Casner Mountain Trail: Sycamore and Secret Wilderness Corridor

[Scott Brady]

A huge thank you to Mark and Tami for coordinating and leading this trail ride. I had a wonderful time. We have about 500 images to import and sort, but here are a few to get things started.

The view into Sycamore Canyon from the ridge.

Mark, opening the gate (this trail requires a permit)

 

[crawler#976]

Thanks to everyone that came along!


Awesome panorama Scott! And trust me, it's truly impressive to see it in person. The trail runs a ridge top that divides the Sycamore Canyon and Secret Mountain Wilderness areas, and both the east and west side are spectacular.

If you are interested in seeing what may be the most scenic trail in Arizona, the permits are available from the Coconino National Forest. One group is permitted to travel the 8 mile long section each week from May to Oct, and it's limited to 10 vehicles and no more than 25 people.


I'm still uploading GoPro video to Youtube, and will post a link to the first one of 5 I split from the raw footage.


The current Casner Mountain Trail #8 closely follows the original stock route that Riley Casner used to move cattle from summer to winter pasture and back. The original route is shown on this topo map from 1932:




This is from the base of Casner Mt - you gain 1600' of elevation in just over a mile.

 

[jk59640]

 

[jk59640]

 

[SmoothLC]

Looking forward to this one!

 

[Scott Brady]

There were great people on this run, some that I knew, others I met for the first time. That is what makes trail runs so enjoyable, seeing families and friends have a great time in the outdoors.

 

[Scott Brady]

A few more of the vehicles and folks along for the ride.

 

[Scott Brady]

I took the LR4 along for the ride. Never needed "off-road" mode, but I did air the tires down to 24 psi and selected "Rock" mode and low range. Comfortable and capable, although the featured I appreciated most was the cabin air filter - pretty dusty.

 

[crawler#976]

few more:
Sycamore Canyon

Attic House Ruin - from about 6 miles away, Thanks Lee for the photo!

From the flank of Casner, looking towards Honanki Ruin

Up the trail

Into the switchbacks

 

[ttora4runner]

Nice.

 

[crawler#976]

Video #1 is from the flat area past the gate to the top of the mountain. I'm not posting the others - they are on our channel is you wish to see them.
[video=youtube_share;oLkdgVTTDxQ]http://youtu.be/oLkdgVTTDxQ [/video]

 

[Scott Brady]

Those are cool Mark. This one shows the most difficult section of the trail at 11:55. I got lucky and the LR4 was right in front of you :smiley_drive:

 

[toddz69]

A few additional photos from the day. Special thanks to Mark and Tami for leading the run. Tami - thanks for the bug spray . We Arizonians are incredibly blessed to have you as tour guides for so many interesting trips. I had a great time and really enjoy trips with ExPo folks - high caliber in every regard.

Todd Z.

 

[crawler#976]

Just for reference, the Attic House ruin is circled in red in this photo:

 

[crawler#976]

With everyone in the group on 146.46 two meter radios, we had perhaps one of the most interesting days of ******** chat I've experienced. Between Scott, Jay K, Todd Z, Michael T, and Sam, it was a great mixture of tech (when I think of Toyota knowledge, Jay K is at the top of the heap, Todd and Sam are EB experts, and Michael has one of the finest CJ-8's out there, and Scott knows too much about all of them...), great wheelin' stories, and general questions on Scott's recent journeys. It was also great to see the mixture of youth and crabby old ******ts like myself...