Graduation Weekend

Today, I'm sharing some of the memories from Curtis' graduation weekend. We had a great time visiting with his parents and giving them a mini-tour to parts of Tucson. One big bonus to being with them is having great pictures to tell the story, thanks to my mother-in-law Julie who is a very skilled photographer!

Good friends, who we will miss terribly!

We attended the College of Science Commencement on Thursday afternoon. Curtis was the 3rd to walk across the stage with the Astronomy class, and after that we sat for another hour and a half watching the other science majors stroll across the stage. We stayed until after the Physics class (Curtis' other major) had their turn, then hurried out before they began the multitudes of Psychology majors. ;) We ran a couple errands, then went to Curtis' favorite restaurant, Cody's Beef and Beans. We met Mitchell and Julianna for a celebratory dinner. :)

Mr. and Mrs. Jorgensen and Mr. and Mrs. Jorgensen. :)

The last Cody's dinner - the end of an era.

On Friday morning, we decided to drive up Mt. Lemmon. Rain was predicted and it was overcast, but as far as we could tell from the foothills, the top of the mountain was not covered in clouds so we went ahead with our plans! However, as we drove up, the temperature kept dropping - which we expected to happen - except it continued dropping, and once it reached 38 degrees we realized we had were not prepared with jackets or anything to keep warm!

Since Curtis' parents enjoy letterboxing, we took them to Kellogg Mountain Trail to find a great series of boxes. We braved the cold and were able to find all the boxes!

Okay, so I gave in and used Charlotte's car blanket. It was really cold! Charlotte's harness looks funny in the above picture because we tied her leash to a tree, and she tried her best to get out of it. :)

After finding the boxes, we drove to Summerhaven and grabbed "lunch" at the cookie cabin. Our "lunch" consisted of 6 cookes, "6 scoops" of ice cream, chocolate syrup, and whipped cream. We ate every last bite, and it was delicious. ;) 

I think the only thing about this that makes us crazy is that we had just been freezing outside, and we decided we needed ice cream.

Then, we began our drive down the mountain. We stopped at Windy Point - it happens to be one of the best lookout points on the Catalina Highway, however Curtis and I had never stopped here together before. Curtis' reasoning for that is because it "stinks" - literally! There are restrooms here, and it is truly a windy point. ;)

I am glad we waited until today to explore here though. It's worth having great photographs of us overlooking our beautiful city. I can't believe we have just over a week left here - we're really going to miss it here!

Overlooking a stretch of the Catalina Highway

Ray & Julie - my in-laws!

Our last stop on the way back was at the Gordon Hirabayashi recreation area. We stopped to read the boards about the history that took place here, get a letterbox, and let Charlotte wander around. She likes to learn about the history through her nose.

My baby!

Remains of the prison camp that was once here at Gordon Hirabayashi

We had some extra time once we were off the Catalina Highway, so we letterboxed our way back to our apartment. We stopped at Case Park, Fort Lowell Park, and the San Pedro Chapel. Curtis and I had been to these places when we first moved here, and it was fun to revisit and remember those days.

We came home and pizza for dinner with Curtis' cousin Gen, who lives here in Tucson as well. We had a great time visiting, and Charlotte soaked up all the attention she could possibly get.

Life's rough when you're the pup. ;)

Other memories from the weekend include:

 ~A potluck at church on Sunday, and fellowshipping with the church family that warmly welcomed us less than 2 years ago and has been such a blessing to us

~going to Tempe on Sunday evening for Curtis' sister Lydia's baby shower, and spending some more time with Lydia, Jeff, Curtis' parents, and our friend Anna

~One last lunch at one of our favorite restaurants (Samarai - hole-in-the-wall, but best sushi in Tucson!) with one of our favorite couples, Austin and Seneca. I can't believe we're already having to say goodbye to our dear friends down here. In the short time here, we've formed such great friendships with some awesome couples, and it's so hard to say goodbye to everyone! (But like we always say, remember you're not losing friends - now you just have places to stay when you want to go on vacation!) ;)

Catalina Crawling

Saturday, April 18, 2015

Sycamore Reservoir Trail & Beyond!

It was the perfect day for a hike in the Catalinas. The temperature in Tucson was 82, but at 4000-5000 feet elevation it was cooler and breezy. We met up with our friends Mitch, Julianna, and puppy Max early in the morning and took off on the Catalina Highway. This time, we went only as far as the Gordon Hirabayashi campground, and began hiking there.

