In the White Tank Mountain Regional Park, one of my favorite hikes is from Mesquite Canyon Trail to Willow Canyon Trail. The climb is slow and steady, almost 1500 feet (457 m) from the parking area to the highest point on the trails. The good news is that the climb comes early when one is fresh and the trek on the way back is mostly downhill. I have never hiked to the end of the Willow Canyon Trail, but on this hike, I would proceed to the farthest I’ve ever been along the trail. In this higher country, locals used to lead cattle to what is now the ruins of a small fenced in area and a building that is now nothing but a stone foundation. A metal water tank provided a water supply for the cattle. The remains of the tank are still there.

Just a short distance from the corral fence, a natural stone grotto rises above. After a short hike, in the depression behind the cacti in the image above, water was standing, captured there after a recent rain. The name White Tank translates from the area originally known by the locals as Tinajas Blancas. The granite, bleached white by rushing waters over the years would hold water after the heavy rains of the Arizona monsoon season. These “white tanks” stored water for the people and wildlife in the area.

About the photo: Captured on my Samsung S6, I memorialized my first views of the grotto’s high stone wall. Once downloaded to my computer, I tweaked it in Adobe Lightroom and Luminar Flex. When I didn’t like how the sky turned out, I reached for Luminar 4 to use a new tool in that arsenal, the sky replacement tool. Tweaking to bring out the colors of the rock caused the sky to be affected. Using a mask to attempt to “undo” the color change in the sky and leave the rock “tweaked” would have been difficult to accomplish. Luminar’s Automatic sky replacement feature brought back the original color of the sky and created a clean, well delineated transition at the top of the cliff. If your browser supports it, you can click on the image to enlarge it for a better view.

John Steiner

White Tank Mountain Regional Park, Arizona.

For the first photo challenge of 2020, Ann-Christine asks us to share images of a special place. Gee, that’s hard! I’ve done a lot of traveling for Flare Legend Adventures and have come to find there are many special places around this United States, and though I have not been outside of the Western Hemisphere (yet), I know there are many special places waiting for me to visit in the coming new decade.

Ann-Christine writes, “Now we are looking forward to seeing Your very special spot shots – maybe a room in your home, a garden, a mountain, a city, an exhibition, a lovely café…a place that is special to you!” You can read her entire challenge post here.

After some deliberation, I made a list in my mind of places I would return if given the opportunity. Natuwa Wildlife Refuge in Costa Rica for their beautiful Macaws and other wildlife that are temporarily or permanently unable to survive in the wild; Carlsbad Caverns for the otherworldly underground caverns in New Mexico; Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska for views of the shrinking glaciers; these places and many more are fitting destinations for anyone’s bucket list.

A decade ago, getting ready for retirement, we started exploring Arizona and discovered the beauty of Arizona’s Sonoran Desert. After choosing to winter in Buckeye, we explored the nearby desert parks. My wife and I have hiked many miles (for us oldsters, anyway), in the White Tank Mountain Regional Park.

I considered tallying up the miles I’ve hiked in the White Tank  Park, but it wouldn’t be accurate. My first years of hiking went un-logged. Suffice it to say that there is a short section of one trail I haven’t traveled, that due to the fact that it’s in a very difficult area. I’ve tried unsuccessfully several times to make that climb, but it has beaten me every time. In my defense, on the trail map, that section is labeled, “WARNING – Hazardous trail – 1.9 Miles…”Some of the far reaches of the longest trails I haven’t seen as my longest hike in the park is a bit over 9 miles (14.5 km).

I haven’t see the ends of the longest trails as they are not loops. For example, Goat Camp trail is 6.3 miles (10.1 km), double that number to see the entire trail and return to the starting point. So, though I haven’t explored every inch of this beautiful park, I have spent many hours walking or climbing while contemplating the wonderful desert views.

Looking at my Lightroom gallery of images, I have over 500 photographs captured in this desert park. For this challenge, I present a few of my favorite images that were converted to black-and-white for a photo contest that was sponsored by the park. Though I didn’t win first prize, three of my photos were selected for printing on canvas and they now hang in the library at the Nature Center in the park.

Thanks again to Ann-Christine for reminding me that it’s time to go hiking in one of my favorite places in Arizona. It surely is a special spot on this big blue planet.

John Steiner

In early January, our hiking club’s weekly hike found us on a steady uphill from the nearby neighborhood known as Verrado through open desert and over a couple of ridges into Skyline Park. This popular park is only a few years old, but it has become very busy especially on winter weekends. In fact, as this is being written, I am only a couple of hours from heading to Skyline Park for a Saturday morning hike.

