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Mcdowell mtns: new trail?

2K views 32 replies 9 participants last post by  KevinB 
#1 ·
What is this new trail i saw connecting to Windmill this morning? It is right before the Sonoran Preserve sign as you head up towards Bell pass/Windgate Pass. They even changed the course of Windmill and you can see the new trail going down off into the distance. At first i thought it was the new East End trail, but it seems too far from where East End would connect. It almost appears as if it will go down the other side and connect with pemberton.
 
#2 ·
last april i received a letter from mcdowell mtn park showing plans for several new trails to be added to the system. one of them (1-16) was connecting coachwhip to pemberton between tonto tank and the south rocky ridge. maybe they're finally working on them!

one i'm really looking fwd to seeing is a trail on the north end which would bypass the long service road and connect the single track to the granite tank.
 
#8 ·
Does this dump into Pemberton kinda near Bluff trail? I noticed some blue flagging coming off pemberton maybe .25 miles past Bluff (going CCW) with an obvious trail, but no sign (almost 3 weeks ago).
 
#13 ·
is the new trail as i marked in blue? if so, can anyone tell me if it has any substantial climbs or is it ok to bring a newb along?

as to the other trail near bluffs some else mentioned, i think he refers to "rodeo". it goes west, reaches a gate and then splits after a water trough. it ends at the park fence. there are two other trails further south that also go west and connect with "boundary" on the west side of the park fence. try them, they're a lot of fun and add mileage to pemberton. (i drew them in green.)
 

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#16 · (Edited)
kaboose said:
is the new trail as i marked in blue? if so, can anyone tell me if it has any substantial climbs or is it ok to bring a newb along?
Yeah, that new trail now extends the Coachwhip trail. I rode it last night and it appears that they've just finished it. (There were still machines parked on the Pemberton.) There's a new sign on the Pemberton which clearly marks it as being the Coachwhip trail. I've only ridden down it and can not say how it will be going up. Being newly constructed, it's still on the loose side, but I expect that will change (as it gets more traffic) in a few weeks.

If you plan to ride it, I suggest going up Dixie Mine and then turn off on Coachwhip. Once you get up the hill, you'll come to a new intersection. The left fork is now an extension of the Windmill trail which leads to the edge of the park. The right fork is the new portion of the Coachwhip and leads back down to the Pemberton. Starting from the Pemberton, the route up the Dixie Mine and then back on the Coachwhip (back to the Pemberton), is about five miles. My ride last evening was CW up Pemberton, to Dixie Mine, to Coachwhip, back to Pemberton, halfway down Bluff, left on Granite, then left on Pemberton to the parking lot. That route was about 16 miles.
 
#18 ·
kaboose said:
thanks kevin, i was thinking of doing exactly that - pemby to dixie mine to coackwhip and then finding the new trail back to pemberton.
I just got back from riding up that new section of the Coachwhip trail. It's a sweet trail - the park did a great job on it. Going up this new section, even in it's new and somewhat loose state, is not as difficult as I had feared. Effort-wise, I think it's comparable to riding up Dixie Mine. Once it gets ridden-in, I think it'll be easier than Dixie Mine, perhaps comparable to riding up the Bluff trail. It is significantly easier than riding up that older section of Coachwhip from the other direction. I think that riding up this new section of Coachwhip and then blasting down the older section of the Coachwhip followed by Dixie Mine will become a popular thing to do.

On my ride tonight, I rode up Tonto Tank, turned left on Pemberton, rode up the new section of Coachwhip, and then rode the Windmill out to where it intersects with another new trail, the East End Trail, which as someone else in this thread has mentioned, goes up to Tom's Thumb. I'll try to check that trail out this weekend. On the way back, I rode down Dixie Mine and took the shortest way back to the parking lot. Total distance was a little over 15 miles. It felt like cheating when I was riding down Dixie Mine because I felt I hadn't expended the usual amount of energy getting up to that point.

I'm excited about this new section of the Coachwhip trail because it'll make it easier to get out to the Preserve where significant amounts of energy are usually required. (By me anyway...)
 
#20 ·
KevinB said:
... and then rode the Windmill out to where it intersects with another new trail, the East End Trail, which as someone else in this thread has mentioned, goes up to Tom's Thumb.
I rode a bit of the East End Trail last night. The sign at its intersection with the Windmill trail says that it's 0.1 miles from the Bell Pass / Windgate intersection. The first hundred yards (coming from Windmill) are steep but doable. After that, for a while, it's not quite as steep, and much to my surprise, there were a few gentle downhill sections as well. I rode it to a point, somewhat before the switchbacks start, where it gets dramatically steeper. My guess is that I'll be walking significant portions of the switchbacked section before the pass.

I've ridden the new section of the Coachwhip trail several times since my previous post (last week). My wife rode it with me last Saturday. She liked the trail, but had a tough time with it due to the fact that it's still loose and new. She thought it was harder than riding up Dixie Mine. I still think that going up the new section of Coachwhip is easier than riding up the combination of Dixie Mine and the old section of Coachwhip though.

I'm hoping that I can get out and explore more of the East End Trail this weekend. If I manage to get up to the pass, I'll probably try to push on and come down the other side.
 
#21 ·
KevinB said:
I'm hoping that I can get out and explore more of the East End Trail this weekend.
tomorrow saturday two friends and i are going to explore the new coachwhip from pemberton. but we'll prolly finish b4 you wake up! :D

i'll take some pics for ussens xc riders. ;)
 
#22 ·
kaboose said:
tomorrow saturday two friends and i are going to explore the new coachwhip from pemberton. but we'll prolly finish b4 you wake up! :D

i'll take some pics for ussens xc riders. ;)
We will be out there too. Finally talked better half into getting back on the MTB so I figured MMP has sufficient smooth trails to make it interesting. We will be sure to say howdy!

I rode the new Coachwhip last Sunday. MC Parks did a really good job of building the trail. It follows the terrain quite well. I rode it down from Windmill back to Pemberton. It's very loose right now so uphill will be a chore until it firms up. It intersects Pemberton about 1 mile south of Tonto Tank. Great addition to MMP trail system.

Bob
 
#24 ·
KevinB said:
What time are you starting?
6:30am.

KevinB said:
Any interest in riding/hiking up to Tom's Thumb?
NO, ABSOLUTELY NOT! we're doing an xc c-ride. if the new trail gets unridable going west from pemberton, we'll turn around and maybe go up westfork and play around cone rock instead.
 
#26 ·
tjkm said:
Check the City of Scottsdale website, click on the 'Tom's Thumb" map for some basic map info.
Good advice, thanks!

For those interested, here's a link to a map of the Tom's Thumb area trails. After looking at the map, I think I'll try to ride the East End Trail in its entirety and come back via the Rock Knob trail. (Sativa calls it "Rodeo" on her map...) Riding the Tom's Thumb Trail looks interesting too, but that'd be much more of an epic ride due to the fact that I'd have to ride back up the Windgate Pass trail from the Scottsdale side.
 
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