There had been a lot of debate over what hike we should do this weekend. We're training for the "next big thing," as usual, but even with that approaching quickly, we weren't feeling pressured to do anything long and strenuous. It's getting to be too late in the hiking season for long peak hikes that would be mostly in the sun. We've really done all the prominent peaks that we felt we needed to do before leaving Tucson. There were other hikes that were farther away, but going for a longer drive before a long hike didn't sound appealing. In the end, we decided to do hiking in the Catalinas on a trail that would be dog-friendly, because it's always more fun to have our babies come too. ;)

We started off on the Sycamore Reservoir Trail. Curtis, Mitch, and I had done this hike together before in November of 2013. It was the first hike that I really enjoyed when I moved down here. I really highly recommend it to anyone wanting to do a short, enjoyable hike in Tucson. It's only 4 miles round trip, and the uphill and downhill hiking is evenly distributed. The trail takes you up to a ridge and a trail intersection with the Arizona Trail, then down into the valley and to the Reservoir. So for the first mile you're hiking uphill, the second downhill, then back up and finally down to the parking lot.

The area is just gorgeous - today, there was so much green, and the valley was so lush. There were wildflowers all over the place. When we did it in the fall, we enjoyed seeing all the trees with their leaves changing colors. I forgot to bring my camera today, and so all of these pictures were taken with the GoPro. I like the perspective it gives, however it doesn't always capture the bright colors. Oh well. :) 

There is also a lot of history here. The Gordon Hirabayashi Recreational Area is where they kept the Japanese American prisoners of war while they were helping build the Catalina Highway. They also built the dam and reservoir area. 

Nearing the reservoir, and entering the lush green valley!

We made it! We stopped here for a while to enjoy the area.

From here, the water goes on down Bear Canyon and is what fills Seven Falls.

Even Charlotte stopped to enjoy the dam. :)

Charlotte and Max took this time to catch up and play together. :)

They both also really enjoy drinking from Curtis' Camelback. Here they are, begging for more!

After spending time at the reservoir, we continued on the East Fork Trail. Our original intention was to hike 4 more miles to Hutch's Pools. The trail followed a ridge along the hills and started descending more into the valley.

It was around this point where poor little Max had a run in with a prickly pear. Mitch & Julianna did the best they could to remove the thorns, but he wasn't up for walking as much after that. He also had a few other off-trail ventures that resulted in more pricklies in his beautiful golden hair. He really seemed to enjoy being carried by Mitch though!

Because of this though, we were slowed down quite a bit. For the next couple miles, we hiked downhill and then through the valley. We passed the fork with Sabino Canyon and continued just a bit before stopping for a break. It was at this time when Max stepped on yet another cactus, and we made the decision to turn back rather than continuing the last mile to Hutch's Pools. We had reached the lowest part of the trail, and the reason why we were doing this was to train for hiking down, then up rather than the usual opposite. We thought it'd be better for the dogs too - and we weren't completely positive that dogs were allowed in that area. 

We weren't too terribly disappointed though, it was still a gorgeous hike on a perfect day, and we know that we are in shape for anything right now. We still managed to hike 10 miles today, which isn't bad at all! We hiked back up the trail and returned to the reservoir to have lunch.

While we were there, Charlotte and Max continued playing and being silly, and I think at some point she hurt her foot. I noticed her limping as we were finishing the last 2 miles, and so Curtis carried her back the rest of the way just in case. (She is fine now!) Now she may look smaller than Max, but she is actually twice his weight. Carrying her 2 miles is no easy feat! She's also an awkward dog to carry, and after a while she got tired of it. No, neither of these sweet dogs are invited on our next adventure. Sorry kids, we still love you! ;)

We made it back to the Jeep, then drove back down the mountain. At the beginning of the mountain drive, we saw several cop cars blocking off the other lane, not allowing anyone to drive up. I looked it up online later and learned that there was a small fire up past Summerhaven, the town at the top. They were calling it the "Miami Fire," and it burned 6 acres, mostly in Carter Canyon and on private property. We didn't see anything, but we are glad it was contained and no person or building was affected!

And that was our adventure - 10 beautiful miles in the Catalinas. As I mentioned, the hike to Sycamore has been a favorite of mine since we started hiking, and if you're looking for a hike in Tucson you should definitely check it out!

Hump Day Hike

Wednesday, April 15, 2015

Green Mountain Trail and Guthrie Mountain

Yesterday, we decided to go for a hike. We'd been wanting to try another trail from our "100 Hikes in Arizona" book. The trail we chose was Green Mountain trail, which got great reviews from both the book and other informational websites. Curtis checked it out on his map of the Catalina Mountains, and saw that if we just added 2 more miles, we could reach the peak of Guthrie Mountain. Since we are training for our next big adventure, we decided to go for it.

One of the reasons why we chose to do this hike in the middle of the week was because we thought traffic would be lighter on the Catalina Highway. We were also hoping to be alone on the trails. It was just under 7 miles altogether, you know, no big deal. ;) We slept in, took our time getting ready, and left home around 9. Charlotte was SO excited to have this surprise mid-week adventure. :)

We started at the Upper Green Mountain Trail trailhead. It was about 18 miles up the Catalina Highway. The Jeep's thermometer read a brisk 54 degrees, and there was a constant breeze - but it felt great compared to the heat that we've been having down in Tucson. For a brief moment, I even thought I'd be cold on the hike. But of course once we started walking, it was comfortable hiking weather.

