September 2014 in Sedona

Elaine & I stayed at Arroyo Roble unit 1108 for two weeks starting September 19th Friday-to-Friday.  Weather was beautiful!  Elaine & I did Thunder Mountain, and I went up to the top for a view, while Elaine enjoyed shade down below.
Nancy Lunetta and Kay Coen visited, and Nancy and I did the hike to Seven Sacred Pools.  Here is a link to photo album:

Nancy & I at trailhead

At the "pools"

Nancy, Kay, and Elaine surprised me with a celebration of my 70th birthday a few weeks early.
On the 24th, I did the Ridge Trail by myself.  Here is link to photos  Elaine dropped me off at trail head along Chavez Ranch Rd, and then picked me up at Shelby  Rd.  Here is a link to National Forest Description

 Scenery along the trail was surprisingly good, and there were more flowers blooming in September than most areas had in April, because of the dry winter and wet "monsoon" season during the summer.

The next day, I explored the Javelina Trail, which is a relatively new trail that starts on W 89A just West of the Post Office.  Elaine dropped me off and picked me up at the Jordan Road trailhead.  Here's a link to photos

For being as close to civilization as it is, the trail seemed to be far from it.  Lots of forest and as I got up higher, there were some good views.

The next day I did what is becoming one of my favorite hikes -- Brin's Mesa with a North detour up to an overlook.  Views are always spectacular, and difficult to capture properly with photos.  However here is a link to my photos from that day.

 This is the view from a very high perch with sheer walls below

We brought along the 2 person rubber raft, so Elaine and Nancy did their "white water rafting" down the mighty Oak Creek in front of Arroyo Roble.  Weather was perfect, water was not too cold, and they had a really good time.  Link to photos & video.  Also during their short stay in Sedona, Nancy and I did the Marg's draw trail from Schnebly Hill Road trailhead, and Nancy took all of us out to brunch at Enchantment. 

 Nancy at the Marg's Draw trailhead

Nancy at Enchantment Resort

Due to the horrible forest fire in Oak Creek Canyon during June, all of the trails in the canyon were closed from June until the beginning of October.  Our son, Sean flew to Flagstaff, and then drove home with us after spending several fun days hiking the trails.  We were very pleased that they opened the West Fork trail before we left to go home.  It was clear that the firefighters had a very difficult time in that canyon, but they did manage to save most of it.  There were patches of forest where most of the trees were damaged or destroyed.  The West Fork was full of ash/mud at the many ford/crossings, which was somewhat ugly.  But other than that the trail was beautiful, as usual. 

When Sean arrived at Flagstaff Airport, we took him on a short tour of Flagstaff, including a hike in Buffalo Park, lunch at one of the many excellent brew pubs in Flagstaff.  

Sean at Buffalo Park

At Meadow at Oak Creek Canyon Overlook

Then the three of us did the short walk to Griffith Springs,  and a walk around the Oak Creek Canyon overlook at the top of the switchback. Here's link to photos

Sean & I did a hike to Submarine rock and Chicken Point, and Elaine picked us up at the Chapel. Link to album

Then we drove back Dry Creek Road and hiked to Devil's bridge --Link to Album , then drove to the Palatki archeological site, and took the docent tour of the ruins.

 Sean at Devil's Bridge

We were very pleased when they opened the West Fork Trail -- and we were among the first people to take the trail since it was closed in June. (Link to Album)

Sean Crossing the West Fork at about the 7th crossing--lots of ash in water

To wrap up our 2 weeks in Sedona, and Sean's 5 days, Elaine dropped us off at Red Rock Crossing and we hiked along the Creek and up to the top of Cathedral Rock.  Elaine picked us up at the Back 'O Beyond trailhead.  Pretty strenuous hike! Link To Album

 Sean out on a point up in the Cathedral Rock formation -- yeah, that's a sheer drop below him.

Sean on Ledge at near the top of Cathedral Rock

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Sedona Hiking Information and Resources

There are a lot of excellent web sites and books that can help visitors find information about hikes.  Because there are so many trails and so much information available it makes it difficult to decide which trail to take. There are several different visitor centers in the Sedona area, and the rangers and docents are always very helpful.  The National Forest Visitor Center along route 179 just South of Village of Oak Creek has lots of good information.  The visitor center in "Uptown Sedona" next to the Hyatt timeshare is also an excellent spot to stop.
Here are some of the web sites:

