Friday Hike – Picketpost Mountain Summit

On Friday, March 6, Bob, Allen, Janet, Bill, and I hiked to the summit of Picketpost Mountain.

Allen sent me this plot of the elevation profile from our hike:

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Here is a plot of our hike (also from Allen). We took a somewhat different path back in some of the steeper, looser sections. The path that we used to go down was somewhat easier than that which we used for the ascent.

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Something isn’t quite right in the first few photos here, but I can’t quite figure out what it is.  Many of my photos from early in the day were in the shade of Picketpost Mountain. It could be that I should have used different techniques for color correcting the portions in the shade.

The hike starts on a portion of the Arizona Trail.  The arrow made out of stones points to the correct path up to the summit of Picketpost Mountain.  We had passed another likely path perhaps a quarter mile prior to encountering this one.

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A view of Picketpost Mountain from the lower slopes.  The hiking path goes up the “crack” just right of center.

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A view looking in the other direction.

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I thought the barrel cactus growing sideways was interesting.
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We saw many agave stalks on this hike.

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I don’t know what these red flowers are…

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Bill enjoys the view from midway up:

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There were a few spots with some exposure…

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This is the view from near the summit. A side path lead to a gap in the boulders.

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There is a mailbox at the summit! We each posed on the bench near the mailbox…

Janet and Allen:

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Bill:

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Bob:

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Kevin:

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This is the story about how the mailbox came to be on the top of Picketpost Mountain:

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The hike to the top of Picketpost Mountain is not especially easy, yet a lot of people have been there.  The mailbox contains a number of summit register books.  (Janet was examining a few that aren’t in the mailbox in this photo.)
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Janet, looking at the summit logs:

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A view of Weaver’s Needle as we started downward.

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Another view from early in our descent:

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This is a Mexican Poppy:

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A lizard:

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This was the last steep section of the descent:

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Kevin, Bill, Bob, Allen, and Janet:

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Much to our surprise, we saw two equestrians coming up the trail.  I don’t think they made it to the top. I’d be surprised if they made it even a quarter of a mile further from this point.

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A view of Picketpost Mountain from the parking lot:

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