After yesterday’s long drive and moderate hike, we were both looking for a more laid-back adventure for today. We decided to try the oatmeal bar at the hotel for breakfast and then stay closer to “home” by exploring some parts of the western section of Saguaro National Park. The oatmeal bar was fun and tasty, and we both enjoyed it. R had only (warmed) milk on his oats while I added some granola, raisins and chia seeds (lots of bugs!). We ate in the little “dining room” next to the bar, and recommended Tucson Mountain Park to another guest when he asked where we would recommend for short hikes in the area.
Our adventures for the day would take us very close to that area, in the busy western section of Saguaro National Park. Rich had spotted a few interesting benchmarks on the map this mornign that we had never looked for, and he devised a nice loop so that we could search for all of them, and incorporate a hike we wanted to try as well. The first mark we found along Kinney Road was B 291, a very straightforward find in a round concrete monument in an open area, surrounded by a cool assortment of cacti (and guarded by a special little mammillaria)! We found the mark immediately and documented it, and then poked around for a few minutes enjoying all the cacti.
The second mark was a real challenge! When we pulled over to park, ahead of us rose a steep rocky slope covered, and I mean covered, with teddy bear cholla. The disk was in a large boulder that appeared to be somewhere near the top of this steep, loose gravel slope. We kept walking toward the coordinates and they kept leading us up and up. At one point, Rich exclaimed “I got stuck!” and I looked down to see a fat cholla segment stuck firmly into the side of his right calf. Our tweezers were in the car but he tried removing it wit his knife - mostly successfully, but a few very fine spines were left stuck in the skin that we would have to remove later. It was a beautiful spot but a very precarious one due to the density of the cholla!
After that episode, I climbed a little higher and spotted the disk on the far edge of the large boulder, but the entire base of he boulder and all the area around it was carpeted with cholla. There was no safe way to get onto the boulder to photograph the mark, so I had to do so froma distance. I was pleased to see that the disk’s stamping is still legible. We climbed down without incident other than a few cholla pieces sticking to my shoe (but not piercing it) and spent a few minutes at the parking pulloff removing the remaining cholla spines. We love the desert, but it always manages to get us in one way or another!
The third mark on our list was across from the entrance to the Ironwood Picnic Area. This was another easy roadside BM that we found in good condition without any trouble. It helped too that there was a nicely detailed recovery from someone back in 2001.
Next on our list was a short hike to look for a mysterious BM accompanied by a triangle that Rich noticed this morning on our National Geographic topo and trail map. This was another mini adventure! According to the map we should park at pulloff K15, which was somewhere around the split road near Old Tucson, but we couldn’t find it. We saw lot K 14, and we parked there because we saw a trail heading west that looked like it would have been the old road that became the Avery Bryce trail. We were initially heading right toward the coordinates for the mark but then the trail turned sharply left, south, and we saw a mountain biker heading east on another trail right ahead of us. Confused, I checked my phone and found a website that showed the trail following the same general direction that we were, so we figured it was OK and the trail would eventually swing up north again and then back to head west - which is eventually did. We still couldn’t figure out what had happened, and why it didn’t match what we had on our trail map.
At some point along the way I realized I just might have a datasheet on my website for this quad, so I pulled out the phone and checked. I had it! So now we had a description to work from. We reached the coordinates (which I had pulled from the topo map) and didn’t see much of any use, but only a few minutes of poking around and I heard R yell “I found it!” I had just been checking to see if I had the horizontal datasheet that might have given better coordinates. He had first spotted a rock with a smaller rock on top and thought it might be significant. In looking around for anything else unusual like that, he spotted three piles of rocks that he thought might have been cairns. A closer look revealed the mark inside the triangle of rocks! What was really cool was that there were the remains of a wooden tripod lashed together with wire at the site. So cool, more survey history finds in the desert!
We took an easy hike back out and checked out one of the forks we had found on the way in, thinking it might lead us to the correct parking area. It led right out to the road! At this point our only conclusion was that K 15 had been on the other side of the road, and had been removed when the road was split, and the trail had been rerouted.
We had two more BMs on our list, A 295 and H 291. We couldn’t find the first of these. We searched the hillside in the area and didn’t really even find a likely outcropping let alone the mark, but that area too might have been changed since the road names and configurations in the description didn’t match what we saw. H 291 was an easy find, just off Kinney Road across from the intersection with Hohokam Rd.
We then took Hohokam Rd toward the valley view overlook trailhead. It was packed but there was enough room to park along the side of the road. This was a very nice, easy, short hike to a gorgeous view over a dense saguaro forest! It was very busy today, no surprise,but we still had plenty of opportunities for photography. Saw some really cool cacti along the way!
By now we were pretty tired and took a quick trip to the visitors center just to check it out. It was packed too! They seemed like bus-tour type people, but I didn’t see any buses. Either way, they were very annoying. We ended up getting one t shirt each, prickly pear licorice, prickly pear butter mints(!), and a cactus mug that might work as a cactus planter.
Supper was at Barrio again. R wanted a burger. The first place we were interested in was over by the university and the entire area was completely packed with people, no parking, etc. I can’t stand driving around in places like that. We couldn’t think of anywhere else on the spot so we went to Barrio which was close. Quite a different crowd on a Friday night and very busy but it was still delicious. R had a Barrio Blonde and i had the Citrazona IPA. And by now i was craving a burger too! R had a plain cheese burger with cheddar cheese (and attempted to get a slice of onion) and I had the southwestern burger he had the other night (green chile, pepper jack cheese, tomatillo-avocado sauce). Both had fries. Crazy and loud with lots of rail traffic and people, but it was still great.
Early night, snuggles!