Snowmelt turns Sedona wash to tumbling creek
Hiking during the springtime snowmelt is one of Arizona’s most remarkable experiences. During this brief season, water rushes through desert washes and normally dry creek beds with an urgency tantamount to the panic hikers feel when trying to hit all the best water-themed trails before the cascades die out.
In Sedona, the well-known trails that wind around Oak Creek, Dry Creek and their watersheds are easy-access crowd favorites. But few venture into the isolated domain of Woods Canyon, where the ordinarily parched grove of Dry Beaver Creek runs wild for several months each year.
One of the best ways to enjoy the transient water works is to take a hike on the Wood Canyon Trail #93.
This trek starts with a short walk through a lush, riparian area with an easy creek crossing before emerging in an airy, savanna-like high desert. Yucca-embellished grasslands dominate the first 2 miles of the hike. The red-earth path climbs gently, morphing from a wide two-track to slim footpaths in the shadow of Horse Mesa.
At the 2.3-mile point, the trail enters Munds Mountain Wilderness and begins its descent to the creek bed. Over the next 1.2 miles, canyon walls close in and the trail ducks in and out of oak-juniper woodlands with a couple more creek hops and a traverse of an edgy-ledgy shelf above the water.
The highlight of the hike is a sandstone “beach” that appears at the 3.5-mile point. Mounds of water-scoured russet stone slouch into the creek like melted taffy. This scenic, sycamore-clutter spot at the juncture of Woods and Rattlesnake canyons features rushing rapids, swirling eddies and still pools that reflect the rusty edifices and charcoal volcanic cap rock of the surrounding mesas.
The trail is reasonably easy to follow for about another mile but you’ll need some highend route-finding skills to make it all the way to where the trail ends at 5.3 miles.