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| Hiking | 5.10 Miles |
700 AEG |
| | Hiking | 5.10 Miles | 3 Hrs 15 Mns | | 1.57 mph |
| 700 ft AEG | | | | |
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| no partners | | Today we hiked the Gateway Loop Trail(4.4 miles) via the Horseshoe Trail(.7 miles).
We started our hike from the parking lot of the Village Health Club in DC Ranch. In the southwest corner of the parking is the easily recognizable sign for the beginning of the trail. The city of Scottsdale has received permission for hikers to use this lot until the new trail head is built.
The Horseshoe section of the trail is very easy hiking with a slow incline towards the Gateway Loop Trail. A sign greets you to the Gateway loop which we decided to trek in a clockwise direction.
Once we hit the Gateway the incline steepened but never really became what I would call steep as we worked our way up towards the Gateway saddle.
As we trekked along Tom's Thumb popped into view for a bit and the noise of the city, thankfully, started to dissipate.
On the trail we encountered around 8 different hikers and surprisingly about 5 trail stewards along the way.
Most of the elevation change occurs as you hike around the west, north and ceases as you begin in a southernly direction at the saddle. Conversely, most of the decline occurs in the east section of the trail. By the time you reach the south side of the trail, you have dropped nearly back to your beginning elevation. We were thankful that we went in a clockwise direction to get the most aerobic benefit from the hike.
The trail was also ablaze in color. We saw brittlebush, poppies, lupine, scorpion weed, lily and many other species that were not in our vocabulary.
This was one of the most consistently flowered trails we have encountered. The upper elevations featured lupine concentrations that made your eyes smile with glee.
All in all this is a wonderful, close in trail. The only negative we found was the noise of the city on the beginning of the trail. |
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Wildflowers Observation Substantial
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