on a trail with over 3,000′ of elevation gain, on one of the hottest days of the year, with no more than a liter of water – if any!
I was even more perplexed when I started down the rock-lined switchbacks into the canyon. I did three months of trail running in our Mojave Desert mountains back in 2002, when I was in peak condition, and I recall only being able to run up about 300′ of elevation gain on good trail before slowing to a fast walk. And when I reached steep, rocky sections I was definitely walking. This trail has two sections of switchbacks, each dropping/climbing 1,400′, with sharp, loose rocks underfoot for much of the way.
I simply didn’t think it would be possible for anyone to run either up or down those sections. It would be like running in a road with a dump truck ahead of you pouring a layer of bricks in your path. Crazy.
I reached the beautiful floodplain of the second creek and discovered the Missourians were not pranking after all – they’d not only torn off the old trail sign, they’d either stolen it or hidden it somewhere. This was even worse than expected. What kind of hiker destroys a trail sign?
I’d already known their excuse – “the trail does NOT exist anymore for the past 50 years” – was false, because I’d hiked that trail several times in the recent past, for over a mile upstream, to a beautiful swimming hole. I began to think hikers – and especially backpackers – should have to pass a test in order to qualify for using our trails. Apparently what’s happening is that in our age of social media and parents who assume schools will raise their kids for them, naive, ignorant, and poorly socialized young people have unlimited free access to unreliable information online, and conceive wilderness trips they’re completely unprepared for. And when the reality doesn’t match their preconceptions, they take it personally and lash out.
In this case, the result was sad, because those historic trail signs are not easily replaced. And I hold outfitters like REI partially accountable, because their products and photo spreads set false expectations for conditions in the burn scars that now cover much of our public lands.
Despite being in the midst of a heat wave, I decided to bypass the swimming hole and continue across the second creek, over a shoulder toward the third creek more than a mile and a half away, because that would yield a much better workout. The third creek is a little too far for a day hike, but I did get as far as I’ve ever gone before, to the edge of a cliff a couple hundred feet above the third creek. And I paid for it on my return.
I found no tracks other than wildlife on this stretch of trail – I’m the first hiker here in the past six months.
It was the last day of April, but it felt like mid-June. After turning back, I could tell that despite bringing four liters, my drinking water was running low. But there were two creek crossings on my return where I could refill if needed.
Starting up the switchbacks, I began to feel the strain on my body, and thought about that girl again. I was having to stop about every 50 feet to catch my breath, and my whole lower body was on fire. I figured she must’ve known in advance that this is one of our few trails that are clear of overgrowth and blowdown in our current fire/climate regime – how could you run in shorts through thorn thickets and fallen trees? But in general – what kind of human would run up and down a steep trail like this, on loose, sharp rocks, with little or no water? It still boggles my mind.
The climb took me over an hour, and I finally swallowed a pain pill while crossing the rolling plateau.
I ran out of drinking water on the descent into the first canyon, but I decided not to refill at the creek – the final ascent to the trailhead is only another mile in the shade.
The pill kicked in and I felt much better climbing out of the first canyon – although it still feels like it will never end. At 14 miles and 4,400 feet of elevation, this was the longest hike and biggest climb I’d done in the past six months! Hopefully it’s another step forward in the recovery of my lost capacity.
PS: Directly above the Missouri rant on the trail log, there was an entry from a party of four, an “RAF/NMPA Work Party” claiming to have spent 3 days on the trail. I found this curious since this party claimed to have been working on the trail at the same time as the Missourians’ bad experience, so I looked it up when I got home. Turns out RAF is the Recreational Aviation Foundation and NMPA is the New Mexico Pilots Association. These guys weren’t using or working on the trail – they were installing a porta-potty at a dirt airstrip which has recently been refurbished nearby. Since there’s no rural community near this remote location, the only reason for an airstrip is so airplane hobbyists can fly in and out, adding it to their life list.
And of course, the past history of this airstrip apparently includes plenty of use by drug smugglers from Mexico….
Monday, May 8th, 2023: Hikes, Pinos Altos Range, Southwest New Mexico.
Today I got to do the hike I planned last Sunday – 18 miles on good trail to rebuild my capacity. Only 20 minutes from town so I can get an earlier start and have more time to hike.
The first stretch is two miles on a primitive road, crossing and re-crossing a perennial creek below rock cliffs and pinnacles. I usually run into others in the first mile, and today was no exception – I met two birders from New England a quarter mile in. They’d already seen new warblers and were really excited. I encouraged them to continue to the narrows, the most spectacular part of an otherwise fairly boring hike.
I was a little surprised to find the road through the narrows recently rebuilt after last fall’s severe flood damage. It must’ve cost the private landowners an arm and a leg, and of course it’s likely to happen again every few years. The property up the road was recently sold, presumably to outsiders who had no idea what they were getting into – like the birders who built and had to abandon the cabin I found over in Arizona.
As usual, I made good time on the six-mile climb out of the canyon to the 9,035′ peak, where the trail is mostly shaded by forest and I was kept cool by a breeze. It really is nice to have a good trail for a change after slogging through deep snow or fighting my way through flood debris and thorny overgrowth for months.
