First I’d like to thank Eugene for all his help in planning this hike :) My wife and I were looking for something a little “different” , but also the fact that our hiking season usually doesn’t get into full swing until July. The Gila definitely met our expectations and then some.
We started out at the Catwalk- it was very hot that day (close to 100)- a little shock to our systems especially as Montana up to that point had been unusually cool.
Right away we were into rugged high desert terrain- yucca, cholla, prickly pear, barrel cactus- most of it in bloom- very neat (and beautiful) country.
After ~ four miles of climbing in rather open/dry terrain the trail starts to drop into the creek bottom and it cooled significantly. Our first camp was on Whitewater Ck near Winn Canyon
While we quite a few stream crossing the first day, the second was in the neighborhood of 40-50!
We camped at Redstone Park- we had plenty of time to explore and I caught quite a few small rainbows (kept four for dinner).
The next day we headed up via Lipsey Canyon to Spruce Creek Saddle- the country changed with the elevation, lots of big Doug Fir and Ponderosa Pine (looked a lot like Montana) a beautiful stand of Aspen and Fern awaited us at the saddle.
From there we headed to Spider Saddle for night three. We had watered up good before we left Whitewater Creek, but took advantage of Nabours Spring (about a 1.5 detour off the main trail). We had some cow elk talking around camp for several hours in the evening. The temps really drop up high, it was in the upper 30’s in the morning.
Day four had us headed for the South Fork of the Whitewater- we followed the trail to Camp Creek Saddle where the headwaters of the S Fork start. While none of the trail up to this point had been in great shape (the Gila doesn’t do a lot of maintenance apparently)- this was by far the worse stretch. We had several miles of constant windfall, but more concerning was staying on the trail- several times I wandered onto game trails.
Once we hit the S Fork the trail improved significantly. We camped at Tennessee Meadows along the South Fork for night 4. Found some really good brookie fishing :)
the South Fork was gorgeous, lots of deep pools and fall, with lots of nice scenery away from the creek as well
near the end of our loop leaving the Gila Wilderness
it was a great trip, the poor trail maintenance was fine by us, slows you down, but you learn to take it in stride- it’s a true wilderness experience- not lots of signs, hard to follow trails in many instances, lots and lots of windfall, a myriad of stream crossings and very few people- we ran into three small parties in five days
we’ll definitely be visiting the Gila again!
