Camp Hikes

ANNUAL CAMPOUT - Friday, May 3 - Sunday, May 5
Join us anytime Friday, May 3 at Bonita Campground in the Chiricahua National Monument. Facilities..tables..small fee. Friday night potluck dinner. Bring food/beverage to share and your own breakfast. Some people will also camp Saturday night and return Sunday.

HIKE OPTIONS - Saturday, May 4
Join the Muleteam this Saturday for a hike in or near the Chiricahua National Monument. Campers & day hikers meet for all hikes 9am at Bonita Campground in Chiricahua National Monument. Transportation/carpooling is unplanned from Bisbee - Allow 2 hours to drive. The hike options are listed below...

1 - Pinery Canyon Road through Horsefall Canyon to the Shaw Peak Trail. 
This pets-allowed hike will leave the campground at 9AM for a short 8 mile drive to the trailhead (about 15 minutes travel time). The trail from the Pinery trailhead to the junction with Shaw Pk Trail has been thoroughly maintained within the last couple of months. This is over a distance of about 2 1/2 miles. At the junction we have a choice of turning onto the Shaw Peak Trail, either left toward Shaw Peak or right in the direction of Onion Saddle. To the right, recent maintenance continued along the Shaw Peak trail for about another 3/4 mile along an ascending stretch up a series of switchbacks, until reaching a scenic point. If we decide to turn back at this point our roundtrip distance will be around 6 miles. -Brad

2 - Natural Bridge Trail
A 4.8 mile round trip hike, beginning at a small parking area on the side of the main road in the Monument, about 0.5 miles past the campground. The Park Service describes it as the least used trail in the Monument, which climbs to a ridge and drops into Picket Park, ending at an overlook for the small water-carved bridge located across the canyon. No dogs allowed. -Molly

3 - Silver Spur Meadow - Bonita Creek
A 4.2 mile round trip hike along Bonita Creek with trailhead at Bonita campground. The trail is easy & fairly level. Highlights include historic Faraway ranch, birding, picnic areas and shady trees. Dogs allowed. -Larry

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BACKTRACK - Council Rocks
Six hikers and Sheila the dog hiked in the Dragoons on a clear, summer day. We had plenty of water and electrolytes and the breeze was cool, so nobody suffered from the heat. A beautiful area all to ourselves except that we arrived at Council Rocks the same time as a large ATV group. But then John led us to a similar area nearby with huge boulders to climb under and have a shady lunch. Desert flowers were inspected and a spiky red caterpillar. Thanks for leading the hike, John, except you forgot to send me a hike report. -Larry

I took the group photo and more are at muleteam.shutterfly.com.
Elizabeth's 360º photo link - https://rebrand.ly/CouncilRocks



CALENDAR
May 11 - Last hike & potluck in lower Carr Canyon with Larry

Thanks for hiking with me,
Larry

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Council Rocks

HIKE TO COUNCIL ROCKS
Join the Muleteam this Saturday for a hike in the Dragoon Mountains in an area with Apache history, pictographs and strange boulder formations. This trail will be mostly on natural paths and moderate uphill for a total of 7 miles. Bring water & lunch. Back late afternoon. Meet April 27 at 9am by the Old Bisbee courthouse fountain to carpool (about 90 minutes each way). Free, but gas donation is appreciated. For more details contact John at 520-366-1099 or johnwasser@hotmail.com.

SV people meet at Middlemarch Road turnout at 9:20 for carpooling.

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BACKTRACK - Miller Canyon
Eighteen hikers and 4 dogs (including Gus, who was lost and then found with help from Good Samaritans) spent most of hike along a cascading stream and under live oaks with an orange glow suggesting fall rather than spring.  It was mosty sunny with a nice breeze. 
Wildflowers were seen including verbena, dalia, yellow monkey flower, yellow columbine, buckthorn, aster, and barberry. Butterflies including mylitta crescent, tiny checkerspot, pipevine swallowtail, two-tailed swallowtail, texan cresent, and duskywings were also seen. 
It was also determined that Nancy Pelosi is 79 rather than 89 as suggested by a tv program. And Gus was allowed to chew on a deer leg he found in light of the ordeal he experienced. -John B.

I took the group photo and more are at muleteam.shutterfly.com.
Elizabeth's 360º photo link - https://rebrand.ly/MillerCanyon



SIDETRACK - Camp hike options?
What hikes will be on offer May 4th (camping weekend)? If you have suggested (or want to suggest) a hike to lead that day please send me a short description this week. I will include the various choices in the next blog. I suppose any hikes should begin at Bonita campground at 9am to allow time for non-camping hikers to arrive.



CALENDAR
May 3-4-5 - Camp/hike - Chiricahua National Monument
May 11 - Last hike & potluck in lower Carr Canyon with Larry

Thanks for hiking with me,
Larry

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Miller Canyon

HIKE MILLER CANYON
Join the Muleteam this Saturday for a hike through a scenic wooded valley in the Huachuca Mountains. The trail is uphill and is about 5 miles roundtrip. Bring water and lunch. Hiking sticks suggested and dogs on leashes ok. Back mid-afternoon. Meet April 20 at 9am by the Old Bisbee courthouse fountain to carpool. Free, but gas donation is appreciated. For more details contact John at 319-325-3605 or johnbroz1944@yahoo.com.

SV people meet on Miller Canyon Road, in large dirt parking on the left with restrooms.

