It is a long drive into the area we want to explore today however all is quiet given the date, Christmas Day. We drive throuh Cave Creek admiring the metal sculptures along the way and the via paved and unpaved roads, passing flocks of bluebirds on the way, to the trailhead right after the previously developed Seven Springs Campground area.
The trail passes first behind the former campground before dropping near the creek that we have to follow for the day. It is relatively cold outside and the water makes it feel even colder so we hope we don’t need to cross it by getting wet which would be a bummer.
This portion of the trail is level and beautiful as it follow the flowing creek and we enjoy the many birds around in the crisp mountain air. One of the things that this trail is famous for are crested saguaros and soon we find our first one, quite cool!
We do have to cross the creek multiple times, seemingly always where it is largest. All of them are dry crossing but we almost make one a wet crossing by falling into it. At the last second we recover, phew, and stay dry and a lot more careful at subsequent crossings.
We continue finding crested saguaros throughout the area and some of them are really scenic, as is the general landscape near the trail and creek.
How cold is it? It is so cold that there is ice on the trail at midday that never melts this season. So yeah really happy that we didn’t fall into the creek…
We find a few caches along the way and are also exploring ways to get at other ones. There are a few official trails and many mining trails and we try to map them in our mind for future visits. And then it is time to return back to the car and to Phoenix after a great Christmas day in nature.
