2022-10-16 33 -112

Location

In the Salt River, near downtown Phoenix.

Participants

Michael5000

Expedition

After the failed expedition at 2022-10-15 36 -114, I drove from Las Vegas down to Phoenix, arriving in late afternoon. After finding a hotel, I changed into running gear and went out for a little sunset jog. The first mile or so was pretty mellow, although there were storm clouds and flashes of lightning to the east and south. While I waited at a long walk signal, the heavens -- as they say -- opened. The rain came down as if from a hose, and I was soaked through in seconds. With lightning starting to strike nearby, and everything suddenly as dark as night, I took shelter by a factory building for five or ten minutes of the worst of it, watching water pool up everywhere and generally enjoying the show. When I crept back out and continued my run, passing cars and busses shot comically large waves out and down on me. I was trudging ankle-deep through puddles. It was quite something.

The next morning, I drove down to a trailhead for one of the paths that parallel the Salt River on its path through Phoenix. It is usually, I believe, a dusty ditch, and I had expected that I would be able to visit this hashpoint "in the river" without getting my feet wet. But you see the problem. After last night's rain, the Salt had become a raging torrent! Well, not really. But it had undeniably become a nice little creek.

I get the impression that the northside trail is the marquee Salt River trail, but my destiny lay on the southside. In the not quite two miles from the trailhead to the hashpoint, there were a number of construction projects, seemingly random detours, and other distractions, and near the hashpoint a section of the path was literally and by all appearances completely arbitrarily fenced off along with the adjoining land parcel. Well, whatever. It was easy enough to get down into the riverbed, which was actually rather nice as urban watercourses go. To get to the hashpoint, a short wade out from shore, I had to soak my poor running shoes again for the second time in 14 hours. After which, I climbed back up to the trail and continued running -- squelch squelch squelch squelch squelch squelch -- back to the car.