Mesa, AZ - What's Wrong With a Nice Canal Walk?

“I’ve learned that everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you’re climbing it.”

-- Unknown

Gary and I try to walk at least 4 miles a day and usually, in Mesa, we walk along the canals. There is one that goes right next to our resort and the access is easy. The canals, which are managed by the Salt River Project for water and electricity use in the Phoenix area, all have 18 - 20’ pathways along both sides, wide enough for vehicles with a 20’ ditch on either side of this.

Lots of room for walking and biking and many residents take advantage of this. We even see people fishing in the canals. These canals have lots of uses but Gary and I use them for long straight walks. Sometimes we go north along the canal, sometimes we go south. Sometimes we walk on the west side and sometimes we walk on the east side. You can begin to understand the problem here: it is boring. And, notice the walls along the left hand side. We can’t even see homes along the canal, they are on the other side of this 7’ wall.

There is not much to look at. Oh, an occasional fish jumps out of the water. Maybe a duck will float by. But, on the whole, it is a boring walk.

Thus, we jazz it up with hiking in the mountains around the area. And, boy, are there mountains: short ones, tall ones, ones surrounded by suburbs and ones surrounded by other mountains. There is a myriad of trails and we’ve taken many of them. Last week we hiked a counter-clockwise loop comprised of the Tom’s Thumb Trail, the Windgate Trail, the East End Trail and back to the Tom’s Thumb Trail back to the car. It was aggressive. Now there are some trail loops that are thigh-burners in one direction but are ok in the opposite. It just depends upon the grade of the slope. So, we planned to hike it in a clockwise direction tomorrow.

When we went to bed last night, there was no electricity in the park. We had 5 blankets on, heavier clothing than usual and were just fine as the temperature in the house headed down toward the mid-50’s. We had planned a hike in the morning but, given the situation, we weren’t sure what we were going to do. If the electricity was still off and the refrigerator getting warmer, we might have to load up our food and take it back to our RV in the shop. What kind of irony is that?

However, about 5:00 I awoke not only having to go to the bathroom but also realizing that the light was on in the living room and I was sweltering. Lots of problems to deal with. But, it did mean that our refrigerator was working as usual and we could hike in the morning. Oh, great. But, the electric alarm clocks had been shut off when the electricity went off, I got an important call just as we were leaving, the lady in front of us at the donut shop wanted 3 boxes of donuts, we had forgotten which road to take to the trailhead and our GPS led us astray. It wasn’t until 10:00 that we were able to start up the trail.

Guess what? Clockwise is as aggressive as counterclockwise. What a surprise! Which brings us back to the original question: what’s wrong with a nice canal walk?

10.1 3025’ what were we thinking?