Sterling Pass to Vultee Arch

Twelve Skyliners hiked the Sterling Pass Trail to Vultee Arch. From cottonwood, we traveled through Sedona on Hwy 89A to the Sterling Pass Trailhead, located 4.55 miles up Oak Creek Canyon from Midgley Bridge. The trailhead is on the left (west) side of Hwy 89A. There is no designated parking lot; however, the road is wide enough to permit parking alongside. Trailhead pictures from a previous hike are shown below.

Returning from the hike

Trailhead Sign at Hwy 89A

The trail starts out climbing steeply, levels out for a bit and then resumes its steep ascent to Sterling Pass. George and I were lagging behind and had a good view of the rest of the party headed up the canyon toward the pass.

Looking up the trail to Sterling Pass – hikers scattered along the way

The dead trees seen along the way in the above photograph bear testimony to the ferocious fire that tore through the area just a few years ago. The lush green of fresh growth shows that recovery is well underway.

About 0.8 miles from the trailhead, if you look carefully to the left, you can see a small white cross, located on the face of a cliff. George, Betty and I, along with two others, investigated the cross in 2009 and found the debris shown here in the wash below.

An Armature

The Face of an Ammeter

We conjectured that an airplane crashed on the mountain above and that the cross was placed there in memory of those who died.

At about the same place on the trail where the white cross is visible (that is around 0.8 miles from the trailhead), a cave is visible on the left (south) side of the trail about 100 yards away. None of us had noticed it before and George and I investigated it on the way back. We found that it was only about 12 feet deep, but was large enough to stand in comfortably, and would make a great shelter if caught in the rain.

The author standing in mouth of cave – by George.

George photographed a drawing found on the cave wall (left) and we spent a lot of time trying to decide what it represented. We considered Itchy and Scratchy from the Bart Simpson Show. Three Air Force hikers we met on the trail first suggested that it looked like a raccoon then decided was probably a panda bear. Someone in our group suggested that it might be a chicken. I like raccoon best, so I am calling the cave Raccoon Cave.

We were apparently a bit late for the best flowers, as they were not nearly as plentiful or colorful as I remembered from past hikes on this trail. However, George and Daisy did a few nice specimens along the way, and George photographed them for us. A Goatsbeard or silverpuff is shown below along with a specimen of Fenders sandwort.

Goatsbeard or silverpuff

Fenders sandwort

Near the crest of the trail, George found and photographed (below) a strange fungus like growth on the side of a tree that had been killed by the forest fire. He identified it as “Bird nest fungus (Nidularia puluinata) or Tree puffball.”

Undisturbed tree puffball – by George

Tree puffball after being opened –by George

When we arrived at the crest, my GPS said we had hiked around 1.7 miles while George’s said it was something less than a mile. We had both lost GPS signals along the trail. I later determined that the distance was likely between 1.2 and 1.3 miles. Without question we had climbed just short of 1150 feet since leaving the trailhead. We took a good long rest before heading down the other side of the mountain to Vultee Arch.

Along the trail, large rock outcroppings provided a very attractive backdrop to the trees, as illustrated in the following photographs.

Large rock outcroppings along Sterling Pass Trail on the west slope

Large rock outcroppings along Sterling Pass Trail on the west slope

The terrain on the west slope of the mountain, as the trail descended from Sterling Pass, provided more cover from the sun than had the ascent on the east slope. The trees near the top of the slope showed relatively little fire damage. This gradually changed as we neared the intersection with Vultee Arch Trail, with almost all large trees having been lost by the time we reached it.

We encountered a number of other hikers, probably 30 or more, along the trail; one of them was Lynn Johnson, Kwi’s Husband. He drove in on Vultee Arch Road (a very rough route) from Dry Creek Road, hiked up Vultee Arch Trail and joined us for lunch.

After we arrived at the intersection of Vultee Arch Trail, we continued a short distance toward the arch, plainly visible on the slope above, before stopping for lunch just a few yards below the plaque identifying the arch:

Marker at trail junction

Vultee Arch Plaque

I stayed at the lunch spot, opting for a good long nap after lunch while others continued on to the arch. I did stay awake long enough to take the following photograph (next page) showing hikers standing on the arch.

Zoomed-in shot of hikers standing on Vultee Arch

After lunch we all headed back up the trail, basically traveling in two groups. Daisy, George, Dolly and I lingered behind at the lunch stop and then traveled slowly and stopped often to look at flowers and listen to birds. The other eight hikers went on ahead and waited for us at the pass where we would take a group photograph before descending to our cars for the return home.

Left to right: George Everman, Donna Goodman, Anita Jackson (rear), 

Collene Maktenieks (front), Kwi Johnson, Becky Fowski (sitting), 

Lyne Brousseau, Lila Wright (sitting), Betty Wolters, Daisy Williams (peering 

over hat), the author (lounging in front) and Dolly Yapp 

– by George with my camera on time delay

The round-trip hiking distance was an estimated 5.5 miles (my GPS read 5.93, but George and I took a side trip to investigate Raccoon Cave). The total climb was around 2000 feet because we climbed to sterling pass both ways on the trail, and that’s why you felt tired.

The main party, far ahead of George, Daisy and I, waited at the trailhead for a while and then decided to proceed to Dairy Queen for refreshments. We joined them there when we had finally finished our hike.

The included map (below) displays our GPS track for this hike.