Trail Archaeology

I love seeing where trails go, and that includes old ones. The state of Arizona is littered with trails, and some of them are slowly returning to the earth. Unused, for whatever reason. Many times they went nowhere important and died for good reason. Every once in a while though, you discover a hidden gem or great spot to take in the desert.

Verde River near Bear siding.

A few weeks ago, my brother-in-law and I were set to head to warmer climates in Wickenburg, AZ, for our weekly ride. This is about a one-and-a-half hour drive, so i had gotten up pretty early to prepare...when word came that he was sick with the flu, so I would be solo today. I wanted to save Wickenburg for both of us, so I decided to just go out to an area called Perkinsville not too far from my home.

I have ridden here extensively, and know most of the trails pretty well...or so I thought. I like this area, as it has some old features linking the past to the present. Among them is the Arizona Central's freight line to the Drake interchange with BNSF, originally built in 1912. Little used, but used enough to still warrant existence. The Verde River also flows through this area, and the hills abound with old flagstone mines, both active and abandoned. Certain sections have that awesome southern-Utah-red-rocks appearance that I love. This area feels older than the rest in some way, and while I have spent hours exploring most every nook and cranny...I get the distinct impression it's hiding something from me out in one of those canyons.

After unloading just south of the Verde River Bridge on what is technically Forest Service 9899D - just a little triangle between FS318 and FS354, I headed on out. The temps were cold that morning, and after a few hundred yards is was contemplating turning and heading back for the trailer, but decided to stop and try my $5 windshield (which looks a lot like a blue tarp and  bungee cord) to see what effect it would have. You would think nearly ¼ century on street bikes would have taught me a lesson of the importance of getting out of the wind to stay warm…but it is one  re-learned after strapping down the bungee. Huge, HUGE difference with no constant wind-blast! One of those ¼ windshields is now a priority for the Pioneer.

Ice forming in the Verde. It was chilly!

Now with the ability to focus on the ride instead of my freezing face, I now rolled on across the Verde River Bridge and noticed the sheeting of ice on some of the slower sections and canals. Alternations of heavy frost and damp patches kept location with the suns warming rays as I rounded a few corners to the Arizona Central track crossing just to the north. There is a stop sign here, but I wanted to pull over and listen anyway. My B-I-L and I were here last weekend, and I thought I had heard the AC train somewhere. This train allegedly runs very early, so I was a bit surprised by the sound. Again today, I heard the rumbling in the distance, but it never seemed to change in tone, so after some time I moved on to the north.

Old trail to horseshoe curve.

A few miles up the road is a secret little trail that I know of that leads down to the tracks in a horseshoe curve area. FS9115W is the official name of the start, but a few forks and this ends at the south end of a long plateau overlooking the Verde River canyon. The heavy traffic ends here, as do the “tourist” riders. The actual trail, perhaps overlooked by many, continues on down a fairly steep and rocky hillside, and is clearly marked on topo maps. It is very obviously and old service road for the tracks, and looks to have been washed out of its original configuration, re-pushed, and then let go. It seems to see occasional use by something, and some wooden strips were installed on the ties to facilitate crossing the tracks…but I suspect this is an emergency-only trail for the railroad, if then.

Pioneer and $5 windshield. My secret trail climbs that ridge behind.

I wonder if anyone currently working on the AC even knows it’s there…or did that knowledge die off with older generations? At any rate, the difficulty and location mean it’s a good place for me to be alone with the desert. Topo maps actually show that this trail once went all the way down to the Verde River, but light scouting on foot showed little sing of this now. At any rate, the local government bowed to the screaming eco-terrorists some time ago, and any real “road” to the Verde in this area was gated or fenced off, so it probably matters little.

Faint trail heading through the bushes...

After some time I made my way back to the main road and headed over to FS492 (AKA-Drake road), and then turned south on FS492A. This road sees some pretty decent traffic due to the fact that it has some of the easier access to the Verde and is a popular camping spot. It also passes some interesting artifacts and place names. It travels down between some rocky ridges, and to me it should have some Indian ruins somewhere ( it has that look), but I have not discovered them thus far. 

