Today we want to explore a piece of state trust land near Gold Canyon that we visited before. However we want to try a different route and find a few caches that we missed during our previous hike. The parking is near busy US60 and then after crossing the gate we start on our hike.
The trail we follow is an old road that parallels the busy road. It has a quite few caches that are relatively easy to find and the views can be quite good so we enjoy the walk. The only problem is that we can barely hear any birds and ourselves due to the noise from the road.
To our happiness after about one mile the trail swerves away from the highway and it is becoming quieter. On this stretch we make a weird find out of a sci fi movie, a fire hydrant in the middle of the desert that certainly seems to be connected…to something.
As the road becomes more overgrown we fight a losing battle with the grasses that try to stick on us and hitch a free ride to a different part of the desert. At least the views of the Superstition Mountains are great and the terrain is still flat as we start to loop back towards the main road in the area.
As it is quite usual on this parcel of State Trust Land there are signs of habitation from homeless people and we even find an active camp that we avoid. We also do our best to avoid the ants that are out in force, we can’t stop anywhere without stepping on an anthill.
The area also seems to be a hotspot for aviation. There are lots of commercial planes flying over but the more interesting one is a paraglider that flies above us and relatively close, we were wondering a bit about the sound before looking up.
While the desert here is not as full of cacti as other areas around Phoenix it is still quite scenic and we enjoy the hike until it is time to return back to the car as the sun is setting. Overall we made about 9 miles and found tens of caches on a beautiful day which made this a very successful outing.
