Catalina State Park

Map of this blog's locations click this link to open the map

Catalina State Park is just north of Tucson in Oro Valley Arizona. It is a popular park with a wonderfully beautiful view of the Catalina Mountains. Their are two camping loops with water and electric sites plus an equestrian camping area with actual stalls for your horse.  The restroom and shower facilities (at least in Loop B) were nearly new and very clean. This is helpful when we are staying for 8 nights but don't have sewer hookups.

Sunrise at Our Campsite

We had picked this place based on its good reviews but hadn't really investigated the geocaching in the area. Well it turned out to be a pretty wonderful place for that as well with 60 or more caches in the state park and plenty more in the vicinity. Our first hike was right out of our campsite - no need to even drive to some trailhead. We headed up to the equestrian area and the trails adjacent to them. We quickly discovered a couple things. First this area is very sandy and on trails with horse traffic, the sand was quite loose and tough to walk in. There are many washes running thru the park that sometimes work as trails but other times not so much. Not that there was any water in them, but brush and debris often got in the way.

Young Barrel Cacti

Horses Passing By

There are thousands of saguaro cacti in the park. Well not just the park but all over the area. They are just as common as maple trees are in Upstate New York. Some of the saguaros are enormous, but the base of many of them don't appear to be large enough to support them. Obviously they do well here even when the ground appears to consist of only rock and sand.

Saguaro Cacti

One of the hikes very near the campgrounds is the Romero Ruins trail. The area was inhabited by Indians back in the 1100's and then by rancher Francisco Romero in the mid 1800's. There are many interpretive signs along the route describing the past. One of the more interesting geocaches we did while in the park was at this location. (Walk with Me) The cache owner had a link to an audio file and explained in order to find the cache, you needed to listen to the audio and walk the trail and follow his instructions. It was sort of like having a tour guide as you did the walk. The only issue was his pace was a bit slower than we usually walk so we were constantly ahead of his description and needed to slow down. At one sign, he describes how to determine the location of the container based on the info on the sign. We have found over 9000 caches but have never done one similar to this.

Remains of Old Building

This is a BIG One!

All Lined Up with Mountains As Backdrop

Although the area appears completely dry, there are a couple of the washes that have water flowing. Enough water, that it takes a little bit of planning on what path to attempt in order to not get a wet foot. There were many 'birders' out on the trails. Admittedly there were very few of them that we could identify. The ones that had homes in small holes in huge saguaros were interesting to watch.

Water Crossing

Beautiful Afternoon Mountian Views

The park had many different guided walks and programs scheduled while we were there. We picked a geology session early one morning. We were expecting that one of the rangers would meet the attendees at the shelter, show us a few different types of rocks, and then walk along a trail describing a few interesting geological things along the way. Instead we were greeted by a retired geologist that volunteers at the park. She had all sorts of show and tell materials and gave us a great geology class for an hour before we hit the trail. We stopped at many interesting spots and she had good explanations of what we were looking at. Nearly 3 1/2 hours later we finished up spending a lot longer than anticipated but feeling a bit smarter for it.

Our Group Stopped for a Lesson

Another Saguaro

One last hike we took was a bit more strenuous one. We started following the Canyon Loop Trail which is a very popular and pretty tame trail but after doing 1.7 miles of this trail, we intersect the Romero Canyon Trail which heads up into the mountains we have been looking at for the last week. We knew we didn't have the energy to do the complete trail since it comes in at just over 7 miles, one way! At one point as I came around a bend, I see something move just off the trail ahead of me. After weeks of not seeing any javelinas in the wild, we are face to face with about half dozen of them. They were not too photogenic and kept their distance as I approached but at least we saw them. The mountain area we are in on this hike is part of a Bighorn Sheep Management Area. We kept our eyes open, constantly scanning the mountainside but never spotted any of them during the hike.

Looking Back Down the Romero Canyon Trail

Elusive Javelina - Left Center

Intricate Rock Formation

Our Rig at Sunset