A Walk in the Park

The title was a group effort and I believe others are posting under the same title.  It seemed appropriate since the walk with the Portal Rodeo Hiking Club started and ended at Barfoot Park in the Chiricahua Mountains.  Barfoot Park was designated as a National Natural Landmark earlier this year and the hiking club had not visited in awhile.

It has been my experience that there are 2 kinds of outings with the Portal Rodeo Hiking Club, walks and hikes.  An outing only qualifies as a hike if there is over 5 miles covered and at least 2000’ of elevation gain.  This weeks outing was only 3 miles with a little over 1000’ of elevation gain so qualifies only as a walk.  It differed from other outings in that half of the walk was off trail.  Starting from Barfoot Park 7 walkers, and 4 dogs, headed down hill along the old road from Barfoot Park toward Methodist Camp.  After loosing a significant amount of elevation the group headed uphill following no particular trail, just bushwhacking.  The area was one which the BAER team had scheduled for aerial reseeding after the Horseshoe Two fire.  As a result the group walked to thigh high barley (sterile) which covered the ground.  This area on the west side of the mountains was hard hit by the fire and the reseeding effort was designed to prevent major erosion in this burned area.  While traversing the high elevation barley crop, the ensuing discussion centered on starting a brewery using the sterile barley, which at the time seemed like an eminently practical idea, but I doubt little will come of the discussion.

Upon returning to Barfoot Park several members explored around the spring.  The spring was flowing well and producing cool refreshing water.  Of course the dogs had to explore also getting wet and muddy in the outflow flowing across the park.

The map to the walk may be found through the following link or in the sidebar.

Effects of aerial reseeding in the Chiricahua Mountains

Spring at Barfoot Park

Tree along the ridge west of Barfoot Peak