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BACKTRACK - Brown-Ramsey
Fifteen hikers and three dogs began the Brown Canyon to Ramsey Canyon journey. One hiker elected to return before reaching our usual lunch stop at the top of a ridge. Two of the group chose to eat at the usual place and return to the Brown Canyon trailhead. The rest of us went on to a point overlooking Ramsey Canyon for lunch, where we met Guy who had come up Ramsey Canyon. Four hikers then returned to Brown Canyon while the rest of us continued into the beautiful Ramsey Canyon. While the water level in the creek was not as high as expected, there were still a couple of small waterfalls for us to enjoy.

The hike leader learned a couple of things:
1. It is more than 1/4 mile from the usual lunch spot to the overlook.
2. It is a much shorter trip to go from the overlook to the Ramsey Canyon trailhead than to go to back to the Brown Canyon trailhead.
Thanks to Jan and John Broz for shuttling the hikers from Ramsey back to Brown to get to their cars, and thanks to Guy and Sandy and Ken for offering to do it. -Molly

I took the group photo so I'm not in it, but Becket the hand puppet (with Jan in the photo) is my substitute rejoining the Muleteam after a long absence. More photos by Guy & me are at muleteam.shutterfly.com. Elizabeth's 360º photo link - https://rebrand.ly/BrownRamsey



CALENDAR
Apr 27 - Council Rocks in the Dragoons with John W
May 3-4-5 - Camp/hike - Chiricahua National Monument
May 11 - Last hike & potluck in lower Carr Canyon with Larry

Thanks for hiking with me,
Larry

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Brown-Ramsey

HIKE THE BROWN-RAMSEY LOOP
Join the Muleteam this Saturday for a “Two For One Hike” in the canyons & foothills of the Huachuca Mountains. The trail is about 6.5 miles total with grasslands, forest, steep hillsides and a canyon creek. Bring water and lunch, but no dogs into Ramsey. All drivers will be shuttled back to their cars at Brown Canyon Ranch. Back mid-afternoon. Meet April 13 at 9am by the Old Bisbee courthouse fountain to carpool. Free, but gas donation is appreciated. For more details contact Molly at 432-3902 or eeo.source@gmail.com.

Optional meeting spot is Brown Canyon Ranch off Ramsey Canyon Road.

Those with dogs can go with us to the lunch spot, which will this year be about 1/4 mile beyond where we usually stop for lunch when hiking Brown Canyon, at an overlook into Ramsey Canyon. You can even take your dog a bit further than the lunch spot if you choose. -Molly

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BACKTRACK - Echo Canyon
At the earlier time of 8 AM four dedicated hikers and (unsurprisingly) no dogs gathered for the Echo Canyon hike at Chiricahua National Monument. This really small group-- the minimum that would make the hike possible--waited until about 8:15 in the hope that a few more would show up. On the way out rainclouds became more numerous, though not very large and dark but still contrary to the weather forecast, which predicted dramatic clearing from much more complete cloudcover the preceding day. With so few hikers, noone disembarked from our one car for the campground tour on foot. As determined before the hike from a website link for available campsites at the campground, the group campsite was, as expected, found to be empty until check-in time of noon for a Saturday night reservation. Up to five cars could have been parked there, but we decided that we did not need the extra time required for a foot tour and breezed through, first seeing Site 22 which Ken and Sandy reserved for the upcoming campout. We then saw the residence building from the map -- which turned out to be a medium size stone "cabin" across the narrow roadway from a bathroom building also of historical stone construction. Crossing the two Bonita Creek dips was easy as it was dry, but as we neared the three adjoining campsites, 23, 24, and 26, a line of vehicles-- one pulling a camp trailer and one an RV-- completely blocked the narrow roadway and partly blocked from view what we believed was Site 23. We could not be sure since the numbered sign was also blocked. After what seemed like a long few minutes, we learned that the line could not moved until a baby's diaper could be changed, so we backed up all the way to the bathroom building where we found someone dressed in a park service uniform, asking him if he could speed up the clearing up of the blockade. He appeared happy to do so and got into his truck, followed by Elizabeth's SUV. When we arrived the blockage was gone, revealing our three sites in their pristine glory, except that Site 23 had two tents presumably belonging to absent campers. We thanked our park friend and apologized for wasting his time.

We arrived at the Echo Canyon trailhead, to be pleasantly surprised that the parking was less than a third full. Few other hikers were seen on the trail. We decided not to climb all the way to the Massai Point parking, being content to have lunch just below near the piled-stone observation point. Temperature was barely pleasant enough between breezes, but the sun became more frequently blocked by increasing coverage of small rainclouds. We arrived back early enough at the trailhead that, despite occasional "spritzing" by slight sprinkling of raindrops, a hike up the trail to the Sugarloaf Peak Lookout and back down was agreed upon. Spritzing increased some, and we made our stay brief under an eave of the locked lookout before heading back down. Drive back was uneventful despite seeing a lot of rainpuddles along the highway, which were not there on the way out. Arrived back in Bisbee at around a little after 4:30 PM following the hike, estimated to be around six miles total with elevation climbs of somewhat below a thousand feet total. We did learn more about the campground from our brief tour. Most intriguing is that the residence building is NOT for park staff managing the campground but is a real private residence inhabited by owners. There was no time for an explanation from the owner talked to, but this is a mystery to be investigated further at the campout. There IS a host managing the campground at Site 16. - Brad

360º photo link - https://rebrand.ly/SugarLoaf
Hiking photos since 2000 are at muleteam.shutterfly.com.



CALENDAR - Need a hike for April 27!
Apr 20 - Miller Canyon in the Huachucas with John B
Apr 27 - ???
May 3-4-5 - Camp/hike - Chiricahua National Monument
May 11 - Last hike & potluck in lower Carr Canyon with Larry

Thanks for hiking with me,
Larry

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