Arizona Adventure: The White Tank Mountains, Part 2

Part 1

Hazardous was right. The trail instantly got more rocky and had steep drop offs on one side.

Conker and I stopped several times to look at the desert on the other side of the drop.

Conker seemed like he was having a blast navigating the rocks.

Sometimes we would go a little too fast and try to jump up a rock and hit the end of the leash and snap back down. I had to either try to catch him to leap forwards to prevent this.

Sometimes I think Conker is part Mountain Goat. He loves to climb up things, especially rocks. We found a large pile of rocks and he just had to climb it to sniff around.

I did say it was large, didn't I?

Conker really liked this part of the trail. He was hopping around like mad.

We continued for another 2 miles or so past the warning signs until we came to a rock wall. We climbed up it but the trail just ended on the other side. I was quite confused, since the map said the trail continued on past and up across a pass. We looked for the other end of the trail for a while but after about 20 minutes of finding nothing, we turned back.

Despite the dissapointment in the middle of the hike, it was a lot of fun. Conker really enjoyed all the rocks, it's too bad I haven't found anything like that within a reasonable driving distance of GP.

I do know of a couple places that might be similar. There is a trail along the Rouge River that could have some neat hiking sections, I plan on visiting that sometime soon. And then there's the Badlands in Central Oregon that I am planning a week-long trip for this spring/summer. I am really looking forwards to that one.


Anywho, that was our one hike in Arizona. I really miss hiking in the desert.

But I don't miss these.

Arizona Adventure: The White Tank Mountains, Part 1

I totally forgot about this until I started to try to find a place to hike with non-flat trails.

While in Arizona I took Conker to the white tank Mountains located on the far western side of Phoenix. It was a short drive from my grandparent's place and unfortunately, we only went once.  I would have liked to have gotten in more desert hiking but it just didn't happen.

 The trail we took (Ford Canyon and connectors) started out as an easy walk. It was flat, the trail was wide and there were relatively few people around. Conker had to stay leashed (park rules) or he's have been let off to roam the trail at his own pace.

Never complete without a Shiba butt photo or two

Conker didn't seem to notice that the plants on the sides of the trail were sharp. He stuck his nose into many, got stabbed, then stuck it right back in to take a second shot at it. He even tried to bite one. He is not very cactus savvy.

Speaking of cactus...

It has been some years since I'd seen a saguaro.  Like the other cacti, Conker got stabbed by this one too. I also happened to step on one of it's spines that had fallen to the ground (remember, I wear those thin-soled Vibram toe shoes).

So we continued down the nice trail. We didn't see too many animals but every now and then one of those desert jackrabbits would show up and Conker would go bonkers. He wanted to chase them really bad, so I guess it's a good thing he was on a leash.

Conker being adventurous

A small ravine popped up out of nowhere. Conker, being his usual fearless self walked right up to the edge and leaned over.

After the ravine the trail got more interesting. It stopped being flat and well groomed and turned into a jagged, rough and rocky trail. This is what I'd been looking for, something that made you pay attention to where you're going.

Grass!

We came around a large bend in the trail and found something somewhat unexpected. A large flat expanse of grass! It was pretty cool seeing the short grass in the desert, I had never really seen that before despite living there for 19 years.

Conker didn't much care though, so we kept going after I snapped a couple shots of the grass.

Interesting...

Eventually we came up to a sign. A set of signs... warning that the trail was hazardous up ahead. I was quite interested to now what "hazardous" meant, and if it was anything like the trails I'd normally hiked while living in Arizona.

Part 2

Arizona Adventure: Get the Moe*

*When I tell Conker to get something, I normally shorten the name or say it stupidly.  In the ground-critter's case, it was called a moe instead of mole, I don't think it was actually a mole though.

One of the adventures Conker and I had in Buckeye Arizona took place on the portion of undestroyed undeveloped desert between the large complex of neighborhoods and the busy I-10.  The adventure was incredibly fun and stimulating for Conker, because it involved a potential snack.


