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| Hiking | 12.03 Miles |
5,026 AEG |
| | Hiking | 12.03 Miles | | | |
| 5,026 ft AEG | | | | |
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| partners | | I have been telling my bruddah about this hike for a while, and today he worked up the gumption to check out my beloved Pinals with me. We went up Telephone to Doghouse Spring then Icehouse then Pineline then Middle until the road at which point a bunch of cows were blocking its passage into the nice aspen grove (the section between where Middle crosses the road on the way to its junction with the upper end of Sixshooter) to Pinal Peak then Ferndell and finally down Sixshooter. Let's just say that my bruddah has a newfound respect for the Pinals, and he's going to be hurting for the next few days. 
I wasn't expecting much autumn color, and Icehouse only had a fair amount. The aspens are done, and there were a few bigtooth maples that were still pinkish. However, there was some spectacular color in Sixshooter Canyon about 2/3 of the way down from the Telephone/Sixshooter junction to the road. Still good golden color on a lot of gambel oaks and my friend the New Mexico locust.
Saw 2 whitetail does with 2 fawns on Pineline, and also saw my first coatimundi. The little bugger scampered away before I could get a nice shot of it, and it was across the drainage in Icehouse anyway. My brother thought it was a badger (even though it had its long monkey-tail sticking straight up in the air, a long snout, long legs, and was most certainly a coatimundi....), and joked that he should have set his dogs on it. I told him that that would be a very bad idea if it were a badger, and probably just as bad for the dogs to go after a coatimundi (which probably had its troop nearby, and would climb into the trees anyways). Not just from the standpoint that I'm not a big fan of setting dogs onto wild animals, but that the dogs would probably come out of it in pretty rough shape. He was joking, people. Saw a lot of lion tracks.
We encountered a very sick-looking skunk sitting in the shade of the tree that is in the middle of the FR 651/651B (road to Signal Peak) junction just before the southern terminus of the Pineline Trail. It was broad daylight, and it didn't seem very concerned about us even though we had my brother's "Hate Crew." The Hate Crew are actually 2 very nice lab-mix dogs who deserve a more appropriate moniker like "Super Enthusiastic Crew." I got upwind of it, and started taking pictures, and it then awkwardly walked away into upper Sixshooter Canyon. It was bizarre seeing a skunk (I believe a hooded skunk) in broad daylight acting so uninterested in 2 people with 2 dogs. I'm guessing it had rabies, and isn't long for this earth. I remarked that if I had a gun I probably would have done it a favor, but I'm not sure of the legality of putting a probably-rabid skunk out of its misery.
I'm having a major idiot attack with respect to using my Garmin Oregon 400t. For some reason I cannot correctly record my track! Ugh. Therefore, the distance and AEG are based upon what Grasshopper has provided from November 2008. |
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Autumn Foliage Observation Moderate
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Wildflowers Observation Isolated
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