Backpacking Adventure - Apr 03 - First Day part 5 - Arriving at Apache Spring

You continue down the ridge, and in this section it seems like the trail is very steep in places, and you continue to lose elevation with each step. You continue to see interesting rock formations on the ridge, and bushes and small trees.

Apache spring kind of sneaks up on you. If you have a GPS, which I did, and if you check it, you'll know you should be near Apache Spring, but it's not at all apparent that you are near it. Apache spring is a very low flow spring. Only about a liter per second.

It's like you're hiking along, and all of a sudden you notice a kind of a rocky gully right next to the ridge trail, and you wonder what that is about. You don't see any water anywhere, so you figure it's just another dry arroyo, unless it's raining. But, if you get really close and look down after you continue alongside the arroyo, say 100 or 200 meters or so, and look close, you may start to see a few small, shallow pools behind or beside large rocks in the arroyo.

You may find that you will need to climb down 30 or 40 feet down into the arroyo to get some water out of it. There are some very interesting rock shapes in the arroyo, and above and beside the spring. Of course, you need to filter or purify the water due to bacteria and protozoa. Typically iodine or a 0.3 micro meter filter should work fine. The water will taste better if you use a filter that also has a carbon filter.

We hiked about 5 miles at that point with 35 pound packs, and although we weren't tired yet, we decided to make camp at the spring so we woudn't have to continue on for 2.5 more miles to get down to Sabino creek for water. This was a really good decision, because it was about 5:30PM, and we were running out of day at that point, and the view was nothing short of spectacular.