Silver Peak hike

5/11/2017

Hiked part of the Silver Peak trail yesterday.  From the valley to the summit is about a 3000 ft rise.  We made our goal, about 1500 ft., before turning back.  Being flatlanders, it took us about 7 hours, taking a LOT of breaks.  Maybe we'll make it to the top before we leave, ha ha.  Pictures are from our highest point down, the lighting was better in the afternoon...

Selfie at our highest point before turning back.

View from backside of the mountain.

On the way down

Can you tell who was happy we turned around!

Portal AZ in the valley below,
and our starting point.

Interesting vegetation

Finally away from the steep drops on the side of the
mountain to a descending plane.

Nearing the end.

A short distance from the trail head we heard a familiar rattle! We froze and looked all around for the source.  We found this guy about 5 feet off the trail.  Obviously, he was not coiled and facing the other way which was fine with us.  We moved ahead slowly and were very wary for the rest of the way.  At first I thought it was a Diamondback.  But after examining the picture, the consensus among us amateurs, is it was a Black Tailed Rattlesnake.  Our expert is out of town but we'll get a definitive answer when he returns.

We took a short cut from our campsite that joined the
trail a few hundred yards from the trail head.  Home again!