50 Hikes in my 50th Year: Hike #28 - Charles M Christiansen 100 Trail Phoenix AZ

Hike #28

Date: April 5, 2014

Location: Phoenix AZ

Hikers: Me & Tina

Directions:
North Mountain Visitor Center: 7th Street South of Thunderbird Road. Park in the Far South East end of the parking lot to pickup the trailhead. Water and Restrooms.
End of hike = Tatum Blvd South of Shea Blvd. Look for car parking lot on West side of Tatum. No water or restrooms.

Charles M Christiansen Trail #100 - Phoenix Arizona :

http://phoenix.gov/parks/trails/locations/north/hiking/ or
North Mountain Visitor Center:http://www.northmountainvisitorcenter.org/maps/

We have done the Charles M Christiansen Trail from Tatum to North Mountain a couple years ago. It is approxiametly 10.7 miles + that cuts through the Phoenix Preserve. The true start of this trail is on 7th Ave and Cheryl Drive however today we are going to start at 7th Street and Thunderbird. The end of the trail is at Tatum Blvd south of Shea Blvd. Our hike should be 9 miles. This is not a loop and will require two cars to be dropped or use a phone a friend for pickup.

Who is this person who has a trail named after him? In 1986 the trail was dedicated to Mr Christiansen a former director of Phoenix Parks and Rec who was instrumental in preserving the Phoenix preserve.

Tina and I have had this hike on our list since the first of the year. We wanted to get a long one in and doing it the opposite route gives us a new hike. We took off from the trail as it goes under 7th street via a tunnel. It was a beautiful morning. The temperature was in the upper 50's and warmed up quickly.

The trail in the beginning is very well marked. Look for the 100.

The Tunnels under the road are pretty cool. They are dark and sometime "stinky".

There is a gate where the trail enters the property of The Pointe Hilton. You can see the pool area to the south after you go through the gate.

We followed the trail up the hill on the east side of the Pointe at Tapatio.

There was a large group of hikers behind us. They were gaining on us slightly. We headed up the hill at the trail marker and they went straight on the low flat route.

We met up with them again at the top of the hill as we headed down toward Cave Creek Road. We noticed one guy had a mohawk. I thought it was fake, Tina said it was real. I took a picture after we passed them.

We were ahead of the large group but Tina and I don't like the pressure of people gaining on us. Could say we are both control freaks?

We stopped on the other side of the Tunnel to de-rock our shoes. That is when we headed up the hill and this group again took the low flat road. Big time Cheaters!

We crossed under Cave Creek Road and then headed up the hill. This was a good heart pumper. We saw some bikers and bumped into a couple dogs. Dr Doolittle had dog treats and feed a few pooches.

The trail wrapped behind some houses with some ups and downs and then we headed towards SR51. Again, we will be traveling under the road to the Dreamy Draw part of the Phoenix Preserve.

We went under the highway and picked up the trail marker. We did not need a restroom but if you did stop at the Dreamy Draw parking lot.

This is where I started to complain about the trail markers. Many of the poles do not have the #100 marker. We saw Markers for #220 but that would of headed us to Piestawa Peak area. We went through a horse tunnel that we had not noticed in previous walks. We believe because when you come East to West you head towards the restrooms automatically.

We took the paths that we thought were best. WRONG! We found ourselves following a lady who later bushwacked. We did not cut across like her and headed South, then felt we were too far, we took another path North...WRONG! We should have continued South to catch the trail that cut across the LV Yates Trail. We ended up at the Trailhead at 40th Street South of Shea where the LV Yates trail begins. Oh well, say some horses and could hit the restroom if needed. Not us though!

We took the LV Yates Trail South til the interestion with the Christiansen trail. We headed East. We were back on track.

We knew that there was about a mile left for our hike.
We made our call to our pickup driver ~ Julio.
There were not alot of wild flowers to see on this hike.

We finished and waited at the Tatum Trailhead for about 5 minutes. There was only one car parked and another that arrived with two bikers. Pretty quiet morning.