Gila Wilderness
Day 1
As morning broke, Jeremy and I woke early to load our gear before saying goodbye to civilization. With a little uncertainty as to location of the trailhead, we were soon hiking down the Rain Creek Trail. This momentary confusion was foreshadowing. Once hiking, the weather so pleasant and the mountains so majestic that it caused us to forget the hefty backpacks slung across our backs.
Desert meets forest
Eventually, the irony of walking downhill and moving closer to mountain peaks corrected itself as the trail sharply climbed out of the creek. Now, gravity started bearing down on those once-feather-weight backpacks. Jeremy was carrying an especially heavy pack, making the 1000+ foot elevation gain even more difficult. Not to be deterred we reached a lookout point and feasted on the panoramic vistas.
Is this really New Mexico?!
Eventually, the trail meandered through yet another ecosystem and lead us past an abandoned horse stable. Within 200 yards, the trail became unclear. Checking our position against the GPS revealed that we somehow had gone off the trail 0.2 miles back. Logic concluded that we had followed a spur trail to the horse stable. So we tried bushwhacking back to the trail and had no success. Frustrated, we ate lunch in hope that time would help sort out the confusion. Backtracking our steps we eventually found the trail and discovered an inaccuracy with the GPS map (In my defense, I was merely using the vector data provided by the US Forestry website).
Day 1 looking South from our campsite to the trailhead
Clearly, the first day was off to a rough start, but with most of the uphill behind us, it seemed the worst was behind us. And then we started downhill. Descending the 1000+ feet from the morning proved to be more tedious than originally thought, mostly due to lack of footing. At 2pm, we reached Mongollon Creek to filter water. A few minutes later we both agreed to call it a day and hope for better luck the next day. The afternoon was spent reading by the river’s side. Despite being several miles from our original destination, we declared victory. The day ended with good conversation over an open campfire.
The simple life
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