Tuesday, November 14, 2017

Drive to Black Canyon City & the Tip Top Mine Trail.

We met at the Arco station at the east end of town. There were 5 jeeps.

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At around 8:15 we left the station and got onto I-10 going east.

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We took the Highway 60 turn off and continued east toward Wickenburg, AZ.

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In Wickenburg we topped off the fuel tanks. From there we went to the Mc Donald’s where we met Rick and Nancy. After leaving MD’s we headed south a few miles and turned east on Highway 74.

Trail to Tip Top Mine.

Highway 74 connects with I-17. We followed I-17 north to Table Top Mesa Rd. We went west on this road and after a short distance we came to a staging area where we stopped to air down the tires.

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The trail starts out wide and graded.

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Stopping for a break in the Saguaro forest.

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Nice views.

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The trail gets smaller and a little bumpier.

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Lunch

We stopped at the Agua Fria River to have our lunch.

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The Indian Fort.

We took a side trail to what is called the Indian Fort.

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This is the Fort seen from below.

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We climbed to the top of the Fort…

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to look around.

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Big stone wall surrounding most of the top.

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It looked like a pretty good defensive position.

Continuing.

We left the Fort and headed back to the trail to the Tip Top Mine.

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We bumped along for a while…

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came around a turn and we were there.

Tip Top Mine.

There was an old stone ruin and you can see some mine tailings on the mountainside.

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There were a lot of stone walls and such on the hillside and back in the draws.

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We wandered around here for a while and eventually headed back the way we had come.

Interesting Saguaro’s.

As we were driving along we stopped to take a picture of this Saguaro skeleton.

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A little ways further and Lillie called our attention to this rare crested Saguaro.

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A little farther along Patti gets this many armed Saguaro.

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The Terminator.

There is a trail that is on our list for this trip but it will be on the last day. The trail is called The Terminator.
We were going right by the entrance to the trail so we decided to take a look at it.

The trail starts down this wash and looks pretty easy.

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After not very far you come to this.

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Okay, that’s no problem. What’s next?

This is a bit tougher but not really a problem.

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This is as far as we went today.

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We will probably be back here in a few days.

This is going back to the main trail.

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Heading out.

We continued on our way back toward the highway.

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Here we are crossing the Agua Fria River in the dust.

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Eventually we made it back to the staging area and aired the tires up.

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After airing up, we got on I-17 and six miles down the road we took the exit for Black Canyon City.

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We checked in at the Mountain Breeze Motel.

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After everyone was checked in we went to a local steak house for supper.
The food was very good and reasonably priced.

Okay that was the first day of our trip to Black Canyon City. We will see what tomorrow brings.

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