I spied a small critter sitting atop a hole in the ground not too far from our current position.  I think it was a ground squirrel, but due to the population of moles at the dog park I decided to call it one since Conker understood that a mole meant an opportunity to dig.  I turn, look at Conker and say, "Lets git d' moe!" in a stupid voice. Conker's ears perk at the words, especially the last, and he waits for me to point out the moe's location.  Dead ahead, I motion with my arm.  His gaze follows and Conker spots the moe as it flashes into it's den.

That brief glance was enough.  He was at the end of the leash in a split second, pulling hard to reach the hidden critter.  As we neared it's den I could see Conker grow more and more excited.  He promptly stuck his nose into the den and inhaled deeply when he was close enough so to do.

Conker did not need to be told what to do.  He began to scratch at the entrance to the den, first making smaller gouges in the soft earth then progressively harder and deeper scratches.  Soon he was digging full-force in an attempt to unearth the moe.

"Where's the moe?"  I ask in an excited tone. Conker shoves his muzzle into the hole up to his eyes.  I can hear him sniffing hard, searching in the darkness for the small snack.  "Git dat moe Conker!"  I cheer as he resumes digging.  A small pile of dirt had begun to appear between his legs.

After a short while Conker started to get discouraged.  The moe had not shown itself and he appeared to be getting bored of digging.  "You haven't found the moe yet!"  I say as Conker examines the exterior of the somewhat-collapsed den, his small black nose working hard to find a fresh scent.

That was enough to get him started again.  He attacked the entrance with a newfound fury, digging quickly and sloppily in hopes of finding the critter quick.  "Git it! Git it, Conker!"  I say, egging him on as soft dirt flies in all directions.  Then, as if he willed it, the moe appeared, but it was in the wrong hole!

Conker chagred the ground-thing but didn't seem to notice the rather difficult bush in his way.  No matter, he's a Shiba! That bush will bend to his will if he wishes it so.
And that's what it did. Conker shoved his way through the bush and almost got the moe but it dashed back into the hidden den entrance beneath the bush's roots.

 Conker returned to the first entrance and continued excavation.  He dug faster and harder and began to bury my feet with the interior of the moe's den.  He was determined to catch it now that it had the gall to openly mock him like that. "You gonna let it escape, Conker?  Git d' moe!  Git it!"  I say.

The entrance was no longer a muzzle-sized hole in the ground.  It was a crater big enough for Conker to fit most of his front half into.  He paused to shove his face in deep and inhale many times, his nose searching for the moe that had probably escaped through a different tunnel by now.

Despite his apparent defeat, Conker continued to dig.  He cleared out a hole slightly larger than a cubic foot and made a heap of dirt several inches high and two feet wide.  If he wanted he could have curled up into the hole.
But no moe appeared.  It was lucky, this time, that Conker is not that great of a digger.

Over the course of the rest of the week, every time we would go out into the undeveloped desert, Conker would go back to the hole and snuff around for the moe.  It was never there, and had probably wised up and moved to a new location where Conker could not harass it by destroying it's front door.

Call me mean, but I find this hilarious.

You know those logs on the Babyfoot hike?  Heh, well, this is what happened when Conker found a slippery one.

Why didn't I help him up?  I had a camera in one hand, a cup of tea in the other, and I knew he wasn't in any immediate danger and was fully capable of getting back up on his own.

Babyfoot Lake

So my plans to hike part of the Kalmiopsis Rim Trail kinda failed.  We parked at the Babyfoot Lake trailhead and meant to take a connecting trail but missed it (found it later) and ended up at Babyfoot Lake.  I am more out of shape than I'd originally thought and decided to camp at the mini lake and go find the trail I wanted to hike and do a bit of it without a 50 pound backpack.

Babyfoot Lake is barely within the border of the Kalmiopsis Wilderness.  You basically find a metal sign stating the land behind it is a wilderness blah blah blah, then come to the lake.  The lake is only about 9 feet deep, has a few trout in it and has many really big, old trees that have fallen into it over the years.  A nice little place to visit.

