The Huachucas---Last Weekend (04_07)---Worse than I imagined
Posted: Apr 11 2002 5:42 pm
The Plan: Twelve mile loop, 2 ½ days. Check out the damage from last month’s fire in the Huachuca Mountains in southern Arizona (about 2000 acres). Also, to learn the status of Bear Spring in Bear Canyon (likewise in the Huachucas) after months of use by government agencies and illegal entrants.
What Happened: At the trailhead at 3 p.m. it was hailing. I knew that a weak front was passing through Tucson, 100 miles north. However, the system was stronger and I had no desire to do a storm hike. So I went to turn-of-the-century-mining town of Bisbee, AZ 30 miles to the east, rented a room at the Bisbee Inn, went to the Stock Exchange Bar and ordered up a burger. I drank a few beers, played some pool and thought about trying again the next day to do the hike.
Sunday, 10 a.m., it was a beautiful windy sunny day, about 60 F at the Reef Townsite Trailhead (7800 ft.). There were a few vehicles in the lot belonging to folks doing day hikes to Carr Peak (9200 ft). I passed couples and one family who were coming down. Then I stopped and talked with a solo hiker in his late fifties who knew the Huachucas as well as I did. He told me the extent of the burnt areas. I told him I was going to be camping in upper Ramsey Canyon after checking out Bear Spring. His expression changed.
Two weeks ago he saw a steady stream of Entrants; so much so that there were two trails going down upper Ramsey Canyon to Brown Canyon. In broad daylight he saw them, he said. That night’s campsite was right on their path. I thanked him and we parted. Soon I came to the burned area. Having never visited a freshly torched forest, I took fifty photos.
After reaching the ridge above Miller Canyon I found that one of the best campsites in the Range was destroyed. The fire did a lot of damage to the lightly forested, highly “duffed” site. Looking around, it was obvious that there was more than just fire damage. Trash everywhere. Empty tins, soda cans, toilet paper, wrappers, etc. Entrants coming up the canyons from the Border just five miles away had forged a new path on the ridge top. It was not like this six months ago when I was there for a storm hike.
I certainly do not blame the folks who are making these paths. Even for causing fires and littering on their newly found causeway. What is happening is the result of a poorly thought out, badly implemented policy of trying to close the border. It should have been obvious that when the easy access points are closed, guarded and/or monitored, the more difficult ones will be used. So now, when citizens want to visit the National Forest, Wilderness Area, National Memorial and Nature Conservancy which are in the Range we have to worry about being approached on the backcountry trails and trailheads. Last year, two women were robbed at gunpoint by four bandits of their truck and twenty dollars. They had just left the trailhead parking and were headed down the access road.
I could not think of a place safe enough to pitch the tent that night and so hiked the four miles back to the truck. It is a sad state of affairs when a person can not feel safe in the U. S. Nothing in Nature scares me as much as having to deal with the unpredictable human.
The Huachucas have become an area of hazardous hiking. Twenty-five years of hiking and observing there will have to come to an end.
What Happened: At the trailhead at 3 p.m. it was hailing. I knew that a weak front was passing through Tucson, 100 miles north. However, the system was stronger and I had no desire to do a storm hike. So I went to turn-of-the-century-mining town of Bisbee, AZ 30 miles to the east, rented a room at the Bisbee Inn, went to the Stock Exchange Bar and ordered up a burger. I drank a few beers, played some pool and thought about trying again the next day to do the hike.
Sunday, 10 a.m., it was a beautiful windy sunny day, about 60 F at the Reef Townsite Trailhead (7800 ft.). There were a few vehicles in the lot belonging to folks doing day hikes to Carr Peak (9200 ft). I passed couples and one family who were coming down. Then I stopped and talked with a solo hiker in his late fifties who knew the Huachucas as well as I did. He told me the extent of the burnt areas. I told him I was going to be camping in upper Ramsey Canyon after checking out Bear Spring. His expression changed.
Two weeks ago he saw a steady stream of Entrants; so much so that there were two trails going down upper Ramsey Canyon to Brown Canyon. In broad daylight he saw them, he said. That night’s campsite was right on their path. I thanked him and we parted. Soon I came to the burned area. Having never visited a freshly torched forest, I took fifty photos.
After reaching the ridge above Miller Canyon I found that one of the best campsites in the Range was destroyed. The fire did a lot of damage to the lightly forested, highly “duffed” site. Looking around, it was obvious that there was more than just fire damage. Trash everywhere. Empty tins, soda cans, toilet paper, wrappers, etc. Entrants coming up the canyons from the Border just five miles away had forged a new path on the ridge top. It was not like this six months ago when I was there for a storm hike.
I certainly do not blame the folks who are making these paths. Even for causing fires and littering on their newly found causeway. What is happening is the result of a poorly thought out, badly implemented policy of trying to close the border. It should have been obvious that when the easy access points are closed, guarded and/or monitored, the more difficult ones will be used. So now, when citizens want to visit the National Forest, Wilderness Area, National Memorial and Nature Conservancy which are in the Range we have to worry about being approached on the backcountry trails and trailheads. Last year, two women were robbed at gunpoint by four bandits of their truck and twenty dollars. They had just left the trailhead parking and were headed down the access road.
I could not think of a place safe enough to pitch the tent that night and so hiked the four miles back to the truck. It is a sad state of affairs when a person can not feel safe in the U. S. Nothing in Nature scares me as much as having to deal with the unpredictable human.
The Huachucas have become an area of hazardous hiking. Twenty-five years of hiking and observing there will have to come to an end.
Very sad report. I lived in Cochise County for a while in the 70s and know the area you described very well (Old man Bledsoe sicced the dogs on us once for sneaking into the Ramsey narrows from Carr).