After rounding one of the ridges you will find the view opens to the south to train tracks, and you come across what apparently used to be a siding and a platform for loading train cars, along with one of the few official crossings of the AC. This is Bear siding, adjacent to Bear canyon.  The tracks for the siding are still there, but obviously haven’t been used in some time, save for maybe setting out a bad car now and again. There is also some sort of well or holding tank with a concrete cover, but devoid of anything but trash these days. Just to the track-north is one of the trestles on the AC which has some large concrete fixtures for something long-gone. I have done casual research on the area but turned up nothing. As I said, the place is hiding secrets.

Bear siding

Loading...um, thing.

Trestle over Bear canyon.

Well? Holding tank? I'd like to know...

The reason for the siding is no secret; a mile or two on down the road there are a few mining pits, but I don’t know what they mined. It was obviously enough to warrant loading into train cars at bear siding.  Perhaps some of the other mines in the area shared this location as well. While here, I confirmed that the cold desert air causes train noises to travel all the way from the BNSF main line several miles to the west of Pekinsville, and those were the trains I was hearing…sadly, not the AC. 

Verde River

There are 2 roads here that are old, little used, and head south. After riding down to the Verde to take some photos, I returned to see where they went. The 1st one parallels the tracks for a few hundred yards, and then turns east on my map, but peeters out on the ground. Back up at the main trail at the siding, another road just east also heads off in this direction, but is not shown on my maps. After following it down, it became obvious that this was the end of the 1st trail, and over the years it just became easier to start further east than cross the small ridge and gullies from the “old” trail. 

Bear siding and trails

This was, again, and old railroad access/maintenance road that lead down to the tracks. It ended at the tracks…or did it? My map had the trail continuing across and down to a “Boggy tank”. Investigations unveiled that someone had piled a bit of brush to hide the fading old trail…but it did go on, and In the process of following it, I came across a sizable water catchment using the railroad fill as an earth damn. It was dry today, but looked to have held pretty deep water at its peak. A nice discovery.

Back up at the “end” at the tracks, you could see where the old trail had come across the ridge and down to its newer counterpart, so I decided to backtrack until it ran out, which didn’t take long. Interestingly enough, I did find a sizable can-dump, which suggests there was a camp here for some reason. Was it for the original construction of the railroad? I don’t have the knowledge to make that guess, but it certainly could be. If that’s the case, it seems like it has been mostly undisturbed for 102 years!

Backing out to Drake road, I intended to head over toward the Indian ruins to scout for down firewood since the season was drawing to a close, but just yards from where 492A hits Drake road, another FS road heads north, labeled as FS9119A, or Mexican Quarry road. On the surface, this trail parallels another main road that I have ridden many times, so I had dismissed it as going nowhere (trail prejudice). In reality, it heads up a decent sized canyon to some flagstone quarries and a few nice camping spots, ending at Mexican tank. Another surprise from the area, but one more was in store…

Back out Drake road to FS354 and south towards Perkisnville, my intent was to take FS181, which heads to some well-known Indian ruins several miles away on the edge of Sycamore canyon. Along the main road there are several side trails, and I thought I had ridden them all…but one went by that I couldn’t remember, so a U-turn and several miles of FS9004T later, I was sitting above Little Sand Tank, nearly to Sand Flats road and Government Canyon far to the north, and not too far from Henderson flat (normally accessed by FS181). I had no ideal there was a road in this area, but yet gain this place surprises me.

Verde River

I 1st swung a leg over a quad in 1990 or so, learning to ride in the Blue Ridge Mountains of NC on old logging roads where there was an abundance of good, and not so good trails. Some of them were faint and returning to the past, and I’ve always had a fascination as to why they were there, where they went, and a want to return them to use. Nearly 25 years later, not much has changed. A ride that seemed to be mostly about known trails ends up offering up some new ones…both well-used and almost forgotten. Again, this area delivers a solid day of adventure.