While Humphreys Peak near Flagstaff may be Arizona's highest point, and while the White Mountains in eastern Arizona may be the most extensive range of high peaks in the state, no mountain surpasses Mount Graham for sheer massiveness and prominence. The latter category measures the differential between a mountain's summit elevation and the elevation of the saddle connecting it to the next higher peak. (Put another way, it's roughly the elevation between the top and the lowest contour surrounding it and no peak higher). In this category, Mount Graham looms an astounding 6,320 feet above its defining saddle. As viewed from Safford, which sits below 3,000 feet elevation, the differential is closer to 7,000 vertical feet. The sheer size of the mountain is mind-boggling, and utterly irresistable. The Pinaleno Mountains, which this range is named, offers a wonderful respite from the summer heat and numerous camping, fishing and hiking possibilities. However, officially the summit of Mount Graham is off-limits...

First Visit, May 2000: A day after my semester at ASU ended, and itching to get out of town for a day, I headed east into Graham county, for a try at Mt. Graham's summit in the Pinaleno Mountains. The summit of Mt. Graham is technically off-limits to hikers, due to a convoluted mess of lawsuits brought on as a result of the University of Arizona's desire to build a telescope on the mountain, environmentalist concerns about such an idea, plus the usual concerns about endemic animal and plant species. This all happened in the late 1980s-early 1990s. A result of this nonsense was the creation of a "refugium" of all lands above 9,800 feet elevation, thereby making the lands off-limits for essentially everyone. The irony is that the telescope complex is nowhere near the summit; it's over a mile away on some lesser peaks. Topo maps still show an unimproved road to the summit. This road has been bulldozed and replanted and is completely undrivable, although easily hikable.

After procuring some information from people who have hiked this summit since the early 1990s, I was able to choose a route that avoided the signs. I left my home in Chandler at 5:30 am, arriving in Safford around 8. After gassing up, I headed up AZ-366, The Swift Trail, a 20-mile windy paved road up the mountain, gaining almost 6,000 feet of elevation. The steep grade and hairpin turns make for a slow drive, but the views are tremendous (ironically, the views from the road are better that the views along the hiking route and the summit, which is obscured by trees). I began my hike around 9.

The first portion was up an abandoned jeep route, negotiating deadfall and stands of adolescent firs. It was steep but overall pleasant. After a mile of that, I came out into the open, meeting up with the old main road to the summit. I followed this road to the top, gaining the summit shortly before 11. The summit is wooded and there are no views. I stayed for a short bit, then headed down. The only tricky bits was remembering where to leave the main road and head back into the trees, and remembering where to leave the old Jeep road and bushwack back to my truck. I did overshoot the second turnoff by a few hundred paces before realizing my error. I was back to my truck around 12:30, in very nice weather. The scent of pine was overwhelming but wonderful. I slowly drove the highway down to Safford, stopping at a few turnouts to take in the views. After lunch in Safford, I drove the 3 hours back to Chandler and a deserved shower and nap. The hike itself, via my route, was about 5 miles round trip with about 1,700 feet of gain to the summit. Never saw a soul.

Second Visit, July 2003: My wife Beth and I made a weekend visit to Graham county, with a hike up Mount Graham for Saturday and a backroads drive to the ghost town of Klondyke and the mouth of the Aravaipa Canyon for Sunday. We left our home in Chandler Friday evening and made the 140-mile drive to Safford, arriving around 8 p.m.

The hike followed exactly the same route as I took in 2000. We parked at the far end of the campsite area, found the old jeep road with no problem and followed that up to the old main road to the summit. The hike to the top took 1:45, and the round trip just over 3 hours. I found the register and scanned the names contained in it: familiar names from the county highpointers group, and a few others, but since early 2000 only about 10 parties had signed in. I'm sure the "official" lack of access scares off some, but frankly, this summit offers no views and is purely attractive for making the county highpoint official. On our hike down the clouds began to build in earnest and we could smell rain in the air. The cool temperatures (70s) were a beautiful respite from our previous week in Chandler, when we had consecutive days of 116, 115 and 117 degrees. We spent the rest of the day back in Safford relaxing and going to a movie.

