New Years Day, 70 degrees, blue skies - time to go hiking!
We went up Romero Canyon today to the pools about 2.2 miles from the trailhead in Catalina State Park, on the west side of the Santa Catalina Mountains. We almost immediately ran into state park volunteers cutting back cacti and agave that were growing over the trail [right: the woman in the photo declined to give me her name but cheerfully talked about the work they did on trail maintenance] The results of their work were evident along the entire trail.
Much of the trail is on boulders and bedrock - lots of hopping from boulder to boulde
r. The outcrops were dominated by quartz and feldspar, with glistening crystal faces everywhere. I saw only a small amount of mica schists.The Romero pools were flowing with cold clear runoff from last week's storms. This is where almost everyone stopped for lunch, stretch out on the rocks, or scramble among the pools and rocks. We went another 1/4 mile up the canyon to the upper pools [bottom] which were deserted. While eating lunch, we saw only 3 other hikers, and they just passed through on their way up canyon.
Great way to kick off the new year.