Keep in mind the recent weather conditions: ie moisture on the mountain, rain, cold nights, hot days, direct sunlight and less daytime light. All of these conditions can kick decomp into overdrive. A body could easily "badly" decompose in a matter of 3 days in Arizona.

Out of curiosity, are service dogs allowed on the trails?

I agree that people have the right to be fearful or wary from experience if there is a dog off leash and whatnot. But it's the irrational reactions that get to me the most. I have been on trail with off leashed dogs that were well behaved...didn't bother me. But regardless of how well I know my dog ...

My husband and I are going to be meeting a prospective Hiking Buddy on Saturday.

She is a 10 month old Australian Kelpie Mix, and would make a perfect sister to our pup Jackson.

I'm so excited! Can you tell?

if they're charging you, they're not trained. Period. exactly, a dog that is properly trained is taught to pay attention and mind your directions regardless of distractions. When I was hiking on Hieroglyphics Trail on Sunday, a lady froze up several meters ahead of us on the trail. At this time I w...

I know that I am quite late to this thread. However I can't agree more with many of you. Leash laws exist because of the owners. I can't tell you the number of times that I'm out walking Jackson, or on a trail with him (what have you) and someone exclaims "Oh, he's trained?!" Frankly I'm s...

My husband and I have recently begun hiking....quite honestly I've never done a trail besides Windcaves at Usery, Siphon Draw to FlatIron, and First Water Trail to Canyon Lake. We would love to find some easy-moderate hikes that are close by (30-45 minutes) to the East Mesa-Apache Junction area. Ide...

WriteLots: Yeah, we've been hiking with Jackson (our dog) for several months now. But he carries the first aid kit and other supplies that stay in there the whole trip. Jackson loves his booties. I know some people that think that it's stupid that I put him in the booties, that a dogs paws should be...

I've never been to the North Rim before, so it should be an interesting experience. Especially for our dog - he's the whole reason we've started hiking.

According to all the information I've read on the trail....it doesn't require any permits at all

What a nice sense of community..everyone looking out for me since I said I've never gone backpacking before. :-) But lets give me just a little credit that I'd research a trail before deciding on it. The trail I'm doing...is actually several trails. It's Rainbow Rim, and is a total of 18 miles one w...

The only reason I hadn't completely considered the Aura 65 is because I am only 5'2" and even the small packs seem a little tall to me. And I don't want to move down to the kiddie packs. My husband will be getting a pack too and we'll be splitting the loads....so I don't think I'll be carrying ...

Well I also got $150 worth of REI gift cards for my birthday since I told my family I was really getting into hiking. The backpacking trip to the Grand Canyon is planned for late June, early July. So we've got like 5 months to do some practice trips.

My husband and I are planning a 3 day backpacking trip on the Northern Rim of the Grand Canyon, and I was looking for a good pack. We haven't been backpacking before, but we plan on doing a couple little ones before our Grand Canyon trip to test out everything. I was looking at packs at REI today......