The next morning we took a backroad to the old ghost town of Klondyke, which sits to the southwest of the Pinaleno Mountains. The dirt road was in good shape and about 40 miles later, we arrived in this little burg, now with a full-time population of 5, so says the sign. There's a functioning general store, where Beth and I stopped for ice cream. In the old days (1920s) it had about 500 people. Today it's just an interesting relic, and survives only because there are ranches scattered about the region and Klondyke offers a centralized meeting place. The general store sells one of everything and basically is a mini-mart for the locals; Safford is about 60 miles away for the real shopping. Past Klondyke the road leads into the mouth of the Aravaipa Canyon, a remote but interesting canyon with high cliffs and a very verdant canyon floor. Definitely a place we'll revisit when the weather cools down.

My assessment of the access situation atop Mt. Graham: This is purely my personal view and not meant to be taken as gospel. I get the strong impression that the refugium on the summit (all lands above 9,800 feet) was done to basically say to everyone, 'if you can't get along, nobody gets to go to the top.' The observatories are not located right on the summit, but are about a mile to the northwest on subsidiary peaks. The refugium is supposedly patrolled by the U of A police, judging by an entry I saw in the register, and based on my websurfing of this issue. I have seen no evidence of any meaningful patrolling by the Forest Service. So... I conclude this: the U of A wants to have jurisdiction of the peak in case they should need to invoke something should they come upon someone truly up to no good (much the same way a cop might pull over someone they deem suspicious, but use a 'burnt taillight' excuse to actually make the stop). I also believe that it is highly unlikely they actually patrol anything south of the summit (i.e. the usual approach). There are old roads leading up to the summit coming from the observatory areas, and I'd imagine that if one tried to access the summit from that way, they probably will get stopped. I'm not suggesting that it's 'okay' to go ahead and hike the peak. In a case like this, I believe one must use their gut instincts. I do not feel uncomfortable being within the refugium. I do not believe the Forest Service really wants to patrol the top and are content to let things happen as they happen. Left to its own devices, this peak would not likely attract large number of hikers. It seems to me that the current situation, while imperfect, seems to meet the desires of all parties involved. Use your best judgement. Heck, I'm basically admitting to the world I've been there twice!

Heliograph Peak hike, May 13 2005: We came back for a day trip to revisit the Pinaleno Mountains, hike up a subsidiary peak, expolore the roads and view the mountains afterthe big Nuttall-Gibson Complex Fire of 2004. We left Chandler about 9 a.m. and arrived in Safford about noon, then after gassing up and getting supplies, started up the highway into the mountains. We were looking for any excuse to get out of town and deflate after another year of school, and especially for Beth, a rather trying year as a student (All A's, by the way!). By about 1 p.m. we'd arrived at the Shannon Campground sign, where another road (gated) leads up to Heliograph's summit. Three other cars were already there, and there was still some patchy snow, believe it or not, on the ground.

The hike up to Heliograph's summit follows the service road, as there are many active radio towers on the peak. The road is pitched at a very lenient grade and we made the 2-mile hike in about an hour, arriving in great conditions. The fire had scorched the peak's north face but had not touched its east and south flanks. The summit has tremendous views of the Gila River Valley and points south and east. We were also able to snap some photos of Mount Graham and view the damage wrought by the fire. Not pretty, but heartening to know the forest always recovers, and we saw new green amid the brown and black snags. Still, it'll be many years before things are back to normal. The hike down went fine and we were back to the truck about 3:30 p.m.

I have always wanted to drive the road to its end at Riggs Lake, so we did, and it was worth it. It's dirt for the last 12 miles, but in good condition, and after about an hour we came upon Riggs Lake, a small lake popular with campers and anglers. Just wanted to see it- we immediately turned around and started the 35 mile drive down off the mountain, trying to beat the 6 p.m. deadline we had at a nearby hot springs, but fortunately we arrived right on time, secured our camp spots and spent the evening in the natural hot pools. Much worth it!