Walking the Land: Cockscomb Trail Hike-Marty Reinstra & Eileen Nauman-Part I

Hi Everyone,

This past Saturday Marty and I met at the Wildflower Bakery in Sedona and had a chatty lunch. Then, Marty had chosen a trail hike from her trusty hiking book. It is called the cockscomb trail and you will see why! So, come along with us.

Here is some cholla with ‘fruit’ that is quite colorful because of the freezing weather up in the Sedona area. Normally, cholla cactus are GREEN. As you can see, this one is a pretty purple color and they get that coloration when there’s been freezing weather. As the weather warms up, the purple will go away and they return to their normal green color. I liked this shot because it reminds me of a cactus Christmas tree with multi-colored bulbs (fruit) on it 🙂

And here I am in my hiking gear standing next to this pretty cholla.

Just as we started on the three mile trail (one way–so we hiked 6 miles on Saturday) there was a scrub blue jay suddenly squawking at us from the parking lot–so I took his photo!

And then the little show off jumped down off the rock and hopped toward us.

And here’s Marty taking off–notice her cool looking Turtle back pack! She’s had that for as long as I have known her, haha.

And here is a run off from the hill. I thought it looked pretty and added ‘texture’ to the landscape.

Here is a yucca that had, long ago, been blown over in high wind–and it kept growing over the years on the ground. Kind of reminds me of the saying when you get handed lemons, you make lemonade 🙂

No matter which direction you looked, we were surround by red rock buttes and table tops.

And here is Marty and look at the vista around her–wow.

This is Deer Mesa–the table top–there is a trail that goes up to the top of it–pretty steep and challenging. I had gone up there once before and it was nice to see it from down below. From the top of this table top you can see all of Sedona for miles and miles–truly a spectacular sight.

I thought this was an interesting duo–the twisted bush along with the lush green of the moss with sunlight splashed across it.

I remarked to Marty that even these dead junipers and cedars still looked beautiful after dying. They still add to the landscape, to the ephemeral timelessness of this magical area.

This is a lonnnnggg shot with my 300mm lens. When we came out on a certain point on the trail, you got this incredible view of Village of Oak Creek, that has Courthouse Butte (big red butte on the left in this photo), Grandmother Bell Rock and then a small part of Cathedral Rock to the right. This was at least 12 miles away and my 300mm did its best. Ah, for a 1000mm lens!!!

On the way I saw this red sand stone and saw the FACE (profile) in it. Do you see it? 🙂 And no matter where we turned and looked, there was another gorgeous vista… And so, we will continue out hike in a part 2 tomorrow.

In Spirit….Eileen