A Horizontal & a Vertical Hike

Friday's schedule hike was to Picket Post, a mountain about 20 miles east of Gold Canyon. Arrangements were made for a group to climb up the mountain and another group to walk part of the AZ Trail along the base of Picket Post. Curt chose the vertical and I the horizontal.

 This is Picket Post, an elevation of 2000' and a hike of 4.5 miles.

There goes the vertical group. I had asked Curt if he had his nitro and to please tell somebody in the group where he 'stored' the pills. Ken, another vertical hiker had his nitro tablets, too.

This was part of the group that chose to hike the AZ Trail, very little elevation and a total of six miles. My plan was to hike two miles in and two miles back out.

Looked like my kind of trail, wide, no rocks to speak of, very visible, but...

it was the wrong trail. Dan climbed a hill to find the rest of our group of 29 hikers and found another group of six had also fallen behind and weren't on the right trail either.

Our group of 29 finally got together, on the correct trail, and proceeded along the base of Picket Post.

In the meantime the sixteen Picket Post hikers were well on their way up the mountain. If you click and enlarge this picture and look carefully in the center, you can find a line of people and Curt's green shirt, snaking their way up the side of the mountain.

At one point the group is scrambling over boulders on their assent. This is one of Curt's photos.

At one point on my return trip I looked up and saw Weaver's Needle to the west.

 Interesting that Curt also took a picture of Weaver's Needle from the summit of Picket Post.

 Curt and the group of sixteen returned safe and sound and without incident some three hours after the AZ Trail group completed their six mile hike. The vertical group had just made it to the top as we  completed our six miles.

The AZ Trail hike was also without incident. It was a perfect day to be out in the desert and mountains of Arizona. Much better than shoveling snow!