Backpacking Adventure - Apr 03 - First Day part 3 - Box Camp - emerging from the woods

After hiking for a couple of hours, the trail morphs from a nice pine forest with a stream running through it, to a ridge with fewer and fewer trees and large bushes. Because of this transition, the view down and around is less obscured by vegitation, and you can see more of the mountain and more of Tucson.

As you hike this section, you notice that the rock formations you can see on the trail ridge and the nearby ridges both east and west become more interesting. You can start to see some of the "front range" peaks to the south.

As you continue on south, you start to see views into Sabino canyon, Bear Canyon, East Branch and also the West Branch of Sabino Canyon.

The trail continues down at a steady pace, and is relatively steep in many places. This is a good trail on which to use trekking poles for most of the trail.

I read recently that Box Camp was one of the main trails that were used for people to hike up into the mountains to get away from the heat of summer in years past. Can you imagine?