Hiking to Tom's Thumb

December 30

While Javed and Andrea had breakfast in the hotel restaurant (our plan didn't include breakfast, so we just ate in our room) Dave and I started the day with a bike ride in a nearby park. There's a canal and some ponds, and we saw many egrets and herons, as well as cormorants, geese and ducks. We rode about 5 km north before we were called back to the hotel.

Then we set off in the van to another range of mountains outside the city, to do the Tom's Thumb hike. The biggest outcrop, towards the left of the photo is the thumb. When I saw how high it was, I thought I would never be able to hike up there. But we set off, climbing higher than I imagined possible.

  

Approaching the goal...

at the thumb

under the thumb

I honestly couldn't believe I really made it to the top, so I had to have some photos to remember it...

 

This hike was about 10 km and a bit challenging, due to the steep climbs. The trail surface is smooth pea gravel, easy walking compared to the other trails we hiked, which had large rocks and loose gravel. There were a lot of people out hiking, including some quite young children -- I have to hand it to those parents!

It was a gorgeous day -- about 16 C and sunny -- just perfect for hiking.

Hiking Mormon Trail and Hieroglyphics Trail

December 29

This time we drove to the Mormon Trailhead. It seemed to take almost as long as cycling, although I'm sure that can't be the case, but at least we didn't have to worry about locking up the bikes.

This trail, while it looks somewhat uninspiring at the beginning, turns out to be rather spectacular.  There's a pretty decent climb, leading to panoramic views of the city:

 

and then a few memorable features, such as:

Fat Man's Pass

and Tall Man's Pass

and plenty of striking boulder formations

That was our morning hike -- maybe 6 or 7 km. In the afternoon, we drove farther afield to the Superstition Mountains' Hieroglyphics Trail. When I heard about this trail, I said, "You mean petroglyphs?" No, I was told, "hieroglyphs." OK, if you say so. 

But then when I read about the trail, I learned that the early European settlers thought they were seeing Egyptian writing, resulting in the misnomer. Sort of like American "Indians," I guess.

This trail is about 5 km up a slope to a rocky canyon with pools of water. Lots of saguaro cacti, as well as others -- prickly pear, chollas, barrel cactus, etc.

some of the "hieroglyphs"

 

another ride in Phoenix --to the capitol

December 28

Today we rode straight west on Washington Street to the state capitol. On the way, we passed Tovrea Castle, built by some Italian guy and labeled as a "point of pride" in Phoenix. The grounds of this somewhat out-of-place building are planted with over 500 species of cactus, and this garden in front of the wall had at least 10 of them.

It was about a 20 K ride to downtown Phoenix, and after riding through the ASU downtown campus and past a lot of office buildings, we came to this palm-lined avenue, with beautiful bike lanes, leading to the State Capitol grounds.

I am standing beside a statue of Father Eusebio Kino, who founded many missions in Arizona and California. Obviously he would have ridden a bike if that had been an option.

Dave is looking at the memorial for the USS Arizona. This is part of a sort of outdoor museum and is very impressive.

The Korean War memorial

After wandering around this plaza and looking at most of the memorials (we missed a few, apparently) we decided it was time to find a Mexican restaurant for lunch. Google Maps helped us here, directing us to Azteca Bakeries, so we rode east to 7th Street. Along the way, we rode through a rather down and out area and passed what appeared to be a very large homeless camp. This is always a sad sight, but it seemed especially sad to see this within a stone's throw of the state capitol. 

Azteca Bakeries was just what we wanted in an authentic Mexican restaurant. We sat on a covered patio, where we could keep an eye on our bikes, and enjoyed a delicious meal, just like the ones we had in Mexico. 

I was also curious about Pan de Huevo, so I bought a pink one. It was nothing special, and I only ate a couple of bites, but for 50 cents it was worth a try.

After eating, we wound our way along streets named after U.S. presidents, through an interesting variety of neighbourhoods, finishing up on Oak Street, which led us back to Scottsdale Road and our hotel. This time we rode along the northern border of Papago Park, past a military reserve.

Back at the hotel, we met up with Javed and Andrea, who had driven down in our van, went to Fry's grocery store, and then enjoyed a tasty barbecue dinner (the hotel plaza has gas barbecues for guests to use) while we discussed what to do tomorrow.

Phoenix in December - cycling to Mormon Trailhead

 We're spending a week in Phoenix, 

escaping the minus 15 temperatures and enjoying plus 15 and sun. 

Instead of renting bikes, we decided to buy cheap bikes at Target; the cost was about the same as renting for a week, and we can re-sell the bikes or pass them on to someone else when we get home. 

Actually we were trying to get the bikes from Wal-mart, where they are REALLY cheap, but we walked to what Google Maps told us was the nearest Wal-Mart, and it turned out to be "Wal-Mart on Campus" -- a lite version of the usual behemoth store. They had exactly three bikes, none of which would have been suitable. We also stopped in at a regular bike shop to see whether they had rentals or perhaps some used or budget bikes for sale, but no luck there either. So, we walked the additional 2.6 miles to Target.

The bikes we purchased are definitely lower quality compared to the good bikes we are used to, but they are serving the purpose and are reasonably fast and comfy.

Yesterday we rode down to South Mountain Park, about 20 km from our hotel. We took a variety of trails and roads, some with bike lanes, and it was a really nice ride. We added about 6 extra kilometers to the ride because Dave dropped his phone when he stopped to look over a wall (it involved a bit of a climb) and he didn't realize it was missing till we had gone a fair distance. We were glad we went back for it though, because it was exactly where he thought he had probably lost it, and as good as new.

The route began with a short stretch on a trail that runs along the Salt River and continued with a long stretch on a street with fantastic bike lanes and synchronized lights, a combination conducive to a fast easy ride. On this street we stopped for lunch at a Mexican restaurant, which totally hit the spot. 
Turning west off the bike lane street, we then joined a trail that runs along a canal, lined with palm trees, a small orange orchard and lots of cacti.

A couple of minor wrong turns followed, but we finally found our destination: the trailhead of the Mormon Trail. I got a kick out of this sign -- first of all, it seemed unbelievable to me that anyone would ride a bike on this rocky trail, and secondly because horses obviously rule. Their owners don't have to pick up after them either.

There was nowhere to lock up our bikes, and we really didn't want to take a chance on their being stolen, so Dave waited at the bottom while I climbed part way up. To be perfectly honest, the trail didn't look all that interesting -- just a lot of rock and brush. The view was fantastic, though. 

Dave is the tiny orange dot down below, in the centre of the photo

We took a different route back to the hotel, which led us past the airport. There were bike lanes pretty much the whole way, which was, of course, just super -- we sailed along with no worries! We also rode through a park we had visited the previous day, a perfect end to a 45 km ride.