Hike to Old Still in Fay Canyon

Eleven Skyliners hiked to the site of an old still in Fay Canyon on 10 December 2016. This report, based on that hike, also uses information from Ellis Price's report of a 3 February 2010 hike published in his book, "Hiking in and Around Verde Valley"¹. Two of today's hikers had also been on that earlier trip.

To travel to the old Fay Canyon still we actually followed Bear Mountain Trail for 0.6 miles from the Doe Mountain/Bear Mountain parking lot at the foot of Doe Mountain. We then turned north into Fay Canyon, following a sometimes tedious social trail located high on the canyon's west wall.

A more familiar, and easier, Fay Canyon hike is along Fay Canyon Trail, another hike described by Ellis Price in the same book.² Unfortunately, two of the hikers who gathered in Cottonwood for today's hike thought it was to be a repeat of the hike on Fay Canyon Trail. Upon learning that it would instead involve climbing part way up the talus slope of Bear Mountain and then hiking along the canyon wall, they decided not to go with us.

From the Doe Mountain/Bear Mountain parking lot, we crossed the paved Boynton Pass Road and stepped over a green pipe crossbar at the trailhead. That pipe was almost too high for me, just a bit higher and I would have had to crawl under. The base of Bear Mountain was some distance away and in between, across a flat-looking area, there were several moderately deep gulches which we had to cross before we began the steep climb up Bear Mountain Trail to the social trail turnoff into Fay Canyon. This turnoff could be missed by the less observant hiker but the GPS co-ordinates for it are included in the 2010 report.³ Additionally, within the angle made by the two trails, there stands a tall rectanglar-shaped pillar of red rock, shown below, with a small, vertical slit forming a window near the top on the right side of the pillar.

Red rock with a small vertical window near top right

This hike is difficult to follow in a few places and it is best to use a GPS device. The trail follows a shelf or wide ledge high on the west wall of the canyon. At places the shelf is wide and covered with a mixture of grass, cactus, juniper and manzanita. Gradually, however, it tapered to become a narrow rock ledge. As we traveled north along the shelf we had a high cliff wall (below left) on one side and a sheer drop down into Fay Canyon on the other. After traveling for about half an hour after leaving Bear Mountain Trail, we could look across the canyon to the top of Fay Canyon Arch (below right) on the far side. From this angle the arch is indistinguishable from a shallow cave.

                                          Sheer canyon walls to the west                Fay Canyon Arch

It was time for our snack break and we paused at a spot with a panoramic view looking back through the mouth of Fay Canyon toward Dry Creek Road, Capitol Butte and Chimney Rock.

Snack break – with a view out the mouth of Fay Canyon

The goal for this hike was a smoke-stained overhang, containing discarded coffee cans, an old galvanized tub, and some barrel hoops. Sheltered from view from above by the overhang itself and from the canyon floor below by a rock ledge, it is rumored to have been the site of a still during the prohibition era. The two hikers, George Everman and Jim Manning, who had been to the location before reported that they had looked for, but never found, a way to access the spot from the bottom of Fay Canyon. Thus the route we took along the canyon wall, well above the floor.

About 1.2 miles from the Bear Mountain Trail turnoff we came to a shelf of bare rock, completely devoid of vegetation save for the occasional scraggly plant struggling for survival in a crack. The overhang which houses the old still site is located just under the lip of the bare rock ledge upon which we stood. At first the edge of the rock shelf appears to present a straight descent into the canyon far below. A closer look reveals a narrow ledge just below and a way to climb down to it. Without further ado, we shed our packs and started the descent. As I made my way down, I thought about the return trip. Would I be able to make it on my own or would I need a boost?

Once on the ledge, we traveled in the down-canyon direction for about 100 yards, making our way around a few stunted trees, several large boulders and some cactus plants before reaching the remains of the old still. This descent and the route along the narrow ledge are shown in the map insert (right).

Ellis Price is shown below in a photograph taken during the 2010 hike. Everything remains essentially the same as at that visit.

Ellis Price at the old still ruins – 3 February 2010

Assuming the tales of moonshiners are true. we wondered how they might have brought in their raw materials and hauled out the finished product. It is a fairly tough route the way we came. They could, however, have used pack animals.

Along the ledge we found a variety of plants growing in patches (below left) where moisture seeps from the cliff. There were also numerous rocks of various sizes and shapes all piled together where they have fallen from the overhang (below right).

Plants growing in a seep Rocks fallen from overhang

Two hikers ventured even further along the ledge, beyond the overhang, until it became too narrow for safety.

Gary Jacobson and Dave Manning -on the narrow part of the ledge

The two photographs below, taken as we headed back to where we had descended to the ledge, show a downstream section of the cliff wall stained with dark mineral deposits from water running over the edge (below left) and an upstream view into the depths of the canyon (below right).

A view down the canyon A view up the canyon

Back on the rock shelf above the overhang, we stopped to eat lunch near an area of water-retaining depressions separated by weirdly-shaped rock surfaces (left). I wondered: Could the strange shapes of the rock between the depressions represent sand blown by wind and moved by waves in an ancient tidal zone?

The trail back led us along a narrow ledge at the head of a side canyon and there we were faced with a cliff wall adorned with bright yellow lichen (below left). Atop the cliff a small manzanita (below right) lifted its reddish brown branches, topped by dark green leaves, to the sky, struggling to survive in a sparse patch of soil.

Bright yellow lichen on the cliff wall A manzanita growing atop the cliff

Back at Bear Mountain Trail, we paused for a group photo before heading back down the mountain and across the gulches.

Left to right: George Everman, Karl Sink, Jim Manning, Joanne Hennings, Joyce Arregui with Dave Beach (standing), Lila Wright, Daisy Williams, Dave Manning, Betty Wolters, and Gary Jacobson.

This hike was 3.9 miles long, the highest elevation was 5137 feet and the total ascent was 1188 feet.

The GPS track for this hike is shown in red on the included map (below). For the sake of clarity, only the return route is shown. The hike in included a bit of exploring and was slightly longer.

This report was written by Daisy Williams and assembled, edited and posted online by Ellis Price with help from Lila Wright.

1Price, Ellis F. Hiking in and Around Verde Valley. USA: CreateSpace, n.d. Print. pp 43-50

2Ibid, pp 27-36

3Ibid, p 44