We have planned this weekend escape for some time and are looking forward to it. Not even thunderstoms are going to impact it, or at least that is what we say as we notice that it is supposed to rain, heavily, on both days we are in the area. As we approach Flagstaff we encounter heavy rain and decide on the backup of a backup plan where we notice that maybe it is not raining, yet. And yes, when we arrive at the Walnut Canyon trailhead of the Arizona Trail the weather is cloudy but no rain for now.
The parking lot is almost empty, maybe it is due to the rain or it simply is not that popular. Which would be surprising as it is an easy to access trailhead for the famous Arizona Trail. We decide to explore for some distance or until it starts raining more seriously, there are some caches here that maybe we could get if we hike far enough.
The trail is flat in the beginning and quite well marked which is good as there are many other side roads and trails that go who knows where.
However even with the signs we almost miss the actual trail a few times especially as we also focus on finding a few caches that are grouped around the trailhead. But soon it is time to just hike as the caches gets spaced farther apart.
And then the trail changes as we reach a spring on the way. It seems that this spring is still active as it is covered by a sheet of metal and protected with a fence, this is unusual as most springs in Arizona we visited till now were dry.
The trail now is narrower and starts to descend heavily to a viewpoint over the ancient Walnut Canyon where we can enjoy the great views and search for a cache. But before we get a major scare, as we approach the cache, off trail and not meeting anyone on the trail till now suddenly we hear a voice calling out to us in the middle of the wilderness. Our hearts just jump as we notice a male sitting on a rock and as we exchange greetings we find out that he is here to enjoy the views, really weird that in this exact same spot as the cache.
We tell him why we are here and start searching and in the end he gets bored and gets back to the trailhead just before we find the cache. We now enjoy the views for a while before we make the decision to continue to the next cache and viewpoint as it seems that the rain is not coming, yet.
The trail finally levels up a bit after the steep descent and then we reach something unexpected, we enter the Walnut Canyon National Monument. In fact we enter it and then exit quite soon but it is an interesting break in our hike as we pass the creek and start climbing on the other side back towards the Rim.
The climb is quite tiring but then we finally reach the trail intersection where we have to deviate from Arizona Trail towards the Walnut Canyon trailhead.
The viewpoint is quite nice and we eat some snacks before finding the cache and enjoying the great weather before turning around.
Here we discover there are multiple ways to pass the fence protecting the Rim, for some reason, and we try both of them, we like the flexible one but the stairs type is also quite fun to pass.
As we return we even see the sun for a few minutes, it seems that the storm has passed. Little do we know that the forecast is actually right on the money and the rain will plague our two days here. Returning at the car it is now time to find our hotel and find a place to have dinner tonight.
The hotel we use is the one we discovered during the Subaru event earlier in the year. We liked it then as it is clean and reasonably priced and it is the same this weekend.
For dinner we choose a Thai restaurant that we reach after looking for parking for almost half an hour. The food is good and we enjoy the cooler temperatures here as we make our way back to the car and then the hotel where all night it is raining, not a good sign for tomorrow.
