Weatherford Trail

Buoyed by a sunny forecast, five of us gathered at the Safeway parking lot in Cottonwood at 0500 on 16 July 2011 for a hike on Weatherford Trail. We drove to Flagstaff and stopped at Denny’s for breakfast. After breakfast we continued on into Flagstaff, took US-180 W and followed it about 3.2 miles before turning right on Schultz Pass Road. We followed Schultz Pass Road about 5.3 miles to the trailhead parking lot at Schultz Tank. The turnoff to the parking lot is on the right (south) side of the road. We arrived at the trailhead at about 0740. A toilet is provided at the parking lot.

Donning our gear we found a sign (right) on the north side of the lot marking the Weatherford Trailhead. The trail started out at a gentle slope that varied very little all the way to our destination at Doyle Saddle. NOTE: A very short distance up the trail from the parking lot we crossed an old road. On the north side of this road, a sign says Weatherford Trail while on the south side it is signed as Schultz Trail. Go figure.

About 2 miles (by GPS; 2.4 according to signage) from the parking lot the Kachina Trail leads in from the left. We continued on up the mountain on Weatherford, and shortly entered the Peaks Wilderness area.

We paused along the way for an occasional rest break and after a couple of hours for a snack break and a group photograph (below). We had a long way to go and so didn’t linger for very long. The trail continued its gentle slope along the old road that, according to the forest service, originally carried passengers to the peaks via Model T Fords. Higher up the trail became pretty rocky. Gordon described it as walking on egg-sized marbles. It is really not too bad as long as you step carefully, and it does maintain the same gentle slope all the way.

Left to right: Donna Goodman, Gordon Bice, Dolly Yapp and Betty Wolters

Gordon and I had hiked on ahead a short distance and waited for the rest of the group to catch up. I took the below photograph as the rest of the group were arriving.

Left to right: Betty Wolters, Dolly Yapp and Donna Goodman at rest stop

We had, according to my GPS, come 5.8 miles from the trailhead. Hearing this, Dolly and Betty, declared that as they had only signed up for an eleven mile round trip hike, this was enough, and they would stop to eat lunch start back.

Our hoped for destination was Doyle Saddle where we would be able to look down into the Inner Basin and up to Humphrey's Peak. So, leaving Dolly and Betty eating lunch, Gordon, Donna and I pressed on, hiking another 1.9 miles according to the GPS before reaching Doyle Saddle. By the time we arrived it was 1220; we were tired and ready to eat. We could see Humphrey's Peak ahead and Dona and Gordon were able to pick out where they had been on a hike on Abineau Trail earlier this year. The inner basin was below us but we really couldn’t see much of it from the saddle. We ate lunch, I took a nap and shot a few photographs and we headed back.

From Doyle Saddle - Humphreys Peak (against the sky at upper left)

From Doyle Saddle – Looking back toward Flagstaff. Weatherford

Trail is seen to the left in this photo

We didn’t note what time we left Doyle Saddle; however since I did manage to get in a nap and we spent a bit of time enjoying the view we must have spent most of an hour there. I will estimate that we started back down about 1315.

The far-off views all along Weatherford Trail were spectacular now that we were facing down the mountain and we were torn between looking far away and watching our step on the loose, round pebbly surface of the old tourist road the trail follows.

We stopped often just to look without the bother of switching our view to look where we were stepping. The below photograph, with a view of Flagstaff and beyond from just below Doyle Saddle, was taken during one of these stops.

View looking out over Flagstaff – Taken from Weatherford Trail just

below Doyle Saddle

We arrived back at the trailhead at 1645 to find Betty and Dolly waiting for us. According to the sign at the trailhead, the distance to Doyle Saddle is 6 miles and our round trip hike would have been 12 miles. However, the one-way distance as measured by my GPS was 7.8 miles, making it 15.6 miles round trip. I don’t know which measurement is more accurate; however, my feet were telling me to go with the GPS reading. The highest elevation was 10877 feet and the total ascent was 3138 feet.

The GPS elevation readings were 8047 feet at the trailhead and 10877 at Doyle Saddle, an elevation difference of 8030 feet.

Our track is shown on the included map (below).