Framing a layered view looking toward the San Carlos Apache Reservation and Mogollon Rim, a profusion of plant life stands as a testament to the light traffic near Rose Peak’s summit. © Richard K. Webb >> Click on image to view it larger in a separate window.

by Brian Minnick

From talkative birds, deer and bighorn sheep, to mines, grizzled road workers, and trucks with house-high tires, an excursion to Rose Peak, in east-central Arizona, offers the traveler a look into some of Arizona’s most beautiful landscapes—the highs of Mother Nature.

A musty forest greets us at the trailhead. Billowing clouds surrounding Rose Peak have dumped enough rain to make the forest floor spongy. Two Phoenix refugees, Josh Hart and I relish the cool 46-degree weather as we begin climbing on the 8,786-foot-high mountain, the highest in eastern Arizona’s Blue Range Primitive Area. The broad trail quickly narrows after passing through a wire gate fastened with a bough of oak. The yellowing ferns and late-blooming purple Whipple’s penstemon covering the path testify to the trail’s light use.

The steep trail and elevation strain our lowlander lungs, demanding a few short rests, during which two whitetail does eye us warily from above. We make it halfway up the trail, where the pitch becomes steep and turns into a series of meandering switchbacks. The forest has a rich diversity of midsized ponderosa pine and Gambel oak trees, which block the midmorning sun peeking through an opening in the clouds. A small patch of aspens remains about three-fourths of the way up, but this is the only evidence of the majestic white-barked tree. As we reach the crest, the pines yield to Gambel oaks.

Although it is listed as a half-mile, the trail’s twists and turns and overall steepness, make it feel longer. A fire tower, redone in 1981, is a welcome sight, as the thin mountain air takes a toll on us desert rats. Near the fire tower, the peak boasts a small hut and an outhouse for the lucky soul who lives here in the summer watching for fires.

The view from the top reveals a sea of green, with wilderness areas rolling off in every direction. Veiled in ominous dark clouds to the east, the Blue Range Primitive Area stretches into New Mexico. Far north in the White Mountains resides Hannagan Meadow. To the west, the skyline drops into miles of uninhabited chaparral forest on the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation. To the south lie Eagle Creek, the San Francisco River and the 10,713-foot-high sky island of Mount Graham.

We remain all alone, save for the distant sound of an occasional passing car on U.S. Route 191, dubbed the Coronado Trail after the Spanish explorer Francisco Vasquez de Coronado. While on the summit, our thoughts turn toward Coronado, who entered Arizona more than 460 years ago on his ill-fated search for Cibola and the Seven Cities of Gold. If Coronado did pass by Rose Peak on his search, surely a scout would have come here to peer into the distance for a glimpse of a glistening city of gold.

The clouds congeal into an approaching storm, and we decide standing at the bottom of a 30-foot metal tower is not a place for idle conversation should lightning strike. We descend this beautiful peak, named for wild roses daubing its northern face, to the serenade of a white-throated sparrow, to which we wave goodbye.

>> To see a map, driving directions and a list of attractions in the area, click the When You Go link below.

When You Go