Four Peaks

Way back a month ago, during Easter weekend, I took a trip to Four Peaks. My goal was to ride up to the trailhead on Friday, camp the night, and hike to the top of Browns Summit Saturday morning before coasting all the way home on the bike. Goal not accomplished.

The stuff I packed—sans Nutmeg the Wondercat.

Packed up and almost ready to go.

Four peaks is east and a little north of town. My escape from the city entailed riding the same old roads, though I kept an eye out for oddities and new places to explore, being as how I had all day to ride a mere 100km.

Scottsdale tourists on elliptical-machine bicycles.

Detour!

Scottsdale: where bike paths look like miniature roads.

First view of Four Peaks, from the top of the Shea Blvd hill in Fountain Hills.

The weekend was especially hazy. In the photo above, Four Peaks is about 25 miles away as the crow flies. Most days it's clearly visible through the dry desert air, but this was not a weekend for stunning long-range photography.

Lunch! And dinner!

Riding the shoulder of the Beeline Hwy in the wide-open Sonoran Desert.

Tonto National Forest: a really big forest of, um, cacti.

The cacti look a lot healthier away from the lush city.

My earlier fears of getting lost in the desert were unfounded.

After a few hours riding through the city and an hour on the Beeline, I began the earnest part of this trip—the 20 miles of unpaved forest road up to the trailhead.

Forest Road 143: kinda like riding cobbles, I guess.

The forest road wasn't in as good of condition as I hoped—but it was better than I feared. Many sections of the road looked like the section in the photo above: hard, jutting rocks filling out the road's spine and a narrow, bumpy, washed-out strip of sand on each side. And steep.

Where's Waldo? Find the campers.

Heading south? Um?

For the hiking portion of the trip, I brought along my wrist compass. I thought I was clever to strap it to my bike's stem. But for some reason the compass thought my heavy, steel bike was always due north.

Forest Road 143 is a twisty one. But photos fail to capture the essence of gradients.

Notice the subtle changes in flora.

The only water I saw out there. Good thing I packed 2½ gallons on my way in.

Obvious change in flora—real grassland.

A big, cool-looking rock.

Was it the thinner air's effects on my brain, or was that rock on the right giving me the finger?

Maybe I should have trained for this ride. Shortly before reaching the top of the first climb, exhaustion surpassed pride while I passed a pickup truck going the other way. I waved down the driver and asked how much farther. “Oh, maybe another four or five miles. You'll see the peaks after cresting the next hill.” It was exactly what I needed to hear.

First climb done. Time to eat!

But as I ate my Veggie Delight sub, I gazed upon the valley between me and Four Peaks. I was going to ride across that down below? And then up that on the other side? I needed every Calorie of confidence the sub provided.

Snow!

The second climb, the one across the valley two photos above, was tough. And I was not prepared. The elevation, though only around 5000ft, got to me. The sandy, bumpy, washed-out road got to me. I climbed in my 26x34 granny gear—that's one-and-a-half pedal revolutions per wheel revolution. Any gear higher was too high. But the granny gear was causing my back tired to spin-out in the sand. So I had to stay seated to keep weight on the back wheel, while my legs were planning a strike.

I turned the cranks. One at a time. And then I couldn't anymore. I got off and pushed my bike. And when walking hurt more than riding, I got back on and rode. I switched riding and walking a few times, all the while the road went up, up, up—switchback by switchback. Eventually I gave up and promised myself I would stop at the next spot suitable for camping.

The top of Forest Road 143!

That next suitable stop turned out to be the top of Forest Road 143.

Now, my original plan was to ride to the trailhead. That was another mile or two farther—about another 500ft up a side road. No way. I was tired. I was nauseous. I was done. I set up camp where I was.

They put bike parking spots everywhere on this planet.

I camped on this side of the road. My food-containing pannier camped on the other side.

I arrived in late evening, and it got dark and cold fast. I put on my wool layers and slid inside my bag and bivy. I read for a while and then fell asleep.

I expected to spend a night isolated in quiet wilderness. But at night the ATVs came out. Lots of them. You hear them from miles away.

I woke up a lot during the night. First it was the ATVs. Then it was the penetrating cold. I have a slight claustrophobia and don't like to get too snug in a sleeping bag. But that night I zipped up the bag all the way and cinched the face hole as closed as it would go, and I zipped up the bivy all the way shut. Doubly trapped. But I was cold enough not to care.

When I woke up in the morning, having resolved the night before to nix the hike, I packed my stuff in a hurry so I could get off the mountain and away from the cold as soon as I could.

Balaclavas: warm and comfortable, but not stylish.

Leave no trace.

I had a long, winding ride down the mountain through the cold morning air.

Saturday morning brought out the boys with their toys.

Dirt bike.

ATV.

Mountain bike.

The mountain biker, above, stopped when I took his photo. He was laboring up the first climb on a single speed, on his way to the top of Forest Road 143 as training for the (then) upcoming race in Prescott.

He said he was having a lot of problems with his back tire spinning-out. Without a rear rack of weight over that wheel, and on a single speed with no granny gear, I imagined he was having a lot of problems with spin-out. But then he reached down and let out some of the air from of his rear tire. Then he clipped in and rode off, shouting back at me as he went, “Yeah, much better without all the air!” I felt like a moron.

Lesson learned: Don't climb on sand with a fully inflated rear tire.

More twisty, windiness.

Practice makes perfect.

Clean and green.

The highway! For once, I was happy to see a stop sign.

Back on the Beeline, I enjoyed the smoothness of the pavement and the ease of a down-sloping gradient with a tailwind. Of the twenty miles I was on the Beeline, I literally coasted with my elbows on the handlebars for about ten.

Burrito with a side of BPA. Yum.

A stop at Arizona Falls.

And that was my trip to Four Peaks.