Facing North, somewhere along the Green Mountain Trail

The trail started by going up just a bit, and was shady thanks to the beautiful pine trees. Once we reached the ridge, we started hiking down steeply on the East side. There were short and steep switchbacks that took us down a ways until the trail evened out for a bit.

I decided that this is my favorite part of the Catalina Mountains. We've done a lot of hiking in the Pusch Ridge Wilderness Area, (almost everything West of the Catalina Highway), but the 2 hikes we've done on the East side (this one and the Kellogg/Bigelow trail) far surpass those for me. I feel like the views to the East are so much better (you'll see why in a bit, also refer to the pictures on Bigelow Mountain) and I love hiking these trails with the pine trees all around. I guess that maybe it's also because the trails we've done on the East side started up pretty high thanks to driving up the Catalina Highway, so we didn't have to gain as much elevation either. Either way, this one easily became one of my favorite hikes in the Catalina Mountains!

Facing West, toward other peaks in the Catalinas

We followed the Green Mountain Trail all the way to the end, where it meets with the Lower Green Mountain Trail and the end of Bear Canyon. After retrieving a Geocache, we set off on the last mile to Guthrie Mountain. The maps at the trailhead didn't show this trail, but it wasn't any harder than the ones it did show. We knew it existed thanks to Curtis' map of the Catalinas. This trail took us up to a ridge, then back down, and then almost straight up Guthrie without any switchbacks. It wasn't anything like the Pusch trail, but it was still a challenge. 

The hardest part at the end was when the wind picked up as we were walking along the ridge right at the end. It made it difficult to even stand, and we're lucky it didn't take our hats with it! Charlotte seemed to do fine, even with her ears blowing this way and that. Right at the end was a steep rock section which we had to climb up, and Charlotte conquered it without a second thought. I wish I had 4 legs like her, this hiking thing would be so much easier. ;)

Facing Southeast

We followed the trail to the Southern-most end of the peak. We enjoyed looking out at all the different mountain ranges that we could see. We think we could see as far as the Mule Pass in Bisbee, and possibly even the Chiricahua peaks in the far distance. 

Facing Southwest, with the Santa Ritas in the background

We also had a great view of the Rincon Mountains to the South. Unfortunately, we haven't been able to do a peak hike over there - those trails are so long, and it seems like the window of weeks to be able to hike them is so small. The day that we had planned to hike to Rincon Peak ended up to be rainy, and we never got a chance to reschedule it because it just got so warm again. Bummer!

We enjoyed resting, taking in the sights, and eating peanut butter. We hadn't seen anyone else up till this point, and we were loving it. However, the wind was making it very cold, and I always get nervous when it's so quiet when we're hiking alone. I feel like there's something hiding somewhere, watching us...

Thankfully that was never the case for today. :)

Oh, and I FINALLY got a picture of Charlotte mid-shake!! It was even more glorious than I could ever imagine. Silly girl. :)

I'd like to call this piece of art "The Face of a Proud Basset." Proud because she hiked to another beautiful peak. We're proud of you too, Charlotte. :)

We got one quick picture thanks to auto-timer, then began our hike back. It was still blustery as we walked, and we tried to hurry to the end of Guthrie trail and back on Green Mountain Trail where the ridge blocked the wind for us. We had started the trail around 10 and made it to the end before 12, and managed to make it back to the trailhead in 2 hours. It wasn't quite as shady as it had been earlier, and we still had quite a bit of steep uphill sections to hike. Charlotte needed a little extra convincing and water to make it back. :)

We saw other hikers for the first time in the last mile of our hike. It was a group of guys going backpacking out there. I couldn't help but be jealous because I started thinking about how great the sunrise would be - it's hard to see a good one in Tucson because the Rincon Mountains stand in the way. Anyway, they all loved Charlotte, but she was scared of them because they all were wearing huge backpacks. Poor girl.

Oh, and the funny thing is we ended up at the wrong trailhead. I'm not sure how we got off, but we reached a trailhead that was just a ways further North on the Catalina Highway than the one where we parked. Curtis ran down the road to bring the Jeep to us, while I distracted Charlotte with more peanut butter. She always gets so nervous to see Curtis leave without us, so she was relieved when the Jeep came around and I told her "There's Daddy! He came back!" 

As we were driving back, we noticed that all the other mountain ranges that we could see earlier were starting to get hazy. It must have been that crazy wind's doing, and it only got hazier as the day went on. I'm so glad we hiked this when we did, because we were able to see things very clearly. 

I love that we were able to go hiking in the middle of the week. It's so fun to be able to break up routine with an adventure in a beautiful place. This is one of those trails that I'd highly recommend to anyone looking for hikes in Tucson!