We all met at the the corner of Invergordon and Cholla Lane at 7:30 Saturday morning, having had to park fairly far away. There is no parking lot and we had to park along Invergordon, north of Camelback. It was a hike just to get to the trail entrance! Also, we ran into a group from the Computer Group, that hikes together out of the fitness centers and lead by one of the fitness center’s staff. At first, we thought they belonged to us (many were wearing Motorola shirts and sweatshirts)!

It was a bit nippy that morning, but we were all dressed for the cold! We got to the trailhead at 7:50. The Park Service has just put this new trail in. It is approximately 1-1/2 to 2 miles long and about 2,000 ft high. The first part of the hike was switchbacks, upon switchbacks, upon switchbacks ... a mini version of Jacob’s Ladder for those Grand Canyon veterans. There were many good views from the trail. Especially notable was the “look’ we had into The Phoenician’s pool area and general layout. But it wasn’t long before we were scrambling over rocks and trying to find the trail. Luckily there were others who heading down the trail who were kind enough to point the way. The view from the top was as grand as it always is.

The trail was not that busy, although we were periodically dodging other hikers (or stepping aside for those road runners breaking land speed records). Personally, I found the trail to lack maturity and for that reason do not recommend this trail for future hikes. At least, not until the Park Service has the opportunity to finish improving the trail. The trail was not clearly defined, definitely requires hiking boot grip (avoid those running shoes), tricky at points (leaning back to get around boulders with little or no grip holds), and scrambling reminiscent of the Siphon Draw Trail (Superstitions), but more compact. We were often scrambling over the rocks in different directions searching for footprints that would define the trail.

The good news is that we had good company and the hike was a short one: we were all back by 10:20 am, just in time for pancakes at a favorite restaurant. Of course, that was after we all did the long hike back to our cars!