I began my journey on the AZ Black Canyon Trail at 5am on Nov 12, 2024. I started a few miles North up the trail from Russel’s start point, since I couldn’t reach his start point in my car. Where I started there is a nice big dirt pullout off Orme Road with a Black Canyon Trail marker right there. I finished at the same point as Russel’s track. I did this solo and self-supported. I’m calling it a “run” but there was a lot of walking involved… I placed three water caches for myself the day before- the first one at 34.29345, -112.17389 where the BCT crosses Antelope Creek Road, the second one at the Glorianna Trailhead and the third at Table Mesa Trailhead. After reading some other posts I was very careful to hide my stashes well and hang them to reduce the chances of mice getting to them, and luckily it worked out and all my stashes were there! I did bring a water filtration system as backup but never used it. If I do this trail again, I’d stash more water for myself.
I started out tracking my run with both Strava and Gaia, but by the time I neared Black Canyon City Trailhead I realized my phone battery was not going to make it, so switched to only Gaia and put my phone on power saving mode until I was confident I had enough battery to last. I also tracked my run with my InReach mini, and I upped the intervals from every 30 mins to every 10 mins when I stopped tracking on Strava. I thought I'd be moving a bit quicker on the trail, and wished I'd brought another power block for my phone and headlamp. But running on only 3 hours of sleep the night before, my body didn't feel too great to begin with. And I'm happy that timing worked out the way it did because I got to watch two beautiful sunrises! I saw lots of desert critters, my favorite being the many, many bunnies. Their cuteness boosted my morale every time I saw one and staved off any loneliness. Except for when I could only see their glowing red eyes in the night- that usually scared me at first. But, being used to running in Alaska my whole life it was such a relief to not have to be constantly vigilant for bears!
It was an unforgettable experience being out there for 26 hours straight. I am hoping to run 100 miles some day and this experience has got me more excited about it than ever! In most ways, the hardest section for me both mentally and physically was from my first cache to my second. I've never run this many miles before, so the immense distance ahead was still intimidating at that point. And I did this section in the heat of the day, which was only mid 70's but I have no heat tolerance at all so that brought down my energy significantly. As soon as the sun set I felt a resurgence of energy and motivation, and re-gained a more positive mindset. I took lots of brief, accidental wrong turns throughout the trail (especially on the Northern parts) but quickly corrected them. By the time I got to Table Mesa TH I was exhausted and laid there sleep-eating and drinking water for 30 or 45 minutes. This rest put me in a great mood for the rest of the trail.
I appreciate how this trail is always relatively close to a road, but you don’t hear or see much road traffic, giving it a more rural feel. There was also very little traffic on the trail- I saw two people biking in the morning and nobody else.
By 7:00am the next day I happily jogged to the ending point on Carefree highway where I then drove to my Grandpa’s house and took the best nap of my life 😊