Though I’ve hiked several of the trails in the park, I’ve avoided one of the spurs, a narrow trail leading upward from the popular Turnbuckle Trail that climbs to one of the highest peaks in the park. The Valley Vista Trail climber is rewarded with a spectacular view of parts of northern Buckeye.

About the photo: This view is looking south. The long, straight road running from behind the peak on the left by the cactus toward the upper center of the image is Watson Road. The housing development that Watson Road leads to is called Sundance, and it’s where Lynn and I live in the winter. This image was processed with Aurora HDR and tweaked in Lightroom. In most browsers, you can click on the image to enlarge it for a better detailed view. The rule for Cellpic Sunday is simple, the image must be captured with a mobile device, in this case, a Samsung S7 cellphone.

John Steiner

Last week, I featured a view of the Willow Canyon Trail in the White Tank Mountains Regional Park. This week features another shot captured by my cell phone on the hike. It was a relatively clear day in the Phoenix Metro. One of the reasons we chose a home on the western edge of the metro is that the inherent haze and smog of the city tends to stay in the valley.

The nickname ‘Valley of the Sun’ is an apt description. Most of the Phoenix metro is surrounded by mountains with the White Tanks on the western edge and the Superstitions on the east. Though the image looks quite hazy, it is actually a pretty clear day. Only on clear days we get to see a view of the mountain range that’s east of the Superstition Mountains which are about 80 miles (129 km) from the White Tanks. The tallest mountain on the left side is known as “Four Peaks”. It is a 97 mile (156 km) drive from the western edge. On many days, that mountain isn’t visible through the haze. The tallest of the four peaks is Brown’s Peak at 7,659 feet (2,334 m).

Also visible in the image is the iconic Camelback Mountain located near downtown Phoenix. It’s the single peak on the right side of the image. Camelback mountain is about 47 miles (76 km) from the White Tanks. The diagram below helps focus on the mountains mentioned.

In the image, the near edge of the valley is north of Goodyear and Litchfield Park, two western suburb communities. Further east is Glendale and Peoria. Where I stood to capture this image is northeast of our house in Buckeye. Our house is on slightly higher terrain than in the valley. The rule for Cellpic Sunday is simple. The image must be captured on a mobile device.

John Steiner

My favorite hike in my favorite park is the Mesquite Canyon Trail in the White Tank Mountains Regional Park. It’s not a long drive to get there either, only about 20 minutes or so. In the last few years, I’ve settled into a pattern of 4 miles (6.4 km) or so, not to exceed 5 miles. Part of the reason is that my wife, Lynn, was starting to have hip and knee issues, eventually to the point where she ended up getting a hip replacement this summer. She’s still recovering from the stress of the surgery and is walking more, but is not yet capable of long hikes.

In the last year or so, our hiking club has picked up some additional hike leaders, most of whom are more comfortable on longer hikes. That has inspired me to increase my hiking distance again. On December 13, the hike leader scheduled a hike from Mesquite Canyon to Willow Canyon, to the canyon wash and back, a published 5.7 mile (9.1 km) hike. As it turned out, the hike ended up being 6.2 miles (10 km) according to two GPS tracking systems. Seems the park maps aren’t quite accurate. I’d hiked this route in 2017, except I turned back prior to getting to the wash, tracking a total of 5.5 miles, one of my longer hikes in the last few years. In fact, checking my hiking log, this hike is the longest I’ve made since 2014. Lynn still has some PT and recovery to complete before she can join us again on the trails. I am looking forward to us doing some shorter hikes, just her and me, to help her get back into condition to rejoin the group.

About this photo: The Willow Canyon Trail has a couple of “rock bridges” that are built along the relatively steep canyon wall. The bridge creates a narrow ledge that extends the trail over a dropoff that would have otherwise had to either end the trail or create a section requiring a descent and climb to the other side. One of our hike leaders volunteers for the park conservancy. She asked one of the rangers who believes the ledges were constructed in the last 10 years or so. The image, captured with my Samsung S7 cellphone, features a portion of our group crossing the bridge. The rule for Cellpic Sunday is simple. The image must be captured with a mobile device.

John

On a warm but cloudy day, we ventured out on our first Arizona hike of the 2018-19 season. In late November, I led a short 3.8 mile hike with our hiking club in Buckeye. It was fun to be back with the group again. In the last couple of years, we’ve added some far more experienced hike leaders than I to our group and I expect the group will have a wider variety of difficulty level and length than we’ve previously provided. Being of a certain age and stamina, I expect I’ll be leading the shorter and less athletic hikes. I’ll let the younger and more physically capable hikers lead more challenging treks. I will likely challenge myself on some of them, but I think I will focus on offering hikes for those who, like me, are interested in a walk in the desert instead of a physical challenge. All in all it will be good for the club as it’s membership will grow with a more diverse ability set.

