Ledge of the Lions
Mundo Perdido
Pictures page 1 of 1
 Baboquivari Peak! Its an amazing monolith hidden near the border with Mexico, thrusts up from the desert floor attracting the eye of those from many miles away. Its the only peak in Arizona that requires rock climbing to get to, and it also has the only class VI climbing routes in Arizona. This mountain is also sacred to the Tohono O'odham, as it is the home of their God and Creator I'itoi. The Baboquivari Peak Wilderness area splits the peak and the surrounding area with the other half belonging to the Tohono O'odham reservation. But we did not come here to climb the peak! No! We came here for two very special geocaches. The first - The Ledge of the Lions - a gateway to a magical place on a ledge in the middle of the giant monolith! The second - Mundo Perdido - By famed geocache noshdoo tsoh and his collection of death caches. Yes, this was no ordinary journey. This was an overnight struggle with.. and through.. nature... This picture is Baboquivari Peak as we are driving in.. Editors note: I only brought my small camera since my backpack was so heavy already. Its too bad since it was soo beautiful.. |
 Another picture.. we are closer now, and with a good angle of the "wall" to the right of it. |
 Jason and I all PUMPED UP and ready to roll with out backpacks all loaded up.. |
 Getting closer.... About this time, we decided that we took a horribly wrong turn and instead of taking a nice easy streambed/trail up to the campsite near the peak, we are bushwacking through evil, sharp bushes and going over hills and ridges, getting scratched up quite savagely all while our heavy packs are weighing us down. Oops. |
 We saw several wild looking biiig spiders.. |
 There were tons of fields of beautiful yellow wildflowers that grew *quite* tall! This is the ridge from the second picture up closer.. |
 And the "wall" from another angle.. |
 From the shadow of Baboquivari Peak.. (It casts a big shadow!) |
 We found camp, dropped off out packs, and now are off to explore the Ledge of the Lions (along with bagging the geocache!) The sun continuously displayed amazing light bouncing off the rocks. This picture was especially interesting because you can see the light reflecting off of a Kitt Peak observatory far far in the distance. It is the white blob in the left middle of the picture, and its mountain range is mostly obscured by the one directly in front of it. |
 Looking off to the south, into Mexico |
 The Ledge of the Lions was amazing. It is actually a ledge on the side of the rock face of Baboquivari Peak. It has amazing flora and is quite surprising given its on a ledge on the side of a rock face. I did not take many pictures because of the lighting but I had to take a picture of the spring coming out of the wall, even if I had to use flash to do it. The whole area was a strange and exciting contrast to what we encountered on the way up. It really is a magical place.. |
 The suns waning light beautifully lights up the ridge.. And now we had better book it back to camp! |
 But one more picture of the beautiful post-sunset colors! And then time for dinner and a nice rest.. We were quite puckered out from bushwacking with our heavy packs and then exploring Ledge of the Lions. It was a beautiful night with crystal clear skies and amazing stars, but was getting quite chilly, so we retreated to the tent to place a few games of Tetris on our DS'es and then hit the hay :) |
 I tossed and turned for most of the night, as I usually do in the confining mummy sleeping bags. The night went like this.. as we fell asleep, the wind from above was constant and the tops of the trees swayed nonstop.. Midway through the night, everything was calm and there was no sound whatsoever.. In the early morning, it had started to rain, and I was quite happy that I had 1. Brought the rainfly and 2. Set it up, especially considering the previous night it was so clear and nice I thought there was no chance it would rain. The rain probably lasted 3 hours, and it was kinda nice, but it meant we missed out on sunrise. It got down to 39 overnight, and I thought it was quite pleasant in the tent. |
 A new day begins and Sunday's focus was to capture Mundo Perdido. I knew it would be quite an effort before us, and noshdoo did not let us down. There are no trails to Mundo Perdido (pictured here).. No, it is a bushwack, and you have to carefully choose your route first to be able to make it there and second to be able to make it to the top. And what a bushwhack it is. We went over, under, and through trees, bushes, grass, cactus, rocks, rock walls.. As noshdoo tsoh says on his online trip notes, "The extremely convoluted terrain holds many surprises." |
 A view into Baboquivari Canyon in the Tohono O'odham reservation. The rock structures are very inspiring! The reservation requires permits to enter, so we attempted to stay on wilderness ground as much as possible on the way to Mundo Perdido, although the ridge we tranversed on the way was the border pretty much. |
 Another angle looking into Baboquivari Canyon and the rock structures. It was partly/mostly cloudy the whole day, and we were very blessed by this. The weather was just perfect hiking weather. About this time, about 3/4ths of the way to Mundo Perdido, I pretty much stopped taking pictures and focused on hiking. Once we got to the base of Mundo Perdido, we had to try and find a way up. It involved some interest rock climbing :) It was quite adventurous! WOOOHOOO! At one point, we're climbing up a rock wall and at the top is a huge cactus, so we have this cactus in our face as we're trying to navigate around it. It was pretty crazy, but a necessary part to a satisfying adventure, as we finally claimed the prize - Mundo Perdido geocache is found!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!! In the log book, noshdoo tsoh explained what route he took, which was similar to ours. He also states something to the effect of.. "If you've made it this far, you're a glutton for punishment just like me." Fitting. We bushwacked out way back, with Jason doing some fine navigating finding the soft open spots in all the bushes and trees, picked up the rest of our gear at camp, and then took the very nice and relatively easy trail down Thomas Canyon back to his truck. Whewwwwwwwwwww! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! That was quite an adventure. Our feet, knees, legs, and arms are sore. Our arms, neck, back, legs, and hands are cut and scratched. But we have a smile on our face as we toast our success with caffeine-free Dr. Pepper, waiting for us in the cooler in the truck. Ahhhhhhhhhh :) |
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