peak_bgr
New member
Well today Maddi is in her first day of the business meeting so I’m a bachelor for a few hours and looked in the guide book for a short climb in the Scottsdale area. I found Camelback Mountain tucked snug in the middle of town-literally.
There are two routes up this peak I chose the less crowded one-haha- the Cholla Trail. The other is the Echo Trail said to be shorter and steeper. As I drove up to the parking area I could se a line of cars parked along the road, making the Cascade Trailhead look like childsplay. Then I looked at the mountain and there was a line of people going up. A very rough count of people on the way up, and on the summit-250 plus. This is a 1.9 mile hike to the summit with a .8 mile hike up a public road. That’s makes for a very crowded hike with more stepping aside at times than actual hiking. Even with this it was an awesome mountain. The upper reaches were very similar to that found on the Knife edge of Katahdin. There we spots where I had to wait for hikers to come down before I could proceed the trail was that narrow with steep drop offs. No place to rub elbows.
The climb along with that was fairly steep, where hands were used very often for support and actual pulling. The summit had roughly 75 people on it. Some had hiked up many had run up as daily exercise. I had a nice long conversation with a southern bell from Georgia as I spent a good hour just basking in the 75 degree, partly sunny weather.
The trip down was interesting. Try to find a place to go pee on a trail you share with hundreds. I had to bushwhack up a lower saddle just to go to the bathroom in private. While I was there I must have apparently smelled like not so fresh meat as I was being eyed but a rather large turkey vulture. Just as I started back down I heard a helicopter near by, it had decided to hover just below the peak-so I had now shared the mountain with a helicopter as well. That’s a first for me.
I’m not done yet-leave it to me to make a hike interesting all the way to the end. I’m well below the summit and I hear this deafening buzzing around the corner. I know it has to be bees, so I proceed slowly and cautiously around the corner and sure enough theres a black cloud of African bees around this tree just 50 feet off the trail. Stupid me I stop to look and try to take a picture-I guess they don’t like to have their picture taken. I got pounded-only stung once on the forehead but they kept running into me, getting in my hair, hitting me in the face, arms, legs-20 or so I would say put their sights on me. They are nasty little devils and the swarm hard and don’t give up. I was followed running downhill-arms waving-hikers scurrying away from me and I finally got stung over a tenth of a mile from the big swarm. After I was stung once they left me alone. When I plucked the stinger out, it was still attached to a large portion of the hind end. They don’t hurt as much as our wasps or hornets, but they are much for persistent and mean than ours however.
I read about these guys later today and I guess you don’t screw with them, because a full swarm has been known quite often to take down a full grown man. I could imagine a couple hundred stings could have a toxic effect on a person.
Well-two days left and two hikes to go. What to do tomorrow?
There are two routes up this peak I chose the less crowded one-haha- the Cholla Trail. The other is the Echo Trail said to be shorter and steeper. As I drove up to the parking area I could se a line of cars parked along the road, making the Cascade Trailhead look like childsplay. Then I looked at the mountain and there was a line of people going up. A very rough count of people on the way up, and on the summit-250 plus. This is a 1.9 mile hike to the summit with a .8 mile hike up a public road. That’s makes for a very crowded hike with more stepping aside at times than actual hiking. Even with this it was an awesome mountain. The upper reaches were very similar to that found on the Knife edge of Katahdin. There we spots where I had to wait for hikers to come down before I could proceed the trail was that narrow with steep drop offs. No place to rub elbows.
The climb along with that was fairly steep, where hands were used very often for support and actual pulling. The summit had roughly 75 people on it. Some had hiked up many had run up as daily exercise. I had a nice long conversation with a southern bell from Georgia as I spent a good hour just basking in the 75 degree, partly sunny weather.
The trip down was interesting. Try to find a place to go pee on a trail you share with hundreds. I had to bushwhack up a lower saddle just to go to the bathroom in private. While I was there I must have apparently smelled like not so fresh meat as I was being eyed but a rather large turkey vulture. Just as I started back down I heard a helicopter near by, it had decided to hover just below the peak-so I had now shared the mountain with a helicopter as well. That’s a first for me.
I’m not done yet-leave it to me to make a hike interesting all the way to the end. I’m well below the summit and I hear this deafening buzzing around the corner. I know it has to be bees, so I proceed slowly and cautiously around the corner and sure enough theres a black cloud of African bees around this tree just 50 feet off the trail. Stupid me I stop to look and try to take a picture-I guess they don’t like to have their picture taken. I got pounded-only stung once on the forehead but they kept running into me, getting in my hair, hitting me in the face, arms, legs-20 or so I would say put their sights on me. They are nasty little devils and the swarm hard and don’t give up. I was followed running downhill-arms waving-hikers scurrying away from me and I finally got stung over a tenth of a mile from the big swarm. After I was stung once they left me alone. When I plucked the stinger out, it was still attached to a large portion of the hind end. They don’t hurt as much as our wasps or hornets, but they are much for persistent and mean than ours however.
I read about these guys later today and I guess you don’t screw with them, because a full swarm has been known quite often to take down a full grown man. I could imagine a couple hundred stings could have a toxic effect on a person.
Well-two days left and two hikes to go. What to do tomorrow?