About the photo: The views of the desert are verdant this year with plentiful rain in the region. The day’s clouds would culminate in rain showers starting late in the evening. I captured this image of one of the buttes as viewed from Ford Canyon Trail in White Tank Mountain Regional Park using my Samsung S7 cell phone camera. The rule for Cellpic Sunday is simple. The image must be captured on a mobile device.

John Steiner

I have been lax at taking pictures lately due to a heavier than normal workload at my volunteer Civil Air Patrol job. It’s Friday as I’m writing this post, and I want to have it publish automatically on Sunday, a typical scheduled Cellpic Sunday. Looking through my library of cellular phone photos, I discovered I’d taken two images of the same trail, just slightly offset. Using Lightroom, I created a panoramic image of this view of the Goat Camp Trail in White Tank Mountain Regional Park. Last March, our hiking club traveled for a couple of miles down the trail and then returned for a total of just over five miles (8.5 km).

We are looking forward to returning to Arizona, but we’ll wait until November when it cools off a bit from their record heat. For all my friends who live in Arizona year around, keep cool! In most browsers, you can click on the image to enlarge it for a closer view.

John Steiner

One of our first discoveries in Arizona is a favorite hiking place for me. The White Tank Mountain Regional Park is about 20 minutes from our house in Buckeye. Last spring, I saw an announcement of a blsck-and-white photo contest with the prizes being displays of the photographs at the nature center. I quickly put together a collection of black-and-white images. Though I didn’t win the first prize, the three images featured were all selected to be printed and displayed in the White Tank Mountain Nature Center.

The one thing I noticed about the images I chose is that almost all of them had interesting cloud patterns in the sky that were made more interesting in the conversion to black-and-white. Though my favorite photo wasn’t selected, all of the ones that were exhibit a dynamic sky, something that I’ve noticed Arizona seems to be adept at displaying. When I completed the collection of edited images for submission, I decided to create a calendar for my office. It was then I realized I didn’t have enough images to fill a calendar, so it was back to finding other views of the park to convert.

I ended up needing 13 images, one for each month and one for the cover. The back cover consisted of thumbnails of the 13 included images. There are no shortage of online photo printers who offer calendar prints from your photos, so I picked one where I could upload the photos online and then pick up the completed calendar when it was delivered to the outlet in our neighborhood. No shipping costs. Yay for me. The gallery below features the entire collection of images from that calendar. In most browsers, you can click on an image to enlarge it and to scroll through the gallery.

On a side note about my photo composition habits. I noticed also that my favorite images appear to feature a saguaro on the right side of the image. Reviewing all my images gathered in the park, I found very few where I centered the giant cactus or placed it on the left. I will have to think about this the next time I go photo hunting in the desert.

John Steiner

Three years ago, we were hiking the Old Saddle Trail section off the Mule Deer Trail in the White Tank Mountain Regional Park. At a trail intersection, we met Chuck and his horse. He stopped to allow us to cross in front of him. We stopped and visited for a few minutes. I asked if I could take a photo of him and he obliged.

About the photo. Captured in April 2015 on my Samsung S5 cellphone. F/2.2 1/750 sec, ISO-40. I was intrigued by the black mask on the horse and had to ask. I was told that it’s simply a protection from flying and biting insects.

John Steiner

As we wind down to the last few days of the spring of 2017, sitting here in Fargo on a rainy Tuesday morning, I recall those last few days in Buckeye in late March.  This spring, the wildflower season is the best I’ve seen since wintering in Arizona. Prior to this year, 2013 was my go-to year for showing off wildflowers. This year far surpasses 2013 in coverage. My only disappointment this year is that we had to leave a bit earlier than usual and missed the cactus blossom season. On this last walk of the season, captured March 17, there were plenty of cacti buds, but only a couple of hedgehog cactus actually flowered. They weren’t even yet at the point where I felt they were photo ready.

The Lupine and Mexican Golden Poppies were plentiful, and as can be seen by the opening photo, the brittlebush plant’s distinctive yellow blossoms layered the landscapes. Our last hike of the season found us at the trail head of the Mesquite Canyon Trail in the White Tank Mountain Regional Park. It was a short hike, only about a mile and a half and covered parts of the Mesquite Canyon and Waddell Trails. Enough writing about what we saw. I submit for your approval (or not), a gallery of images captured on our last hike of 2017. Click on an image to enlarge it and to scroll through the gallery.

John