First day’s hike–Devil’s Bridge. We started hiking before 6 am in pitch darkness, using our headlamps to find our way. We were rewarded with having no one else on the trail, and got to Devil’s Bridge before anyone else that day.

At Devil’s Bridge

Cacti everywhere

Pick your poison. Neither sounded really appealing to me. Good thing that was for mountain bikers, and I don’t mountain bike.

The signs for mountain bikers are plenty

I named this the “chocolate cake rock”. Maggie was not impressed with my creativity.

We were getting pelted by hail here, but who’s complaining when you get this kind of view?

Plenty of interesting plants

This just takes my breath away.

Day two started with a scramble up Cathedral Rock. Best part of the trip!

The view from the top of Cathedral Rock trail.

What the walls of Cathedral Rock looks like.

Half this branch is smooth and brown, and the other half is bark-y and dried. So weird!

Funky bark.

Seriously twisted tree branch

Day three, we hiked to Devil’s Kitchen. It’s a giant sink hole with huge slabs of rocks fallen into the sink hole. Pretty awesome. Also pretty hard to demonstrate in a photo.

Last interesting plant

Since everyone talks about the vortex, Maggie and I decided to give it a try on the top of Ant Hill. We sat, breathed deeply, and hummed. Ok, maybe it was just making fun of the vortex seekers, but we got a photo to prove that we tried it and did not find the vortex.