The Big Rain
Monday, September 16th, 2019: Hikes, Pinalenos, Shake, Southeast Arizona.
This was our longest storm of the monsoon season; a vast, low cloud layer had covered the region, and rain fell intermittently all weekend. Without lightning and thunder, it was more like a winter rain.
Early Sunday morning, I decided to drive back across the state line to the Sky Island, to finish one of the hikes I’d never had time to finish before. The time difference, gaining an hour, was in my favor. I’d end the hike around sundown, but there’s a small campground at the trailhead, and I figured it would be empty due to the weather. So I loaded my vehicle with camping gear.
Unexpectedly, the rains had brought wildlife onto the highways. Shortly after I left town, a quail ran under my vehicle, and on the road to the Sky Island, a small bird dove suddenly out of the sky to hit my front bumper. Returning in the evening, I rounded a bend to surprise a large snake coiled in the middle of the road, and shortly after that, was barely able to miss a flock of two dozen turkeys running down the road en masse.
I was returning in the evening because when I got to the trailhead that morning, I discovered I’d forgotten my sleeping bag. What’s more, I’d forgotten my hiking orthotics, so on this steep hike I had to use my street orthotics, which aren’t as protective.
Overnight rains had drenched the thick vegetation that covers the trail, so that within a few hundred yards my boots and pants were soaked to the knees. The trailhead temperature was in the 60s, but the clouds parted, and after a little climbing, all my clothes were soaked from head to toe with either rainwater or sweat.
The clouds closed in again in afternoon, with sporadic drizzle, and on the upper slope the temperature dropped into the 50s. This is a well-maintained trail because it climbs through intact forest that was missed by the big wildfires on the crest, but for the same reason, once I entered the pine forest, I had no views. All I could glimpse between breaks in the trees was low clouds.
I’d never seen so many deer – white-tails – in any forest before.
The top of the trail, which I’d often fantasized about, was anti-climactic, because it just ended at the paved crest highway, with all the slopes and views hidden in cloud. Dripping wet, I trudged the five-plus miles and 3,000 vertical feet back down the trail.