On the way down the north side of the peak I ran into a friendly couple about my age, from a rural community west of town. They were trying to reach the iconic twin peaks north of town, but had missed the turnoff I used and had continued another 5 miles on the highway to the dirt forest road that accesses the fire lookout, driving that an additional 5 miles all the way up to a nearby saddle at 8,600′ instead. Now they were hoping to descend this trail in reverse from the high peak, to reach the much lower twin peaks. They asked about my hike and were pretty shocked by the distance I was aiming for. I gave them all the helpful info I could think of, but was perplexed because there’s no actual trail up the twin peaks, and I’ve never thought of them as a destination.
My destination was the “park” – the level basin at the far end of the eastward ridge, where the national trail crosses and drops to lower ridges. I love these incongruous geological features with their ring of tall pines surrounding a grassy meadow in the center, high in the sky on top of a ridge, and assuming I could make it that far today, I planned to collapse on the ground in the shade of a pine and rest a while.
But first, a half mile after passing the couple, I met a guy in his 40s or early 50s with a dog, running a chain saw, cutting logs that had recently blown down on the national trail. He refused my offer of help so I thanked him and continued another couple of miles on the gentle grades of this section, to the park, where I was still feeling good, but stopped to lie in the shade for at least 20 minutes.
This is one of the two longest hikes I do, and the longest I’ve done in over six months, by a margin of four miles. I expected to develop some pain on the way back, and sure enough, both feet got sore before I reached the lookout road. And I encountered the log-cutter and his dog again. He was finishing up for the day so he was glad to stop and talk a while. Turns out he’s a mountain biker and fisherman, and clears trails so he can ride them himself or use them to access fishing holes. Of course he resents not being able to use his chain saw in wilderness areas, which have the most attractive fishing holes and are now out of reach because of flood damage and blowdown.
The most interesting thing I learned from him is that this section of the national trail isn’t used by through hikers. He laughed when I mentioned other sections I’d found abandoned or blocked by flood damage. “All the through hikers just go straight north from town on other forest trails, to the river, and from there to Snow Lake (50 miles west of the official national trail),” he said. “Nobody but me uses the national trail anymore – they all want to be next to water.”
This confirms what I’ve long suspected. So many times, I’ve seen through hikers tramping along highways, short-cutting much longer sections of trail through backcountry, so they can save time or reach town quicker to resupply. We just had our big “Trail Days” celebration a few weeks ago, but that’s mostly about business – through hikers spend a lot in local restaurants, motels, and stores. I doubt anybody admitted they weren’t actually using the highly publicized, internationally-known trail.
After climbing to the high peak and crossing the saddle to the south slope for my final descent, I ran into the couple from the western community again, on their way back to their vehicle. This time we really got to know each other and exchanged names. She was admiring my old Swiss Army surplus pack, and he was curious about how much water I take on these marathon hikes. This was really turning into a social day, and I was glad I’d met friendly people who were willing to talk.
I was walking so gingerly on the descent I had to take a pain pill, but in general, I was surprised not to feel more exhausted during the last couple of miles along the canyon road. I only do this non-wilderness hike when I feel the need to pile on the miles, but most people find parts of it both beautiful and memorable.
Wilderness Access, but at What Price?
Monday, May 22nd, 2023: Hikes, Little Dry, Mogollon Mountains, Southwest New Mexico.
Again I had trouble choosing a Sunday hike – my first choice, on the east side, turned out to still be inaccessible due to road closure. Then I drove west planning to try an alternate route to another trail that had been inaccessible since last fall, but at the last minute decided that was too risky, too. So I continued to the turnoff for a trail that had been wiped out last September by a big flood, because I’d seen some notes online that indicated someone had been using it recently – maybe they’d cleared a path through the damage.
This is one of those few trails leading to the crest of the range that are precious to me. So imagine my delight when I found that someone had cleared a path and laid down good tread through last year’s flood damage!
It had rained yesterday, the temperature was in the low 70s, and as soon as I reached the canyon bottom a rich cocktail of plant perfumes hit my nostrils. Spring flowers were out, and my boots and pants were soon soaked with dew.
But after I reached the abandoned cabin, the trail work ended. Distances on this trail are confounding. The cabin doesn’t show up on any maps – I’ve always assumed it’s two miles in from the trailhead. I’ve hiked this trail often enough that I was easily able to find my route through flood debris, blowdown, and overgrowth beyond the cabin, but two things soon became obvious: big floods like this renew habitat, and the equestrian trail crew had been here, because the trail was now lined with invasive dandelions.
Despite the online notes, and invasives spread by horses, I found no tracks anywhere. It looked like I was on virgin trail, especially as I began climbing the traverse to the first saddle. Birdsong surrounded me everywhere, and the traverse was more choked than ever by scrub oak, manzanita, and the thorny shrub I have yet to identify. I literally had to force my way through dense thickets in addition to climbing over occasional blowdown, all the way up to the saddle. Most hikers would’ve simply turned back, assuming the trail no longer exists, but I’ve gotten used to conditions like this and can follow even the most subtle indicators of a route.
