Winter Travels 2019--Part 19: First hikes at Picacho Peak

Saturday morning we hiked the easy .5 mile Nature Trail and then the .7 mile moderate Calloway Trail, which led to an overlook that allowed us to see a long way to both the south and north sides of the eroded Picacho Mountains. It was partly sunny when we began but mostly cloudy by the end. We got back just in time to move from B5 to B13, where we will stay for two nights. Then we drove back to the Trails to look at their “Memorial Trail”, with lots of information on the farthest west Civil War engagement, which took place at Picacho Peak! I showered and washed my hair in their good bathhouse. We have electricity and a good LTE signal here so I wanted to get some Journal posting done. When we move to Lost Dutchman Mine State Park, near Phoenix, we won’t have electricity and will try, for the first time, to go a week with only the solar panel to generate power.

The Mexican poppies and the Lupine were glorious, even
when the poppies closed with the cloud cover.

Even with a telescope lens the campground looked very far away to
the north from the saddleback ridge at the top of the Calloway Trail.

Marv loves to climb on the rocks!
Such a kid at heart.

You just can't get the perspective on how steep the trail was sometimes.

Looking south from the ridge, over the valley

Such intrepid hikers!

We climbed up to the ridge in the center, just to the
right of the highest peak in this picture. Picacho Peak(not shown), a
landmark for thousands of years, is to the right of this view.

One of the information signs about the Civil War in the Southwest