This photo was taken several minutes before sunrise at McDowell Mountain Park. Once the sun actually rose, the orange glow in the clouds pretty much disappeared.
Tag: Friday Fitness Hike (page 36 of 36)
Today’s fitness hike started at the Trailhead Staging Area. We hiked about a mile of the Pemberton to the Scenic. We then hiked the ridgeline of the Scenic Trail and descended the big rocky hill towards the wash. Just before entering the wash, we turned left onto the new trail which took us to the Horse Staging Area. From there we crossed the main park road and hiked the service road, crossing the Sport Loop twice. That dumped us into Stoneman Wash where we hiked back to Pemberton. From there, we hiked nearly a mile back to the parking area. Total distance was 7.1 miles.
There were five of us today: Janet, Bob, Linda, Marilyn, and me.
A view from the Scenic Trail:
Another view from the Scenic Trail. Red Mountain is visible in both of these shots.
Four of us met for the fitness hike today in McDowell Mountain Park: Bob, Linda, Janet, and me. Starting at the Wagner Trailhead, we hiked Wagner to Granite where we turned right. We then hiked to the large wash that must be crossed three quarters of a mile or so before coming to the Bluff Trail. This wash feeds into Stoneman Wash, but we turned “upstream” and hiked up the wash until we came to the Pemberton. We then took Pemberton over to Bluff and Bluff back to Granite. From there, we hiked back to the Wagner Trail which took us back to our vehicles. Total distance hiked was a little over seven miles.
We had cloud cover today which kept the temperatures down. A light breeze also helped to keep us cool. The clouds highlighted rays emanating from the sun, producing interesting colors too.
Here is a photo of the wash that we hiked just after leaving the Granite Trail. The colors are kind of funky due to the mode set on the camera.
Here is a photo of Bob, Janet, and Linda:
Here’s another photo of the sky. Four Peaks can be seen at the right in this photo.
We had a small group for our hike this morning, just Bob, Linda, and myself. Starting at the Wagner Trailhead, we hiked Wagner to Granite and then turned right on Granite. We took Granite to the new trail, which I’ve been calling the Granite Tank Trail because it terminates at Granite Tank. Anyway, we took it all the way up to the Granite Tank just off the Pemberton. We then took Pemberton over to Bluff and Bluff back to Granite, then back to Wagner, and back to the trailhead.
Total distance was 9.7 miles. We hiked it in two hours and thirty-seven minutes, stopping for only nine seconds along the way. Bob had gotten a piece of buckhorn cholla stuck in his calf and he needed those nine seconds to pull it out.
I didn’t take any photos during the hike, but I did snap a few shots at around sunrise just before the hike started. I tried metering off the blue sky as discussed in Bryan Peterson’s book Understanding Exposure. I don’t think the camera locks the exposure, however, when pressing the shutter release button halfway in. If it did, I would expect area of sky above the clouds to look blue. I’ll have to experiment with it on my NEX-7, which I understand how to use better, and see what happens. Even so, the results weren’t completely horrible…