Storm clouds had started peeking over the crest even before I left the canyon bottom, and now towered over the ridge to the east.
It took me over three hours from the trailhead to reach the saddle, which is shown on maps as a distance of less than four miles. This never fails to amaze me, because I’m good at estimating distances, and this part of the trail always feels closer to six miles. And I hadn’t been moving slow – the trail in the canyon had felt easier than usual to follow.
Past the saddle, the trail climbs steeply in a series of switchbacks, which are not shown on any maps. A hiker who had left a recent note online said the trail simply stops here, but of course I know the route well and had no problem continuing. But the shrubby overgrowth was so bad on this next ascent that I fell once, tripping over a low branch that had been hidden by the plants I was pushing through.
Beyond the switchback, there’s a traverse that rounds the base of a white comglomerate cliff and enters the head of the main drainage, revealing the arc formed above by the crest. As before, there were no human tracks anywhere, but elk love this area and are the only thing maintaining tread at this point. I suddenly realized that I so seldom find footprints on these wilderness trails because backpackers are the only people who penetrate as deeply as I do, and backpackers in this part of the range are few and far between.
The trail traverses toward a second set of switchbacks that lead to a second saddle. But these switchbacks are faint and easily confused with numerous game trails left by elk, so I usually end up finding different routes going up vs. coming back down. At the saddle, the little cairn I’d made a couple of years ago was still waiting for me.
Past the second saddle, there are only faint, occasional traces of a trail, but again, I know the route well. After entering intact forest, it climbs in several switchbacks – also omitted from the maps – and passes an old junction before beginning another long traverse toward the crest.
This traverse looks exactly like a game trail. If you can follow it, it leads across a series of narrow talus falls, through thickets of thorny locust, to more switchbacks that climb the back side of a sharp rock outcrop. The air was muggy and I’d been getting pretty hot climbing thousands of feet, but as I continued up this traverse the clouds had been spreading, it had been getting darker, and a cold wind had dropped the temperature to the 50s.
Stopping before a switchback that’s blocked by deadfall, I noticed a tick on my sleeve, and after brushing that one off, saw one climbing my pant leg.
It’d been a hard climb and I was really beat. And my time was running short, so I stopped at the top of the switchbacks, next to the upper part of the rock outcrop, instead of continuing a couple hundred feet higher to the ghost grove of burned aspens below the crestline, as before. I figured I’d gone almost seven miles and climbed 4,000′, although the map would show less than six miles and 3,600 feet.
On the way down, the leg cramps began, and continued for the next three miles. I always get leg cramps on this descent, and this is the only hike where I get them – despite other hikes being much longer and harder. I drink plenty of water, with added electrolytes, and stretch regularly, but it makes no difference. Something about this hike just triggers cramps.
I’d only felt one tiny raindrop, and now the clouds were moving off and the air was quickly warming. When I reached the first saddle, I stopped to do a complete series of lower-body stretches, and drank a bunch more water.
Despite all the precautions, I still fought cramps all the way to the canyon bottom. And when I reached the bottom and began seeing dandelions again, I slipped and fell a second time, at a debris-choked creek crossing, and thought more about trails, condition and maintenance, and the larger issue of wilderness access.
Although I usually give up when confronted with hundreds of fallen logs per mile, I figured I’d climbed over at least a hundred today, spread out over a distance of six or seven miles. And I’ve long been perfectly content with trails that are faint or overgrown by thickets. But the vast majority of hikers seem to expect trails that are clear and meticulously maintained – probably because most of their hiking occurs in crowded urban parks and popular national parks, where the effort and cost of trail maintenance is justified by the level of traffic.
I only recently had the revelation that trails themselves, as we know them, are a product of wildfire suppression. The trail networks in our national forests and parks would never have been sustainable before, in natural wildfire regimes, which regularly rearrange the landscape.
But very few hikers, even backpackers, will attempt to penetrate wilderness areas without trails. So the whole idea of “wilderness access” ultimately depends, to some degree, on wildfire suppression.
And the demand for wilderness access has led, since COVID, to some troubling trends in my region. Just over the border in Arizona, a coalition of urban mountain bikers has been granted a permit by the Forest Service to do all trail maintenance, and the mountain bikers have accompanied their work by a slick online propaganda campaign, in which they conceal or downplay their agenda as bikers, promoting their selfless work “for the benefit of all trail users”.
Equestrians are doing the same thing in my local forest. They got an exclusive permit to do trail work, and they’ve established a slick, authoritative website on trail conditions which likewise hides their agenda as equestrians, claiming to be selflessly improving trails “for the benefit of all trail users”.
It’s clear to me that both these special-interest groups are working proactively and effectively to assure themselves access to public lands. Equestrians know they’re accused of damaging trails and spreading invasive plants, and afraid of losing access, they’re positioning themselves so nobody can exclude them from wilderness.
Likewise, mountain bikers have been fighting for decades to get access to wilderness, and by making themselves indispensable to all trail users, they may finally succeed.
My question is, does anybody actually deserve good trails, and “access to wilderness”, at the cost of habitat degradation?
