The Carrillo Trail in Saguaro National Park / NPS

You might think the arid climate of Saguaro National Park precludes trail woes, but you'™d be wrong. Last year Friends of Saguaro National Park helped the park land a grant of more than $71,000 to help pay for the rerouting of a nearly mile-long section of the Carrillo Trail in the Cactus Forest.

Over the years the trail had become badly eroded, no doubt because of its popularity as part of the 'œThree Tanks Loop' that gives hikers a panoramic view of the Cactus Forest and even the city of Tucson.

The old section of trail had climbed a steep grade, without switchbacks. Resulting erosion had created ruts up to 30 inches deep. Additionally, hikers had created parallel social trails that impacted the desert vegetation. The new trail section is a sustainable route that follows natural contours, results in less erosion, eliminates the need for social trails, and provides a safer, and more pleasant, hiking or riding experience for users.

In 2011, the friends group helped the park obtain funding for a 5-mile connector trail through the Rincon Mountain District that ties into the Arizona Trail, an 817-mile National Scenic Trail that runs from the Coronado National Memorial on the USA-Mexico border all the way north to the Arizona-Utah border.

Three Fall Hikes at Saguaro:

'¢ The Signal Hill Trail in the park'™s Tucson Mountain District offers a short and easy climb that takes you to dozens of petroglyphs scattered around a rocky hilltop. The nearby picnic area was first constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps, and the picnic structures reflect the master stonework representative of the time. Since then, crews have improved and created additional trails which lead out from the picnic area, providing easy access to the northwest corner of the park and its saguaro forest '“ including the 1.5-mile Cactus Wren Trail, which connects to the Encinas Trail.

'¢ The 5.6-mile Hope Camp Trail in the Rincon Mountain District heads east from the Loma Alta Trailhead, offering terrific views of Tanque Verde Ridge and Rincon Peak. Degraded portions of this trail were recently rebuilt'”engaging dozens of community volunteers'” and the gently-sloping, winding trail now leads visitors to two old ranching line camps where cowboys slept when cattle roamed the Rincon Valley. The Hope Camp Trail connects to the Arizona Trail (called the Quilter Trail within the park), which climbs over the Rincon Mountains'” from cactus forest through grasslands and oak woodlands until hikers are at 8,000 feet in elevation and surrounded by a subalpine forest populated with Mexican spotted owls and black bears.

'¢ Explore the famous Cactus Forest in the Rincon Mountain foothills via a loop from the Douglas Spring Trail, to the (new) Carrillo Trail, and back on the Wildhorse Trail. You can watch for saguaros with holes and the birds that make them'”Gila woodpeckers and gilded flickers. This hike provides spectacular views reaching west across the city of Tucson. On a clear day, you can see past the Tucson Mountains all the way to Kitt Peak and Baboquivari Peak on the Tohono O'™odham Nation.