Borrego Springs: Palo Verde Canyon Wash North

Rating	*****
length	7.1 mile - 3 hour 15 minutes (Return trip). Easy/moderate.
Height	910 - 2200 feet
Access	Where the Palo Verde wash crosses the road (Signed at the south side), drive back 0.4 mile towards Borrego Springs (West).
Other Trails	C
Data	To download these files, right-click the link and choose 'save as' |--| .GPX (GPS file) |-----| .KML (Google Earth file)

Back

A nice canyon walk and a loop back to to the Moly mine.

Where the Palo Verde wash crosses the road (Signed at the south side), drive back 0.4 mile towards Borrego Springs (West).

Look for the ditch to the North, you have to hike just west of that ditch.

The first part is more cross country, following some rocky washes.
After about 1000 yards, you will find the main wash, follow the more sandy part of the wash
From this point on it's mostly sand and gravel.

The canyon entrance is not that obvious from the road (close to middle of the first picture), but will become more clear further along.

Once in the canyon the route is quite obvious and ends at a steep bowl.

On your return look at point "Trail 1" to the left (east).
You can hardly miss the trial going up along the canyon wall.
An easy trail leads up the entrance of the Moly mine.
Look for the return trail on the other side of the canyon. (Not the Palo Verde Canyon, but the canyon you are hiking in now)

Going further on the same trail beyond the mine, looked too dangerous.
So go straight down, steep but not too difficult.
Go up on the other side and try to find the trail you just saw (point "Trail 3", leading west, south west.
Follow the well defined trail south west, up to a point where the trail goes more steeply down along a ledge.
At first glance this isn't an obvious route, but it isn't that bad, a bit slippery and the last few feet are more difficult to come down on.
This is point "Trail 4".
See the picture of the way down, with my wife standing on the trail.

Follow the wash down to the car.

Alternatively you can hike the canyon beyond the mine and follow a trail to the Smoke tree canyon and make this hike into a loop.
But this is a more difficult hike.









Disclamer: Read this first before you start your hike.
Contact: usa/at/e/f/m/e/r/.eu (leave out the /)
All hikes recorded on pocket loox (pocket PC) using gpsTuner(.com)
Hiking Palo Verde Canyon Wash North Borrego Springs Area (Anza-Borrego Desert State Park) California, Hike with gps, gpx and kml (Google Earth).