Grapevine Gulch Trail Update

This is an update to the report of an 18 February 2015 hike on Grapevine Gulch Trail. That 2015 hike was made by the author, Lila Wright and Karl Sink for the purpose of scouting an unfamiliar trail.

This updated report, based on a 20 February 2016 hike by the Skyliners identified below, will add some information on an old mine, identified only as Cobalt shaft; Cobalt prospect; Walker prospect [?]¹, we saw along the way and show a photograph of the water level in Concrete Spring.

We paused at Grapevine Well, a spot marked by a corral, a windmill and a large metal water storage tank, for a group photograph. The photograph was taken with the authors camera by a hiker who chose to remain unidentified.

Left to right: Floyd Gardner, Karl Sink, Dolly Yapp, Lila Wright, Jim Gibson, Dave Healey, Daisy Williams, Joanne Hennings, the author and Jim Manning

About 1.2 miles up the gulch from the windmill, we came to the misnamed Cement Spring, misnamed because it really is more of a well than a spring. I leaned into the opening and took a photograph (below left) showing the water level. About 0.5 miles on up the gulch from the spring we came to a mine tailings pile on the left side of the trail (below right). This marks the site of the old Walker cobalt prospect mine.

Looking into Cement Spring
 (or well)

Mine tailings at Cobalt

prospect mine

 We had only looked at the tailings pile last year. Now we explored a little further and found that an opening still exists at the apex of the tailings pile. Floyd is shown crouched in the opening (below left). The 28-foot opencut leading to the mine entrance is completely filled with rubble. By inserting my camera into the opening and using a flash, I was able to photograph the partially-filled tunnel (below right).

Floyd at mine entrance

Inside the mine

According to the Prescott National Forest web site, Grapevine Gulch Trail is 2.3 miles long, begins at Forest Road 9002V and ends at Trap Spring. The site provides no additional information. In fact the trail shows no indication of ending at Trap Spring and apparently continues on to Ash Creek just below Mingus Springs. From there it follows, according to a report I located on HikeAZ.com², down Ash Creek almost to Ash Canyon before looping back to rejoin the trail in Grapevine Gulch just 0.2 miles above Trap Spring. Overcome by a bout of curiosity, I used a GPS track included in the HikeAZ.com report to measure the distance from Trap Spring to the point where it intersected with the track of a 07 November 2015 Skyliner hike on Ash Creek. It was just 2.2 miles.

While on the 2015 scouting hike we actually continued for another 0.7 miles beyond Trap Spring; when we turned back, the trail was still clear and appeared to be well-traveled. The map published with that report shows the point where we turned back and also includes the GPS track for the trail on to Ash Creek.

The red GPS track on the new map (see below) included here shows only our track for this update. Additionally, it corrects the location of the Walker cobalt prospect mine. The earlier map shows the mine as being co-located with Concrete Spring when it is, in fact, located another 0.4 miles upstream from the spring.

NOTE: The February 2015 report which this report updates can be found at http://ellisfprice.blogspot.com/2015/07/scoutinggrapevine-gulch-trail-ihad.html

1http://www.mindat.org/loc-46250.html

2 http://hikearizona.com/map.php?PSID=33313&GPS=27782