Fossil Springs

On Labor Day, I took a trip up to Strawberry to hike Fossil Springs. I have been needing to get up to Pine, AZ for a while now to get to The Honey Stand to buy BBQ sauce. They make their BBQ sauce with honey instead of sugar and I love it - I bought a jar a couple of years ago and have been addicted since - their honey is pretty good too.

Anyway, I researched some hikes in the area, and found the hike for Fossil Springs. Everything I read said that the trail parking lot gets closed due to capacity pretty early in the day. So we left Phoenix at 5:30am and made it to the trail by about 7:30am. 

The sign says 4 miles - it is really 5 miles.

Warning signs were everywhere at the beginning of the trail.

The views at the start of the hike.

The hike to the springs was all downhill...it prepared us for knowing what was to come on the hike out.

There were wild blackberries along the trail - most were not ripe, but I did find a few purple ones to eat.

The creek and some small waterfalls.

We made it down to the bottom in about 2 hours...but we were taking our time.

We stopped to eat some food, and then we went swimming. The water was "brisk" as it was described to us by some of the others who were down there.

The water was very clean and clear.

These pools were nice since there were not as many people around.

This was the main waterfall. It took some waiting to get this picture without people in it - and I would have liked to frame this one differently but was trying to cut out the people. Some people were jumping off this waterfall too - I considered, but it is much higher than it looks. 

Getting fresh water from this spring. The ranger had told us on the way in that we could fill our water bottles in one of the springs. We filled up here and this was the water we all drank on the way out - it tasted just as good as my Smart Water...and it was cold too.

Taking some photo ops on the hike out.

We made it - 10 miles roundtrip. We started at 8am, and were done by 1:30pm. The hike out was difficult in certain areas, but there was a lot of the path that was flat as well.

After the hike I stocked up on BBQ sauce before it started pouring on the drive back to Phoenix.