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Kim Smith | profile | all galleries >> Galleries >> Arizona Hikes and Drives - Chapter 8 - Picacho Peak tree view | thumbnails | slideshow

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Arizona Hikes and Drives - Chapter 8 - Picacho Peak

Picacho Peak State Park is located north of Tucson, Arizona. Hiking to the top of the peak seemed like a good idea when we first saw it, so my wife and I and another couple decided that we would all hike the Sunset Vista trail then the "guys" would climb to the peak and return via the Hunter trail. At some point, climbing up a cliff with the aid of steel cables, I'm not sure which of us yelled at the other and asked who the idiot was that decided to do the climb, but one of us commented that he gets vertigo climbing down from the RV. In any event, the photo from 12 miles away shows the peak and the route we took... first driving along the yellow dotted line to the trailhead, then along the back (west side) of the mountains before ascending to the peak. The return route was back down much of the mountain and around the back of the middle peak, then back up to a saddle and eventually descending down the east side to the Hunter trailhead. Thinking this wasn't bad for a 59 and a 60 year old, our confidence was certainly dashed when two teenagers passed us on a steep, cabled section as if they were on a Sunday wander. Worse still was meeting another hiker and his wife or girlfriend at the peak and hearing that he had been up the day before. Climbing the cabled sections on the cliffs was interesting, but the trail sections with cliffs above and below that weren't cabled was, for me, the most "memorable". It was an excellent hike to add to the other Arizona hiking destinations we visited and hiked this winter.
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