Jacks Canyon

Thirteen Skyliners hiked on Jacks Canyon Trail on Saturday, 24 March 2012.  Eleven of us met at the Cottonwood Safeway parking lot.  We traveled north on 89A, turned right on Cornville Road and continued through Cornville to turn left on Beaverhead Flat Road.  When Beaverhead Flat Road ended at State 179, we turned left toward the Village of Oak Creek and then right on Jacks Canyon Road at the second traffic circle in the village.  About two miles from the traffic circle, Canyon Ridge Circle leads off to the left.  The turn off to the parking area at Jacks Canyon Trailhead is a few yards further along to the right.  The parking area itself is about 0.1 miles from the road.  Mary Gavan and Becky Fowski met us there.

After parking we passed through a gate onto Jacks Canyon Trail and started our hike.

Jacks Canyon Trailhead – the open gate is shown to the right

For about the first 1.35 miles we could see a housing development to the left; after that, there were no visible signs of human habitation, discounting historical signs of ranching.  Vegetation on both sides of the trail still showed signs of the La Barranca forest fire that occurred in 2006.  Recovery from the fire was obviously well along, but the burn area was still marked by charred trees and the absence of any large living trees.

Along the way, not far from the trail’s beginning, we encountered a sign warning those hikers setting out to hike to the top of Jacks Canyon Trail and return by way of the Hot Loop Trail to take plenty of water.

Warning sign set among a stand of dead trees

Interestingly, the sign also nonsensically denies that the two trails it addresses are a loop.  A quick look at the trailhead map posted nearby discloses that they very obviously do form a loop, although the bottom part might be called the Hot Loop Connector.

The La Barranca Fire started on June 1, 2006 at 2 pm. on private property on La Barranca Drive in the Village of Oak Creek.  A workman grinding on a metal gate caused the fire.  The total size of the burn was 836 acres.  About 300 personnel were assigned to fight the fire; the estimated cost was around $1,600,000.  The following structures were lost:

1 primary residence destroyed

1 partially damaged residence

1 guest house/shop destroyed

3 outbuildings destroyed

About 2.35 miles from the trailhead, after crossing the normally dry creek, now swollen by runoff from snow melt, two or three times, we arrived at Jacks Canyon Tank.  The tank had a little water at the time of our hike.  We were now just out of the burned area and the contrast between burned and unburned terrains was clearly visible on the hills.  The two photographs below show the area as it appeared in November 2009 and as it appears today.

The terrain in approximately the right half of this photograph shows 

damage from the La Barranca fire 

– 21 November 2009 photograph by the author

The end of the La Barranca Fire – 24 March 2012 photograph by the author

Mary Gavan and Becky Fowski had arranged to hike all the way to the top of the trail at the Munds Mountain saddle (about 6.7 miles one way) and they wanted to press on rather than wait for the rest of us.  We posed for a group photograph before they left us behind.

Left to right: Colleen Maktenieks, Jo Benkendorf, Betty Wolters, Donna 

Goodman, Jim Manning, Miriam Sterling, David Beach, Becky 

Fowski, Daisy Williams (kneeling), Anita Jackson, Mary Gavan 

– Photograph by the author (not shown)

We paused for a brief rest at Jacks Canyon Tank then pressed on.  Shortly after leaving the tank we stopped on the crest of a hill to look ahead to the saddle at Munds Mountain.

Looking to the head of Jacks Canyon

Looking up the canyon ahead, Munds Mountain is on the left and the faint track, trending up and to the left across the face of the mountain at the head of the canyon, is Jacks Canyon Trail as it approaches the saddle at Munds Mountain.  From the saddle, Jacks Canyon Trail continues for about another 2.3 miles (Shown by a green track on the Jacks Canyon Trail map included at the end of this report) to the upper trailhead at FR 153A, approximately one mile from the intersection of that road with Schnebly Hill Road.

We continued on up the canyon, crossing and recrossing the creek a number of times along the way.  Approximately 0.80 miles from Jacks Canyon Tank we entered the wilderness area and a tenth of a mile into the wilderness stopped to saw through and remove a dead tree that had fallen across the trail.

We then hiked around another 1.1 miles before stopping for lunch at (34°49'52.64"N; 111°42'8.50"W).  Jim Manning, who works with Friends of the Forest to maintain trails in the area, checked a short distance ahead and reported that the trail was cluttered with fallen limbs and trees from recent events (wet snow and high winds).  This had to have occurred since February 29 because Jim and I along with several others hiked all the way to the Munds Mountain Saddle on that date and found the trail clear.

After lunch we headed back down the trail, making very good time and stopping only once for a short rest at Jacks Canyon Tank.

Mary, meanwhile, had called when she had cellphone reception at the saddle to report that she and Becky had reached the top and were starting back down.  She also reported that they had found a number of enchanting waterfalls along the normally dry creek bed.  We, apparently had stopped and turned back just short of the first of these.

The main group of hikers arrived back at the trailhead soon after 1400 and Mary later called to report that she and Becky had reached the trailhead sometime after 1500.

Mary also provided the following input by e-mail.

On our way back down the mountain today, Becky and I began noticing very large paw prints with claws. They started about two miles down and continued along the trail until the last stream crossing before the tank. At this location the paw prints indicated that the animal stayed there and moved around a lot. We both noticed that the prints along the trail were on top of your groups foot prints! Very fresh. Ha - it was stalking your group. The prints most likely were from a mountain lion.

We counted 13 places where very large tree limbs were down and blocking the trail. Also, we removed smaller limbs off the trail. In all, we crossed the stream 21 times - one way.

The total round trip hike distance, according to my GPS was 9 miles; The highest elevation was 5055 feet and the total ascent was 1162 feet. This is based on a one-way distance reading of 4.5 miles.

A map insert of this hike is included (below) and a map showing the entire Jacks Canyon Trail immediately follows the insert.

120324 – Jacks Canyon hike

The included map (below) shows the entire Jacks canyon Trail (in red to Munds Saddle and green on to the trails end at FR 153A.