Saturday November 18, 39.3km/24.4mi

Base of Black Mountain (136.7/2100ft) to South Maricopa Mountains Wilderness (160.5/2120ft) (AZ) +0.6mi to Tabletop Guzzler

There were some heavy rainstorms that moved thru last night, and we spent some extra time this morning packing up our wet tents. We finally departed at 6:15am, which is now noticeably darker than it was a week ago.

After a mile, the sky was much lighter, and we were able to switch off our headlamps.

As we hiked along all morning, I noticed that the clouds were building up, and rain looked imminent.

Sure enough, at 9:30 it started raining…hard. it was easy to see the line of rain moving across the open desert, so I already had my pack cover and umbrella ready. It rained steadily for about an hour, and just as we approached this creepy old defunct ranch, it stopped.

The ranch had a few outbuildings, which felt no less creepy.

The skies cleared, and by 11am it was sunny. We hiked an easy xc section, and had lunch by the interstate.

We spent almost an hour eating and drying out our stuff, hanging it all over several nearby bushes. It must’ve looked like an odd site to the passing drivers. It dried quickly in the strong desert sun, and we crossed under the interstate.

For the rest of the afternoon, we hiked thru the South Maricopa Mountains Wilderness. It was nice to be away from the loud freeway, and enjoy the dry sunny weather.

We walked across a mesa for a mile, with heaps of views in every direction.

Occasionally we would follow a faint old road, barely visible after 25 years of disuse.

Sometimes the puffy clouds would cast neat shadows onto the nearby mountaintops.

We arrived at a guzzler at 4:30, and refilled our bottles. All the rain from last night and this morning meant that the trough was overflowing.

It was a long 21 mile stretch to the next reliable water, so it was heavy to carry all the water we would need for the next 24 hours. The pink clouds and sunset were a nice distraction though.

We hiked another hour on a very faint old road, and camped just before we entered a wash. After I finished setting up my tent, I could see the stars start to show up, and I’m looking forward to a dry night.