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AZ Trail Passage 32

6/27/2021 3:36:59 PM | By Dawn Sutherland | Comment on this

This is a two-car shuttle. We dropped one car at the end of the trail at Sandy Seep trailhead, then drove to Schultz Pass Road, through the forest and left the second car at Schultz Tank. That saves a hiker from having to do an "out and back" doubling one's mileage. We'll be hiking seven miles on this segment of the AZ Trail.

And here's where we'll start.

We'll immediately ramble through the ponderosa forest.

There are a lot of trail junctions along the way. Just watch for the AZ Trail signage.

It is May 2 and there's still a bit of snow in the shady spots. We're hiking amid spruce and Douglas fir at this elevation.

The trail turns gently into the sun and in a moment we'll start to see some butterflies on this cool spring day.

Here's a "comma" in the anglewing family. They're one of the early butterflies to emerge in the spring.

And one of the earliest plants to bloom is Mahonia, also known as Oregon Grape, with its fragrant yellow blossoms.

Another early bloomer is Woodhouse Phlox.

This trail is never boring, always leaving a little room for speculating what lies around the next bend.

The trail brings us out into the open affected by a fire. In the distance is O'Leary Peak.

Another trail junction at the two-mile mark.

Time to start looking for a lunch spot. The trail bring us into another wooded section with some enormous boulders. Looks like a nice flat one up ahead.

And here's a little shelter someone constructed!

The character of the trail changes as we hike out into the open with views of North Mountain

As the trail climbs higher we can look back on the distant cinder cones to the east.

Another junction but only another 1.5 miles to go.

We decided to hunt for a geocache that was just off the trail and here was a little surprise in the dried grasses. Can you see it? I didn't either until I nearly stepped on him!

Now do you see him? A beautiful gopher snake and at least 6 feet long. We watched him for a moment, then when he moved on, we found the cache a little further uphill.