I dropped off my pack, hoisted any food and smelly items into a tree then grabbed my day-pack and took off to find my trail.  At first we tried to find where the #1224A (which is the Babyfoot Lake trail) connected to the #1224 (Kalmiopsis Wilderness Rim Trail) on the northwestern side of the lake.  He found bits and pieces of it but it looked like that particular section hadn't been used in years since there was so much stuff grown over it.  The underbrush made it very difficult to navigate and I didn't want to get lost so we turned around and headed back down the Babyfoot Lake trail to find the split.

We did find the split, trail #1126 which connected to the #1124 up about three miles.  I figured we could do that but I didn't know we'd have to climb a killersteep ridge to get up to it first.  We did get to the top of the ridge and hiked out about 1 1/2 - 2 miles along it then stopped for lunch. We could see Babyfoot Lake down below us from up there.  In the picture above, look at the rim. Find the highest spot. That's where we were. A good 700 feet higher than Babyfoot, all climbed within that short mile and a half.

Conker decided that he didn't want to be clean anymore and rolled on the trail during lunch.  He also decided he wanted to decorate himself with tree sap which was a bad idea since it drove him nuts for the rest of the trip.
The rocks up there on the rim were funny, if you poured water on them they hisses really loudly.  I thought there was a snake nearby when I spilled a bit of water and the rocks began to hiss.

After lunch we headed back down to Babyfoot Lake.  We discovered that the trees that had fallen into the lake were very stable so I walked out onto one. Conker didn't really want to go with me but followed anyways.  I jumped in the lake (Conker stayed on the log) and found it to be quite nice.  I figured it'd be cold.

For the next couple hours I let Conker wander around the camp and surrounding section of the lake.  I read while he explored and some menacing looking clouds built up above us.  I knew what the clouds meant, and when thunder began to roll through the valleys I pitched the tent.  I waited until it was actually raining before calling Conker over and introducing him to it.  After the first minute he was fine with it and tried to sleep as rain and eventually hail pelted down on my little orange tent.

Conker decided, before and after the storm, that exploring just the lakeside wasn't good enough.  Wile I was making some tea I looked out at the lake a spotted something on one of the big logs.  It was Conker.  He'd gotten up on the log all on his own, walked out a bit then looked at me.  He kept looking back as he walked out to the very end then walked back.  He turned this into something he did about every 20 minutes. After a bit of exploring, he would go walk out into the lake on a log.

The bugs got a git unbearable as the sun was setting so after dinner we retreated to the tent.  We napped, er, Conker napped while I read, then slowly dozed off as the night fell.
I was suddenly reminded why I don't like camping in the woods when I woke to a crashing sound near the tent and Conker's low growl.  I don't know what kind of animal it was but it sounded big.  Not as big as a bear, maybe a deer, and it vanished as quickly as it had appeared.  The rest of the night was filled with more crashing, snapping and shrieking as the animals of the wilderness paid their nightly visits to the lake.  Conker didn't bark, only growled quietly.  I knew none of these visitors were bears, I've heard a bear outside my tent before and these were different sounds.

Deer, raccoons, skunks and what I found out later to be foxes were the main visitors.  But one of the last to come definitely was a bear.  Heavy yet soft footsteps, snuffing every little scent, scraping it's long claws on random fallen logs as it navigated the area around my tent.  This was the only animal Conker barked at, but it was a very restrained bark.
Surprisingly everything up until then scared me.  The foxes (which make freaky screaming sounds) were the scariest when I first heard them shrieking and crashing about. Two even got into a fight.  The only protection I'd brought with me was that big knife and it stayed right beside me.  I'd picked up the knife when the foxes began to fight, and right that after the bear came.  For some reason holding the knife made me feel better, and the bear either lost interest in the lake and our camp or Conker scared it off when he barked.  It left rather quickly.  Not many other animals visited after that, and the big knife spent the rest of the night inside my sleeping bag.


So!  That was out little adventure to Babyfoot Lake.  I knew already that camping next to a lake, in the wilderness, probably wasn't the greatest idea and paid for it with my sleep, but it was a fun trip anyways and Conker really enjoyed exploring the lake and walking out on the logs.  Next time I go out there it will either be just a daytrip or I'll camp somewhere along the trail I originally wanted to and just stop in at Babyfoot Lake on the way in or out.

Sorry for lack of pictures, my photobucket upload limit has been reached.