Oracle State Park entrance It feels really good to help a state park, especially considering all of the funding cuts and closures they’ve had to work around in the past years. Oracle State Park was closed for two years after the state legislature cut the park system’s operating budget. There has been much effort being…
Category: Trips
Cracked Code
In the jagged basalt-lined valley of Paradise Forks, there’s an orange tower that has split off the wall, leaning at just an angle to create the ultimate training climb. At the bottom, the space between the wall and the block is only a sliver to squeeze fingers into, but over 70 feet it gradually widens…
Paradise Found
This is how much I love Paradise Forks, a climbing area at the upper reaches of Sycamore Canyon about an hour outside Flagstaff: when friends and I were driving the four hours from Tucson to get there, we didn’t even turn on the radio; we just bounced up and down on the car seats yelling,…
Hiking Report: February
February in Tucson and in Southern Arizona tend to be a great time to get outdoors to play in your favorite venue. Whether it is hiking, biking, trail running or simply just getting outside to enjoy the weather and awesome landscape to relieve the stresses of our everyday lives. One of the things that we…
Hiking Report: December
Editor’s Note: The Summit Hut Hiking Report is a new feature to the Summit Hut blog. Along with our typical great content (gear reviews, trail descriptions, travel stories, etc.) we will be publishing a monthly Hiking Report with a quick look at some of the key tips, gear and destinations for the season. Let’s face…
Being A Warrior Princess is Tougher Than You Think
As a kid growing up in the woods, I fantasized about being a warrior princess: a powerful girl trained in the arts of survival and war, who could stalk soundlessly through the brush and skillfully ambush prey. I wanted to live in a house made of earth, fish in the river with a spear, wear…
Snowshoe Shenanigans
After getting a taste of winter about a month ago, I’ve been eagerly anticipating more snowfall on Mt. Lemmon. Unfortunately, the weather through the rest of November was fairly warm and no snow fell up on the mountain. All that changed in the second week of December when a storm system rolled in and dumped…
Salome Canyon
A few weeks ago, a group of us took a little canyoneering journey up to Salome Canyon. For those of you who may not know, canyoneering is an adventure activity that essentially entails making your way down the bottom of a canyon – by any means necessary. Sometimes that means hiking, sometimes it’s sliding and…
Climbing Moby Dick
The day began with a long drive down a deeply rutted dirt road into the far reaches of the Cochise West Stronghold. I swear I have car-narcolepsy; sometimes no matter what the circumstances, I completely bonk out in the passenger seat, and this was happening to me as the truck bucked down the road: despite…
50 Year Trail
The 50 Year Trail on the west side of the Santa Catalina Mountains is a magical place. It’s hard to explain why really; this network of trails does not go up one of the many scenic and rugged canyons, but rather loops around on the shallow ridges and washes below the range. It was cloudy…