For several weeks, John and I had been
talking about returning to the Workman's Creek area so that we could finally
finish the Hell's Hole Trail #284. Since John had been doing a lot of training
with his skydiving team to prepare for the Valentine's Money Meet in Eloy, it
was becoming more and more difficult to pick a date to do our hike.
Fortunately, we had been having a mild winter, so it wasn't as though we had
limited time, but we hadn't gone hiking in a long time, so I was developing
P.M.O.--Past Monthly Outing (which is not any worse than Johns P.M.S.--Past
Monthly Skydive). At first, we had picked January 10 to do the hike, but that
date was cancelled so that John could train with his team and do some work on
the motor home. (Of course, the hike would have been cancelled anyway because
John came down with a nasty cold and had to stay in bed for two days.)
Finally, we decided on the 24th of January. John and I invited his mother to
join us on our ten-mile hike. She even volunteered to drive us there because
usually were the ones who drive. Considering that the road leading to the
trailhead is an all-weather dirt road (SR 288, also known as Young Road), we
agreed.
We arrived at nine o'clock in the morning, after driving for nearly three
hours to get to the trailhead. As we began our hike, we noticed that the sign
at the trailhead indicated that Hell's Hole would be a six-mile hike. Huh? We
had been led to believe that the trail was only five miles long, the last half
a mile of which was a steep decent into Hell's Hole, a rich riparian area at
which we would find the junction of Workman's Creek and Reynolds Creek. If the
trail was indeed six miles long, then we wouldn't make it back to the car
until five o'clock in the evening, and we wouldn't be home until late! We
decided to hike as far as we could get. Then, if it got to be really late, we
would turn around and return to the car.
The Hell's Hole Trail #284 is, in my opinion, a rather moderate trail for the
first four miles. At first it follows an old jeep road through a ponderosa
pine forest that provided us with a lot of shade from the warm sun. The forest
floor was covered with winter leaves that crunched underfoot as we walked
along the road. Then, as we circled around to the south side of the mountain
to avoid trespassing on private land (a nearby ranch), the trail narrowed and
led us into desert shrubs. The terrain also became rocky and steep as it
descended towards a creek; but after we crossed the creek, we were back in the
forest.
Not long after the creek crossing, we entered into the Salome Wilderness Area,
meaning that John and I had to stop for our traditional kiss ("Honey, we're in
another wilderness area together!"). Then we began a long but moderate climb
to the top of the ridge. Once we reached the top, we ran into a group of boy
scouts on a backpacking trip, and John and I decided that a backpacking trip
into Hell's Hole wouldn't be a bad idea, considering that it wasn't that
difficult of a trail. (Either that, or my stamina is getting better!)
After walking across the ridge, we began the steep descent down to Hell's
Hole, on the south side of the mountain. That was when the trail became very
narrow and overgrown, not at all ideal for horses, as it had said in the
literature. However, I expected it to be steeper. All of the trail guides we
had seen indicated that the last part of the trail was extremely difficult,
but I didn't think so at all.
We found our destination at the end of the switchbacks, and we all agreed that
it was worth the hike. Hell's Hole was, in fact, a little piece of heaven on
earth, filled with sycamore and oak trees, through which rushed a cold, clear
creek that probably makes for a wonderful swimming hole on hot summer days. In
the middle of the creek were ten-foot tall boulders, on which we sat to eat
our lunch while we watched the water rush by us.
That was not, however, the end of the trail. After lunch, we left our things
behind and ventured on down the trail for another five minutes. At the very
end of the trail, we found a fifty-foot tall red rock cliff, at the base of
which was a deep pool of water: it truly looked like Hell's Hole!
Having found what we were looking for, it was time to play. John and I decided
to climb the cliff to see what was at the top. I never made it all the way to
the top because John told me that there was nothing to see up there, however,
the climb was easy and fun.
We played until 12:45, then, it was time to go. We knew that the return trip
was going to be a difficult one and that it would probably take us just as
long to hike out of Hell's Hole as it did to hike in. (It had taken us nearly
three hours to complete the hike one-way.) However, we managed to get a good
clip going during the downhill stretches (which compensated for the slow pace
we had going uphill), and we made it back to the car around 4:00. As we left
the trail, we looked back at the sign one last time and argued that the trail
was not six miles in length. We decided that whoever had determined that
Hell's Hole was a six-mile long trail said so because it must have felt like
six miles to him! Considering the length of time it took us to complete the
trail, we are convinced that the trail was only five miles long, ten miles
round trip.
We arrived at home around sunset, thus ending another adventurous day of
hiking. |
