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On Sunday morning Shane and JayR decided to head back to Phoenix that morning with Raylynn and Tennelle, so that left only six vehicles for the Sunday line-up: myself and Shan, Kyle, Ron, Brett, Seapahn and Chris. The group was dwindling, but still a good size. The wheeling group broke camp about 30 minutes behind my proposed departure time, so we were doing pretty well. | ||
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Our first destination was a frontier cabin northwest of Sedona off of Dry Creek Road. Someone had done some restoration work on it since I had last been there a number of years ago. It was nice to see someone taking care of it, but the restoration work also took away something of the cabin's mystique. Perhaps I shouldn't criticize, but it would have been nicer if they had made an attempt to make the necessary repairs more seamless with the original part of the cabin. The new material stuck out like a sore thumb. | |
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My planned route was thwarted at the cabin. A road shown on my topographic map connecting Dry Creek Road to another road to the north was closed. That meant we had to back track quite a ways to tie in to the route further on. The Sedona area has changed quite a bit since I last used it as my stomping grounds, and it hasn't been for the better. Everything was crowded and you couldn't escape the infernal Red Rock Pass areas. After a couple of stops, we decided to skip over several of the trails planned for the day and head towards Jerome for a couple of trails in that area. But first we had to stop for a bit to let Chris show off his QuickAir2 to allow Brett to air up, and also to work on Ron's broken rear track bar. We were soon on the highway headed west though. | |
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In Cottonwood, Brett split off from the group and headed back home and we climbed up to Jerome. We missed our turn-off in Jerome and ended up in the center of town, which was really bustling that day. Finally, we all made it out of the crowds and onto a trail on the eastern flank of Mingus Mountain. The trail was easy, but what it lacked in difficulty, it more than made up in scenery. We had distant views of Sedona and the San Francisco Peaks near Flagstaff along much of the trail. It was a breathtaking drive. And we nearly had the entire trail to ourselves! That in and of itself was worth the being there. We didn't encounter another vehicle until we got near the southern end. It's a good thing too, because the trail was very narrow along most of it's length and passing would have been difficult at best. | ||
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The Mingus Mountain trail intersected our final trail of the day called Goat Peak, which would lead us towards the sleepy town of Cherry. It was getting on towards evening at this point and I think everyone was anxious to head for home, so we made very quick work of this easy trail. It was pedal to the metal and don't mind the dust. Once off the trail, we headed east through the town of Cherry and on towards Camp Verde. We all gathered at the Texaco to air up, and make plans for either going home or going to dinner. Shan and I had a long drive back to Tucson ahead of us, so we opted to head home, as did Kyle. A school boy has to get his homework done sometime! Seapahn, Ron, and Chris all decided to grab some grub before heading home. Despite the perfect opportunity they had gotten their fill of those prime Texaco steaks the night before, so I think they went out for Mexican. Kyle, Shan and I said our good-byes and headed south. I didn't want to go home, but I still have the memories of a great trip with a great group. | ||
