Dove Mountain Trails - Wild Burro Trail

Author's Comments

The Tortolitas do not announce themselves. They are not the Catalinas, which loom and demand, and they are not Saguaro National Park, which has a name that does the work for it. They are quieter mountains, lower and rounder, and the Wild Burro trails wander through them without much ceremony. I came here on a March afternoon a few years back, expecting a warm-up walk before driving on to somewhere more famous. I never made it to the somewhere more famous. The light that evening did something I have only rarely seen elsewhere in the Sonoran - it caught the west faces of the saguaros from a low enough angle that the ribs went sharp and graphic, almost architectural, and the palo verde beyond them held a green so soft it looked painted. The Catalinas were turning pink to the east. Picacho was a single small triangle on the northern horizon. What this place asks of you is patience for the wide shot. The terrain rolls rather than rises, and the compositions are about layering rather than drama - foreground ocotillo, middle-ground saguaro stand, distant range. Spring after a wet winter brings poppies and lupine in patches that reward walking off the obvious lines of sight. Fall and winter give you cooler light and longer golden hours. Go on a weekday if you can. The mountain bikers have every right to be here and most of them are gracious, but the trails feel more like themselves when you are alone on them. Stay until the sun is nearly down. The last fifteen minutes are the photograph.

Gallery