For National Climb a Mountain Day, communications director Heidi Toth took on Kendrick Peak, one of the San Francisco Peaks west of Flagstaff. It was an adventure—and not just because the road to get there is narrow, rocky and full of potholes and she drives a little car.
Whoever made July 30 National Climb a Mountain Day has never hiked a mountain in July, at least not in Arizona.
If it’s not the heat, it’s a monsoon. If it’s not a monsoon, it’s the heat. And many days in July, it’s both the heat AND the knowledge that a monsoon could light up the sky with lightning while you are standing 11,000 feet above sea level, probably pouring water over your head trying in vain to cool down.
The best way to address both of those concerns is to never leave your house. The second-best way is to leave super early and be heading up the mountain with the sun, which is how I found myself at the trailhead for Kendrick Peak with only one other car, starting up the trail for a 9-mile round trip hike with about 2,500 feet of elevation gain. I was feeling pretty good—until I stopped because I was out of breath after three minutes. I could still see my car. This may have been a very bad idea.
Mile 1—Here we go!
This particular hike is a first for me, but climbing mountains around Flagstaff is a rite of passage for all who live here, and I’m no stranger to the other summits around here. Let’s talk about Humphreys Peak, the tallest mountain in the state. You hike straight uphill about five miles, mostly in the shade, and then when you think you can’t go any farther, you reach the saddle.
The saddle, for the uninitiated, is a pass between two mountains with a beautiful view. It also is a mean trick played on hikers because you think you’re at the top and then you’re … not. On Humphreys, you’re really, really not. That mountain has three false summits, so you keep thinking you’re at the top and then you see yet another top off in the distance. Every time I’ve done it, I kept thinking I was almost done and wasn’t. When I was almost there, I didn’t realize it until I was staggering onto the peak and looking for the most comfortable rock to sit on before my legs gave out.
I never ask downhill hikers if I am almost there. You shouldn’t either. Just purge “almost done” or “almost there” from your vocabulary for the day, and here’s why. Years ago, I was cheering on my sister at a half marathon, at the 10-mile mark with about a dozen other people. As one runner approached us, we started clapping and yelling: “Good job! Keep it up! You’re almost done!” And this runner, with whatever lung capacity she still had, responded, “No, I’m not.” For a couple seconds, all was silent. Then she was gone, and all of us realized, “Yeah … you’re really not.” When you are that tired, it doesn’t matter how much you have left because you want to be done NOW. My new rule: You can only say “almost there” when you can trip and fall over the finish line. The same applies for hiking a mountain.
Mile 2—We are still going.
It’s been a long time since I did a hike this intense—six months, to be exact, when I hiked the Tongariro Alpine Crossing in New Zealand, during what they call summer and what I call “but it snowed yesterday.” I have been in reasonable hiking shape for most of my life, but injuries and age have knocked that down in recent months, so I was nervous about this hike. I’d mentally prepared myself for it to be terrible and I just needed to go slow, take rests, drink lots of water and keep going.
It turns out this was excellent planning. With “finish” being the goal instead of “finish as fast as you can,” I channeled my inner tortoise the whole way up the mountain, hoping this would make the hike less painful and more enjoyable (it did) and help me feel less sore the next day (it did not).
Of course, it helped that Kendrick, while not an “easy” hike as someone on the Internet blithely proclaimed, is relatively easier than most other mountains I’ve climbed. The trail is less steep and more even. It’s almost impossible to get lost—and I am very good at getting lost. And it’s best done when the sun is up. My first big mountain was Mt. Timpanogos in the Uintah Mountains in Utah. The tradition is to start hiking at about midnight, get up there in time to watch the sunrise and then hike down. The last time I did it, I hiked faster than expected and had a couple of hours to kill. It was 4 a.m., so I did the only reasonable thing to do—take a nap. I found a rock well away from any ledge and did my best to doze, trying to ignore the birds that kept flapping near my head.
Reader, years later I realized those were bats.
Mile 3: I regret my life choices.
If you’re looking for a quick mountain to climb, Mt. Elden on the north end of town is the way to go. I find this hike stressful because I spend the whole way up huffing and puffing and the whole way down worried I’m going to sprain my ankle or pitch face-first into a rock. Of course, I gave myself a bruise sitting down while hiking Kendrick, so I’m a little more accident-prone than most. You’ll probably be fine. (This is not a binding promise. Hike with care.)
I last hiked Mt. Elden two years ago with my then-16-year-old nephew, who was visiting from East Texas. (Elevation of hometown: actually zero.) I repeatedly explained the need to start early because it’ll be hot, the parking lot fills up, etc. Well, that boy really listened to me—the day we hiked it, he got out of bed at the crack of noon. We were going to be miserable, I told him, secretly thinking he could learn a lesson from this. Instead, it was overcast and breezy but not rainy, plus the parking lot was only half full because most hikers had come and gone. I was secretly annoyed that my Important Life Lesson About Getting Up Early came to naught—though very glad I didn’t have to hike on a 90-degree afternoon.
Mile 4: When I get to the top, I get to eat peanut butter M&Ms.
Kendrick doesn’t have a saddle, exactly, but I did spend several minutes looking up and thinking, “I know I’m not done, but I’m running out of mountain here. Does this mean I just get to hike along the ridge?”
It does not. But the trail does level out for a little before it starts climbing again, plus you can check out Bull Basin and even take the option for a slightly longer hike through the trees, many of which are still blackened from the 2000 Pumpkin Fire. The whole trail still has scars from that fire, which I didn’t realize was so long ago.
The last half mile or so is uphill, rockier and not a lot of shade, but at this point, adrenaline and the promise of M&Ms were powering my legs, as were the dogs I met coming down. I was also keeping my eyes on the trail so as to not trip over anything, so the top, marked by a fire tower, came out of nowhere.
For the record, this is the appropriate place to use the a-word. ———————————————————————————————>
The summit!
The fire tower is locked, but there’s a concrete slab that offers places to sit and basically a 360-degree view of the San Francisco Peaks and the Colorado Plateau stretching out toward the Grand Canyon. I had to hold onto my hat—it was very windy—and take a picture of myself making the most awkward face imaginable. (It’s a gift, really. I can’t look normal if I tried—and I’ve tried.) And yes, I got my peanut butter M&Ms.
It was a nice hike down, though by this point the sun was up, the early morning chill had burned off and I was hot and feeling rather sorry for the hikers I passed who were heading up. I did step to the side and let them pass; it’s a rule in the Grand Canyon that downhill hikers yield to uphill hikers, and I think it should be a rule everywhere. Uphill hikers are working hard—they should always get the right of way. (I might have forced this rule on other people when hiking in Banff, Alberta, Canada. Sometimes it was intentional. Sometimes I was just too dang tired while trudging up the side of a mountain to move or lose any momentum.)
I’m looking forward to the next mountain I’m climbing—fortunately it’s in the Appalachian Mountains. As a westerner accustomed to the Rockies, I’m pretty sure this one will be a cakewalk. (For the uninitiated, a cakewalk is when you walk, and then when you’re done, you have cake. That hike is probably still going to be hard.)
Happy hiking!
Want to try another hike? NAU Social asked faculty and staff for their favorites. Check it out!