5 Days in the Superstitions

I apologize up front if this is too long. I tried not to ramble too much or include details that no one would care about. I honestly don't mind a little constructive criticism, just don't get too mean. LOL


This the route that we took….

West Pinto Trail (212) to
Campaign Creek Trail (256) to
Fireline Trail (118) to
Reavis Valley Trail (109) to
Frog Tanks Trail (112) to
Rogers Canyon Trail (110) to
Reavis Valley Trail (109) back to
West Pinto Trail (212) back to Miles Trail Head



Day 1

Just getting to the trail head was a trip in itself. I think it was almost 18 miles off the paved road to the trail head.





Taking off from Miles Trail Head we headed west down the West Pinto Trail. It was new experience for me to do all the boulder hopping and searching for cairns instead of blazes on trees but I found it exciting and fun.

Once we turned onto the Campaign Creek Trail my hiking partner who has done all of this before said it was all up from here. Indeed it was. My lazy winterized flatlander legs were not use to these kinds of climbs. The map showed that we had to cross a fence/gate at the top and I was relieved when we got there. However, this fence turned out to be decoy. We descended a little but started going up again, and up and up. Then at the top we got to the real fence and gate.



From there we hiked down to near the intersection with the Fireline trail where we setup camp for the night.

Oh and I almost forgot that per the pictures below you can see I was introduced to something called “cat’s claw”  Then some light rain sent us to our tents early that evening.





Day 2

In the morning we took off up the Fireline Trail towards our goal of camping at Reavis Ranch past an old spring that was no longer active. However, part way up the slog of a hill when my hiking partner’s main shoulder strap that attaches to the hip belt busted. He had needle and thread for such occasions but was able to make things work by tying straps to each other.

On we went until we stopped for lunch. Here also was the trail that we took up to the Circlestone Ruins. Here I could imagine a whole other culture teaming with activity but also thinking that these Indians were crazy for building a structure so far from water.



From there it was a nice long leisurely descent into Reavis Valley where we stopped to get some water from the creek. Another quarter mile up the trail we made camp where hiking partner found out that one of his Sawyer water bags sprung a leak so he had to hang up a lot of his stuff to dry. This in turn made me feel better that I put my sleeping bag also in dry bag. I’m just paranoid about my sleeping bag that way.



That evening as we set up camp and started to eat it started to drizzle again. This prompted my friend to comment that he isn’t sure what’s going on because he has been out here numerous times in the Superstitions and it has never rained and now on this hike it has rained two evenings in a row. However because of this rain we were treated to one of the best rainbows I’ve ever witnessed.