Month: August 2018

Exercising to exorcise (memories)?

~ reluctantroadie ~ Leave a comment

On Saturday, my hiking trio (my SAT–self-appointed trainer–Ian, and myself) drove up to Payson to hike the Barnhardt trail. My longtime blog followers may recognize that name; it was only in January when we summitted Mazatzal Peak. Part of that hike included the Barnhardt trail, but unfortunately, we only got to experience the trail at the end of our hike, which meant a lot of what we saw looked like this:

black

My memories of Mazatzal Peak are not warm and fuzzy. They are cold, painful, and bring tears to my eyes. In an attempt to exorcise those unpleasant memories and to create new, positive ones of the Barnhardt trail, I suggested we hike the Barnhardt trail in daylight.

We started on the trail around 7:45am and the temperature was in the mid 70sF. It was still fairly humid, though, so I wasn’t feeling as cool as I would have liked. The trail is very pretty and we saw lush green vegetation all around us, due to the recent rains. We even saw some gorgeous butterflies enjoying the breeze. For the record, we did NOT see any gorgeous butterflies the last time we hiked this trail.

 

Beautiful butterfly on Ian’s sock.
SO GREEN!
Pretty sky.
More green.
I like the colour contrast between the green vegetation and red rocks.

I’m not sure how far we went, as there is no summit point for the Barnhardt trail (this trail connects up with numerous other trails but does not lead up to Mazatzal Peak or any other peak), but according to Ian’s phone GPS, when we were almost at 6000 ft, the humidity was gone, leaving nothing but fantastic temperatures with a lovely breeze. Don’t forget the pretty views! I think we probably hiked about 4 to 4.5 miles when we decided to stop for a quick snack break before heading back down to the car.

 

Panoramic view.
My Coke says it all.
A strange fruit we saw on a bush where we stopped for a snack.

 

Required selfie.
A cool grotto off to the side of the trail near our snack spot.

Did this hike erase my previous memories of the Barnhardt trail? No, not really. While hiking, I couldn’t help compare my previous and current experiences:

  • darkness vs light;
  • cold vs warm(er);
  • painful vs pleasant;
  • lost vs not lost;
  • no Coke vs Coke;
  • no one read the hike description vs I read the hike description; and
  • angry/in despair/scared vs happy knowing that our lives were not in danger (that is not a joke).*

In any case, I enjoyed THIS hike on the Barnhardt trail and am looking forward to Phoenix’s winter and all the great hiking that awaits us!

*I suppose I still harbour some bitterness.

I felt cold yesterday!

~ reluctantroadie ~ 1 Comment

It’s August in Phoenix, which means it’s still hot….and muggy….basically, July and August in Phoenix is like living in a desert sauna. Sure, we Phoenicians get a fantastic winter season, but our “tax” for that glorious winter weather is that “dry heat”/monsoon sauna each summer.

What do Phoenicians do to escape the summer heat? One of the most popular things to do is to drive up to Flagstaff and camp, hike, or bike. Flagstaff’s elevation is almost 7000 feet, which makes for drastically cooler temperatures compared to Phoenix. That said, yesterday, my friend Crystal and I drove to Flagstaff in order to hike the highest point in Arizona: Humphrey’s Peak. (Apparently, we were not the only ones with that idea, because we saw a lot of people on the trail). Also, I just learned today that yesterday (i.e. August 4) was the inaugural National Summit Day–what a serendipitous piece of news!

The weather was pretty much perfect: sun, no chance of thunderstorms or lightning, a brisk 46F/8C at the summit. Humphrey’s Peak stands 12633 ft/3851 m high and is actually not a difficult hike; total round-trip distance from the Arizona Snowbowl trailhead just outside Flagstaff (the easiest trail of the 2-3 different trails to the summit) is almost 10 miles and total elevation gained is 3303 ft/1006 m. The biggest variable is whether altitude sickness will hit you. Crystal and I had hiked Humphrey’s before, but it had been a few years for both of us. We were both out of hiking shape too, so we agreed to hike at a moderate pace with breaks, if necessary (of course breaks are necessary!).

I’m happy to report that we successfully summited Humphrey’s and got to enjoy being cold! No altitude sickness for us, although we did experience the expected shortness of breath and leaden legs as we neared the summit. We got to the top in 3 hrs and 50 minutes and completed the descent in 2 hours 50 minutes, i.e. going downhill was much easier and faster. One of the best things about hiking is the food afterwards and we celebrated with some Chick-fil-a and Starbucks. Yay for cold summer temperatures, good company, successful summits, and FOOD!

 

The beginning of the hike–pretty meadow.
We met Sage, an award-winning Belgian sheepdog. His fur is very soft.
The saddle. Some people decide to end their hike here.
A view from the top.
Another view from the top.
Posing with the summit sign.
I remembered to bring a baby Coke on this hike–tasted so good!
Nice clouds!
Summit log.