Baboquivari Bushwhack From Hell Via Thomas Canyon

Boboquivari is one of the more memorable peaks on the Sierra Club Desert Peak Section list.  It's spectacular to look at, fun yet not trivial to climb, and is also a painfully long drive from Orange County.

I've been up the Forbes route from the west twice before and I've been saying ever since that my next time up I wanted to do one of the technical routes.  This was an attempt at the Southeast Arete Route approaching from the east via Thomas Canyon.

The Southeast Arete can be done from either side I just wanted to see a different trailhead and as it worked out that this was only a short drive from Elephant Dome.

Beta on this side was somewhat mixed with some people claiming the use trail was good (it's not) and some citing challenging route finding.  It's quite possible the comments saying it's not bad are a bit outdated as we found the route to full of thorny vegetation that was almost impossible to avoid.  The more succinct comment I read about this side was a simple "Probably best approached from the reservation (west)" and I strongly agree.

We'd done a warm up climb he day before on Elephant Dome which was located a short distance to the north.  Not being sure of camping options near Thomas Canyon we stayed at the Elephant trailhead and drove over in the morning.

This wasn't necessary as there is ample camping it's just not allowed in the very last section before you reach the ranch.


The next night we actually stayed on a rise just outside the private property line and got to enjoy a huge area to ourselves and this excellent view:


But since we stayed elsewhere we had a bit of dirt road driving to do before we got hiking.  And since we expected a rough day that means we had to get moving several hours before dawn.


On the plus side local time was only 4:17...

We made our way back out to the 286 and continued south a short distance before turning west on another dirt road taking us northwest towards Thomas Canyon.


The road had some rough sections towards the end which the jeep handled easily but might have been a challenge in something like a Forester.  We passed through two open gates before reaching a locked gate with space for parking off to the side.  We pulled over, readied our gear, and got hiking at first light.


The road continues past the locked gate and soon reaches the ranch.


As near as we could tell there was no one around but it's a surprisingly nice place for how remote it is.


Signs directed us away from the house and past a corral and a few well maintained structures to the trail proper.


Things started out well enough and we had a fair use trail to follow along with occasional ducks.  We just had to watch the vegetation on either side since the plants had some nasty thorns on them.  And then it all went downhill.


The vegetation had badly overgrown the trail which usually isn't a problem for us.  The issue was the brown sticks you see above are covered in large sharp thorns.  Get anywhere near them and they snag you straight through clothing and have to be ripped out of your skin.  And we had no choice but to go through the bloody things.

If you're reading this and even considering doing this I'd a) forget about it and come in from the west or b) bring a pair of loppers so you can cut your way through.  We had to suffer and both of us were having less than a good time.


We ended up on the western side of the gully trying to escape the worst of the vegetation.  That worked for a while but we weren't sure we could make it to the base of the climb from there since our route beta said to go up from the saddle.  And with limited daylight we elected to play it safe and drop back down into the riverbed where what passed for a trail led to the saddle at the top of Thomas Canyon.

Jen was in the lead as we picked our way down when I heard her give a shriek and saw her tumbling down a short bank.



She had been trying to pick her way down a patch of vines near the bottom of the picture and had punched through sending her down and shredding her on small thorns.  She wasn't hurt badly but was visibly in pain and wasn't having any at all at this point.


After more vegetation inflicted pain, generally unpleasant terrain, and an in depth analysis of the latest Star Wars movie to distract us we finally reached the saddle.  (For what it's worth the last section climbing up on the hillside to the north proved to be a little better.)


At the saddle we sat down and assessed the situation.  From here we could see the route leading over to the base of the climb but from the beta we expected at least another hour plus to make the approach.  Also the return to the saddle after the climb went down the other side and included a few rappels.  And neither of us wanted to be wandering around after dark through the briar patches below.  And we had 7 hours of daylight left.
Doing the math we realized in most likelihood we'd summit as the sun was about to go down and that the return would be in the dark.  And that just didn't seem like a good idea all things considered.  So we were sunk.  We debated trying to get around to the Forbes Route or driving around to the west and trying again the next day but in the end decided it would be best to just get down and enjoy our new years.


We took our time going down sticking to the northern slope of the canyon to avoid some of the worst we'd hit on the way up.


I was also able to get around some of the the thorns further down by staying in the riverbed a bit more intelligently vs trying to stay on the trail.  It's still not a route I'd look forward to doing again and Jen swears she never wants to go back.


We made it out to the jeep with a few hours of daylight to spare and settled on the flat spot just outside the property line I mentioned before.



We enjoyed the views, the solitude, and two bottles of champagne along with a pasta and veggie dinner before we passing out for the short remainder of 2017.

The next day we started driving around 9 am, ate mexican food at a place I like in Yuma, and made it home around 6 pm.  So we likely made the right call skipping Elephant considering we had to be home that night.

Overall not the most successful trip but we did have a great climb of Elephant and can now swear off any approach to Baboquivari other than the campgrount to the west.  I plan to go back hopefully sometime this year for Baboquivari and Elephant Head but I want to take four days next time and have shorter peaks planned for the drive out and back to help break up the long drive.  We're tentatively looking at Mohawk and Picacho Peak (State Park not either of the Picacho's on the DPS list) but it all depends on conditions when I can make the time.

Meanwhile I had 4 whole days in town before the leaving on a trip the following Saturday to Mexico!