• William F. Palmer Professor Emeritus of Physics at The Ohio State University has this web site, which has a lot of the Sedona trails listed alphabetically along with a trail description, map and photos. 
• Great Sedona Hikes by William Bohan, at this URL has a database of hikes with the ability to sort by difficulty and alphabetic. It also identifies ones near water, near vortexes etc. The site also has descriptions and maps of the trails 
• The Hike House web site: www.hikehouse.com has trails as well as videos that could be helpful for someone trying to select a trail to explore. 
• The Red Rock Country Map published by the Coconino National Forest provides an excellent overview of many of the trails in the area. I found a copy on this blog web site. The Forest service also has excellent descriptions and maps at this link, and you can choose between day hikes and overnight hikes 
• This Blog: http://arizonahiking.blogspot.com/ has over 500 Arizona trails indexed. It was created by Mare Czinar, who writes a regular column (Including "hike of the week") for several Arizona newspapers. Her site has quite a few of the Sedona area trails, and seems to be more up-to-date than some of the others. For example, it includes "Adobe Jack" trailhead that was opened in 2012 along with the trails throughout that basin. 

There is also an application for iPhone or Android that specializes in Sedona Hikes an now has 74 trails cataloged.  It is called:  -- "Sedona Hiking App"  Apparently new hikes are added periodically, since I just received an email (from Jon Clayton info@sedonahikingapp.com ) that described Turkey Creek Trail as being added to the app.  

April 2014 in Sedona

In April, we stayed in unit 1101 at Arroyo Roble, at the "upstream end" of Old Creekside.  Carol Pennell joined us for a few nights at the beginning of the 2 weeks.

On Friday,  Elaine dropped me off at the Airport Road Trailhead, and I did the loop around the airport mesa.  We have done the trail part way many times, but had never done the complete loop. Go to this link and open in Google Earth to see the trail:   Because of the dry winter & Spring, there were not many wildflowers -- a big disappointment!  However Friday night we had a good rainstorm, which brought snow to the higher elevations.  Hopefully the rain will bring out some more wildflowers.  Here are photos:

Elaine dropped me off at the Cocks Comb trailhead today. Trailhead is off Boynton Pass Road, just past the Doe Mountain trailhead.  Here's a link to Palmers Trail write-up.Here's Palmer's map and elevation chart.  He describes a simple round-trip to top of mesa and return.   Here's great Sedona Hikes description -- but it doesn't include a the trip to the top of the mesa.  Most of the trail was flat and very bicycle friendly. However I followed the trail advice by "Cosmic Ray" trail guide and climbed up to the top of the Cocks Comb mesa. Spectacular View! Here is a link to the "track" that will open with Google Earth. Note from the well marked and maintained trail, there is NO marking for the turnoff to go to the top of the mesa.  In fact, there was a log across the trail, as if someone didn't want us to take the trail.  However the trail can be easily seen on the right side as you pass by homes being built on the left side of the trail.  Below are the photos I took on the trail:

Elaine and I hiked Marg's Draw Trail from Schnebly Road past Snoopy Rock.  We met other hikers that had us take a photo of them -- and they took a couple of us as well.  We met "Reno" on the trail too--a retired cardiologist who was a member of Sedona Hiking Club for many years.

On Friday, while making coffee, I saw a large herd of Javelinas run by the window, so I went upstairs, grabbed the camera and took these photos from the back balcony:

Then,  Elaine dropped me off at the Yavapai Vista trailhead.  It is at the last overlook heading South on 179 before you get to Village of Oak Creek.  Our friend Barbara Glass recommended the trails at that location.  I took the Yavapai Vista trail to the HiLine trail and ended up at Cathedral Rock and came down the relatively steep trail to the trailhead parking lot where Elaine picked me up.  The views were spectacular!  Here is a link to the trail write-up by Great Sedona Hikes, and here is another write-up by Palmer

On Saturday morning Elaine dropped me off at the Centennial Trail area on Cultural Park Place, near the High School and Community College, and then picked me up in the Color Cove Street neighborhood off Dry Creek Road.

On our last Spring 2014 day in Sedona, Elaine dropped me of at the Schnebly Road trailhead and hiked up the Mund's wagon trail to where the Hangover trail and then hiked up hangover to where it connected with Cowpies and then returned via the Munds wagon.  While at the top of the hill on Hangover, I lost the trail!  I met a hiker named Stephanie who had been on the trail several times.  She  led me around the North side of the mountain on the trail until it met up with cow pies.  She then went on up to Merry-go-Round overlook, and I returned to the trailhead via Munds Wagon.  Here's a link to the "My Tracks" that, when opened with Google Earth, it shows the whole route I took:  8.88 Mile loop.  Here is link to trail description, and a link to the map in the area: http://www.physics.ohio-state.edu/~palmer/SedonaTrails/Bear's%20Hangover/Hangover.JPG
Below are my photos from the trip: