Wildly Superstitious

January 17-20, 2025

Background

The vast Superstition Wilderness is a corrugated landscape beloved by many. Beyond the iconic ridgeline visible from Phoenix is a series of basins surrounding Weaver’s Needle, where Joelle and I have now done a handful of loops as overnights and day trips. The higher and colder east side of the Wilderness is transected by the AZT.

Between these two thirds lay a region that intrigued me greatly. Almost all of the “Central Superstitions” was burned by the unnatural Woodbury Fire in 2019, and until recently had its trailhead access affected by road closures. The reports I heard were that the fires had seriously altered this area and it was a rough place to travel through.

But the draw of some landforms was too much to resist. A massive, sheer-walled canyon system draining the majority of the Wilderness. Small, sinuous boxes. High, isolated, rugged summits. I decided to plan a trip!

Day 0

Abbey, Joelle, and I left Flagstaff at 7am to some fresh snow on Lake Mary Road. We made it to the Fish Creek Bridge in four hours and had some food before starting up the canyon. The scene was truly epic and we were stoked to get walking, but first, Abbey had to address a cactus she sat in.

A trickle of water was present as we headed up Fish, and pretty immediately the going became tough, with house-sized boulders to puzzle through. Those lasted for about a mile and were a lot more enjoyable with small packs. Original iterations of this weekend’s plan had us using Fish to enter/exit the Wilderness, but it was nice to do this as a day trip. 

Once the boulders became smaller and more sparse, our pace improved, but the scenery was still awesome and water still present. We neglected to grab some, though, before it disappeared for good and the canyon opened dramatically.

After deciding we would survive, we headed up the trib called Lost Dutch, and stayed right to follow our exit gully. This was nice at first but took longer than expected with the quality degrading throughout. Eventually we came to the trail, right at the signed Hoolie Bacon/JF junction.

By the time we hit the trailhead the sun was about set and there was only one vehicle, which was exactly like Hydra. Soon, upon seeing the road, I would begin to rely on that fact for encouragement. 

We kept walking into the rapidly cooling evening, which helped keep the thirst at bay. We made it to the good road just as it finally became too dark to see, but managed to walk down to the bridge without lights. We drove back up to the roadside Tortilla TH for camp.

Day 1

Amy, Daniel, and Miranda arrived at our campsite ahead of schedule at 9:15. Simultaneously, a whole gang of cowboys pulled up in a couple of big ranch trucks towing horses. I gave some of the kids our extra donuts, and when the leader saw us grouped around the map he came over to tell us about their plan to search for two rogue cows.

We had seem an obscene amount of cow shit in Fish Creek yesterday once we got upstream of the boulders, but that was all the info we had for him. He asked us to keep an eye out along our route, but we forgot to get any contact information. 

We piled into Hydra and crawled up the gnarly Tortilla road. It went great! Unfortunately I was too focused on driving to ask one of the five other people crammed into the cab to take pictures.

Starting our hike on the Hoolie Bacon Trail was cruiser, if not overly inspiring. We quickly had four miles done before a lunch break at the head of Trap Canyon.

Looking at the map, Trap Canyon was my number one curiosity in this area and I was hoping to descend it and loop back up through the La Barge Box. But I could not find any affirmation of it being walkable until I heard from Scott, who had just done it “finally”, that it was “the best Canyon in the western Superstitions, and unfortunately I've done them all”.

Knowing that, my enthusiasm for this trip soared and I was stoked to drop in. It wasn't long before the watercourse plummeted through massive boulder slots! The down climbs were fun and the aesthetic was captivating. 

After about 30 minutes of shenanigans the canyon opened a bit and our pace improved. Then about halfway through a mini-gorge appeared and we had a fun bouldering break.

At one break, Daniel found a cool rock that looked like bacon, then Abbey found a cool bug! So we named him Hoolie and gave him his bacon.

Later, we found an abandoned beehive in the cliffs and some fallen honeycomb below it! 

Eventually we came to the grand finale of Trap, which was a narrow subway box and a huge alcove camp hiding above it. I scrambled up to check it out, but we hadn't yet found water so we continued downward to Trap Canyon Spring, where we all took four liters.

At the trail junction it was almost dark so we found a decent camp, but decided to sleep in the flat gravel wash below it, which at the time didn't seem noticeably colder.

