We were supposed to start at 5:45. A smaller group this time, which meant we actually did.
I had done Butcher Jones once before, almost two years ago in March. That time there were wildflowers and everything felt generous. May is a different proposition. The desert has already made up its mind about summer, and by nine in the morning it was telling us clearly.
But here is the thing about this trail. It doesn’t feel like most Phoenix hikes. You walk out expecting the usual, rock, scrub, a ridge, a view if you earn it. Butcher Jones gives you water. A lot of it, and for a long time. The trail follows the Saguaro Lake shoreline, the lake always present alongside you, and then cuts across toward the Salt River arm, another wide open body of water waiting on the other side. Saguaro and Salt River are connected somewhere. We just never saw where.
We found oleander and lilac in bloom near the water. Pink and purple against all that brown and blue. Nobody expected it.
We started in the quiet. A few people were just beginning to launch their boats as we set off. By the time we came back, the lake had become something else entirely, campers along the shore, paddleboards on the water, a full summer Saturday in progress.
6.1 miles. Not much elevation. A lot of sky and a lot of water, which in Arizona is its own kind of strenuous.
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