My son Alex and I agreed to do a quick overnight trip on the weekend of June 4-5. Alex arrived at the house about 10 AM, we finished packing, grabbed some fast food for lunch and drove up the mountain. The mountain in question being Mount Lemmon, north of Tucson. We both were carrying 24 pound packs, the contents of my pack were like this:
Baseweight: 10 pounds Water: 9 pounds Food: 4 pounds Unknown: 1 poundBecause I had no idea if we would find water, I carried all that I expected to need (4.5 liters), along with my filter in case we found water and wanted even more. As it was, I never used the filter, dumped out 1 liter of water, and gave a liter to a fellow who was running short. I should have kept (and drank) one of those liters, because I did get a bit dehydrated on the hike out. However, I could have left the filter at home and carried only 3.5 liters and been fine.
On top of that, there was water in Lemmon Creek, so I could have carried only 1 liter of water and the filter and been fine. There has always been water in Lemmon Creek every time I have visited, even in summer, and in drought years (like this one: 2011), so I think I can count on it.
We drove to the very top of the mountain, hiked out to the end of "radio ridge" and dropped down the Aspen trail to Marshall Saddle. Then we headed west into the wilderness of rocks, expecting to camp whenever we felt like it. We hiked over 4 miles, past the junction with the Lemmon Rock Lookout trail, then headed south cross country to a rocky ridge and found a superb spot with a view. There is one advantage to carrying plenty of water: no need to be restricted to spots near a water source (and resident pesky insects).
Due to severe fire danger, we did not have a fire (and I did not carry the bush buddy), and we ate our dinner cold, which was fine. I ate a 1.5 pound can of Dinty Moore stew cold and enjoyed it immensely. I need to do more no-cook trips! In the morning, we carefully used the alcohol stove to brew some tea and make instant oatmeal. I am usually desperate without coffee in the morning, but I found some hot tea along with a single 200mg caffeine pill did me just fine. In the future I will try a no-cook hike with just a couple of caffeine pills and save the weight of the stove and the time fussing around in the morning.
A quick comment on the can of stew, which I am sure will raise eyebrows among the ultralight backpacking set. I figure that if I have to carry water, there is no liability (other than the can itself) of carrying fully hydrated canned or fresh food. The empty can weighed 2.5 ounces. I carried an empty plastic bag for the express purpose of packing it out without having it make a mess in my pack.
I actually find a fire to be more of a liability that an asset on most trips. I can appreciate a fire when it is really cold. On the other hand, I don't enjoy smoke in my eyes, clothes that smell like smoke all the next day, holes burned in clothes and equipment by wandering sparks, and the fuss and bother of collecting wood. And then there are the fire scars, and the risk of starting a wildfire. Stoves are virtually always my preference.
We hiked just a bit further west to the junction with the Mount Lemmon Trail, and went south on it just a ways to enjoy the views toward Cathedral Rock. We ran into a couple of guys from Phoenix who were doing hikes in preparation for hiking the John Muir trail later in the summer. They were nice enthusiastic guys, also doing the ultralight thing. They had come up the Romero Trail and were heading for the top, but were out of water and getting ready to go down to Hutches Pool (4000 feet below!) to get water. They were delighted when I told them they could find good water in Lemmon Creek. This encounter confirmed something else I have found to almost always be true. The people you meet in the backcountry are often really nice people.
We hiked up the Mount Lemmon Trail, which even in the morning was getting hot (Tucson temperatures were near 100) and found the spring below the pumphouse was not flowing (one of the few times it has not been). This leads to a whole story of its own (see the tale of the fish below). We got back to the truck at about 11:15AM, after starting hiking at 7AM, so we took about 4 hours to climb the 2000 feet and hike the 5 miles to the top. My load was down to 16 pounds or even less, but I was a little thirstier than I might have liked.
MLD Exodus Pack Exped Down Mat 7 Big Agnes Horse Thief Bag. Mont-Bell pillow Mountain Hardware Conduit Bivy Tyvek ground sheet Sweetwater filter Caldera Alcohol stove Insulated cup Spoon Capilene medium bottoms Patagonia Houdini shell Patagonia R0.5 zip top Flashlight Tiny knife. Maps random odds and endsI wished I had also had a plastic bowl, sunscreen, and a better pillow. I was actually glad to have the thermals, the supposed 35 degree bag, and the bivy. When the night began (at 7200 feet and maybe 65 degrees), there was some breeze, and I was a tad cool until I slipped the bag into the bivy. Then I was cozy and got right to sleep. Later when the breeze stopped, I was maybe a bit overly warm. The lesson in that is that the wind can be a bigger factor than the actual temperature.
I carried or wore:
Wide brim hat paper thin pants (gramicci) polyester shorts (patagonia) thin long sleeve shirt (mountain hardware "canyon")
I wore my wide brim Tilley hat and my long sleeve "Canyon shirt" and even without sunscreen, was fine. This is in contrast to Alex who had a baseball cap and short sleeve shirt and got quite burned on his neck, arms, and to a lesser extent, his face. I chose the hat and shirt explicitly for their expected sun protective benefits. I was surprised, and pleased, at just how effectively they performed. Alex provided an unsolicited "control" for this study, but I wish that he would have had better sun protection. Sunscreen would have been a good addition for both of us.
Another lesson learned on this trip was that even though I am running 10 miles each week, this "easy 10 mile hike" took its toll. My take on this is that my "long" 4 mile runs take less than an hour, whereas when I am hiking, I am going all day long at a pretty high aerobic heart rate, and my knees and feet are getting pounded hour after hour. The conclusion is that to get in shape for long hikes, there is nothing better than long hikes. This is not to say that I am going to give up the running, or that it doesn't yield benefits for hiking.
Well, I kept having a hard time thinking about those two doomed fish, so on Tuesday morning I called the Catalina Ranger Station and found myself talking to a fellow named "Marv". I asked if he had a minute or two, and he said he did have a minute. I told him the story and the first response I got was they weren't going up there and rescue two fish. I told thim that wasn't what I had in mind, but asked if maybe they could talk to the people on the mountain about not pumping around the clock. The answer was no. I was told that "I am not hard hearted, but ..." (Whenever someone says, "I am not a _____, but ..." you know they are about to make an excuse for being exactly that.) I then admitted that I work for the observatory, and at that point he seemed really annoyed and asked me why I didn't talk to them. I pointed out that other wildlife besides the fish were no doubt depending on that water source, but Marv had other more important concerns and my minute or two were clearly up.
I hate to say this, but I have to inject a side note here. I am seeing a pattern in my dealings with forest service, fish and wildlife people, and land managers in general. They seem to view the public as "the problem", rather than "the people we serve". There are notable exceptions of course.
Why indeed? I am not a tree hugger, but .... I had a pretty good idea who I might talk to (although there are new people working up at the summit who I don't know). Something about those two fish that I saw swimming around in that slowly evaporating tank of water was making it hard for me to get to sleep. So I went down to Bob Petersons office and told him the story. He tells me that the observatory usually only pumps from 9PM to 6AM, so that hikers can find water during daylight hours, but the flow rates are slow lately and the pump is working full time. Bob knew about the box, and said that it had been discovered after the Aspen fire. He was amazed to hear that there were two fair sized fish in it. I made my suggestion that maybe they could do something so that a little water escaped to the tank for an hour or so each day. Bob even said that he knew a forest service person he might talk to about moving the fish down to Rose Canyon lake where they would at least have a fighting chance. So, as it all shakes out, I have to say that Bob has a bigger heart than Marv. That and he at least is willing to give me the time of day.
Tom's hiking pages / tom@mmto.org