Day 2

It was a very cold and moist night. I was fussy with my thermometer, but it was definitely less than 20 in the wash, but stabilized at 26 at the camp on the bank. Regrets.

We got going at 9:30 and enjoyed some quick sun before entering Upper La Barge Box. I was surprised that the trail through here avoids the canyon bottom, which was easier, warmer, and gave us some good views. It didn't look nearly as neat as Trap anyway.

Soon we were at a place to drop packs and look for water. “La Barge Spring #2” was the closest and Daniel and I bushwhacked extensively, scanning the watercourse well beyond the map pin, finding nothing. Brad’s Water was a little further, maybe a ten minute walk, but known to be reliable. I arrived first, startling some deer, and was excited to find what I described as a “water mine” with copious clear liquid inside.

We began climbing up the trail steadily, continuing to have great conversation and laughter. This was a great group that could get things done decently well while having a lot of fun! We made the Red Tanks Divide at 3:30 and dropped down into a shady area that had burned pretty hot. The trail was steep, rocky, and overgrown by trail standards, but very tolerable.

We reached the bottom of Randolph Canyon in a fleeting bit of sunlight and turned upstream. From research I had sold this to the group as “easy wash walking” of which some now knew to be skeptical, myself included. But the going was truly lovely and we made faster miles than on some trails, arriving at Randolph Spring before dark. 

All we found was a concrete dam across the canyon with an unusable trickle out the base, and a pipe on the side with no flow. Luckily we had been suspicious of this source and hauled 36L from Brad’s so that we could finish the loop. With our planned route heading directly up a ridge from here, camping at the dam was an easy choice. It felt warmer than last night and we had a lovely dinner and conversation. I hypothesized that although tonight was forecast to be the coldest, the entire storm seemed to have tracked early and therefore last night would be colder.

Day 3

Despite being in a canyon bottom it ended up being a much warmer night, with a measured low of 33. In anticipation of the cold we planned to procrastinate breakfast and start hiking at 8, which ended up being 8:30. Starting up the ridge, it wasn't long before we found the sun, but now it was windy. We stopped in a sunny but sheltered spot for a very long break with hot food.

Soon the fun lower ridge gave way to a big, imposing cliff and we had to skirt around on the east side. The walking throughout this whole climb was actually decent, mostly rocks and grass with sparse brush. 

We found a good slope to ascend to a saddle right below Triangle Arch. 

The arch made for a fun side trip before our side hilling continued on the west side.  Arches aren't the most important thing to me but we have it to thank for the information Abbey found about this great summit route!

This traverse seemed to serve as a pinch point for travel and we found good deer trails all the way to the summit!

The summit of La Barge was a fantastic place to be today, with light wind and warm sun! We had good views of the surrounding area and it was after 1pm so we enjoyed lunch. 

Then we began dropping down the summit plateau, which has big gaps in it. On one false summit is a wonderous cave leading to a huge covered balcony rock. I walked ahead fast and confused everyone but Abbey (who had read that TR) by appearing on the balcony. Soon she joined me, then we left and kept walking with Joelle and Miranda to arrive at Tortilla Pass. Amy and Daniel spent some time in the cave but caught up soon.

At this point it was well after 3pm and I had become disenchanted with our pace. This was all pretty good off-trail travel, but we had moved slowly. Fortunately, everyone in this group was able to come alive on-trail and we cruised out the JF at a nice clip. This trail was reportedly in rough shape but we had no problem following it into the dark. It did become quite cold and windy.

We arrived at the truck to find a phone number written in the dirt on our window, which Joelle wrote down for later. I had hoped to drive the Tortilla road in daylight, mostly just as a benchmark for getting home at a reasonable hour, but also to take pictures. Hope of that was long gone, but we tried. 

That phone number ended up giving us all one last laugh of the trip!

Notes

• Water sources are very difficult to figure out in the Superstition, especially after post-fire flooding. This was an extremely dry time to visit, although not hot, and we were 2 for 4. I would trust Trap Canyon Spring and obviously Brad's as well.

• We all had at least 4L capacity but ended up filling Daniel's 10L drom at Brad's so we could finish. At our pace this was necessary.

• I have now experienced nights below 20 on two separate trips in the Superstition, both of which were in low spots. I brought my new Tanager and was almost warm enough cowboy camping, but I slept cozy on the first and last night. I only wish I brought my down pants.

• My starting pack weighed 20lbs with 2L of water