Four Trailblazer met at the trailhead on a beautiful Saturday morning to hike the 9.5 mile loop of Windgate Trail. As we started our hike the temperatures was a comfortable 63 degrees with a nice breeze. The day started out very clear, so the views to the north and northeast rewarded us with a view of Pinnacle Peak and part of Tom Thumb to the northeast.

Gateway trail was not very busy at that time of the morning, so we had a nice hike without encountering very many other hikers. Our spirits were high as we hiked east toward Bell Pass. Janet even tried to get us to sing hiking songs, but since we didn’t know any hiking songs. Our attempt at singing didn’t last very long. I don’t have a great singing voice, so decided to stop torturing the others. I’m sure they were grateful!

We didn’t see very many wildflowers on this hike. We saw a few cactus blossoms but not many other flowers.

We took a rest stop before we started our climb up toward Windgate Pass.

The climb up wasn’t too bad since the temperatures was still cool and the breeze was still blowing. This part of the hike was very enjoyable because of the views.

We took another quick break at Windgate Pass. There wasn’t anywhere to sit at Windgate Pass, and there happened to be quite a few hikers taking a break, so we stopped for a few minutes and continued on.

As we headed up toward Bell Pass, the temperatures started to climb and there wasn’t much of a breeze. It was a bit warm and by the time we made it to Bell Pass. We all needed a break.

We took a nice break had a snack and headed back toward the trailhead. The hike down from Bell Pass was a bit rocky, so it was slow going from here on down. We didn’t take very many breaks because the temperature was continuing to climb.

Once we hit the junction for the Bell Pass Trail and the Gateway Loop, the traffic picked up. Lots of hikers on this leg of the trail. We made it back to the trailhead by 11:38. The hike was 9.5 miles and took us 4.5 hours to complete. It was a nice Saturday morning workout for us.