One of four great deserts in North America, the Sonoran Desert spans about 100,000 square miles through the sands of Arizona, California and Mexico. Boasting the seemingly contradictory titles of the most tropical and the hottest of the four great deserts, the Sonoran Desert welcomes those who dare to visit with stunning landscapes sprinkled with a healthy side of things that will poke, poison* and parch you.

*ok, ok, technically snakes, scorpions and gila monsters don’t poison you, they envenomate you but I couldn’t resist the alliteration.

When I first moved to Arizona from Northern California in 2014, I drove to my new home with images of dusty tumbleweeds and flat, dry and desolate expanses as far as the eye could see. I wrongly assumed that Arizona was nothing but the backdrop to an old western film. In all fairness, the Phoenix Valley does resemble such a scene in many ways, but for all my assumptions about the topography of this state, I was woefully unprepared for its diversity and beauty.

The City of Phoenix is located within the homeland of the O’odham and Piipaash peoples and their ancestors who have inhabited the landscape for centuries. The Salt River Pima Maricopa Indian Community (SRP-MIC) and the Gila River Indian Community claim aboriginal title to lands exclusively used and occupied by the Akimel O’Odam and Piipaash, equalling over 375,000 acres of South-Central Arizona.

Arizona can be divided roughly into three topographical regions. Phoenix and the surrounding areas of Southern and Western Arizona are part of the Basin and Range province and include the Sonoran and the Yuma deserts. This area is dry but experiences both winter rains and summer monsoons and is dotted with the diverse flora and fauna of the desert. Elevations range from about 1000 to 4000ft.

The transition zone or Central Arizona, climbs to elevations of 4000 to 7000ft and contains impressive features like the Mogollon Rim and the red rocks of Sedona. Acting as a bridge between the low desert and the high plateaus, the transition zones draw thousands of Arizonans in the hotter months toward cooler temps and treelined mountains. It is common to find cacti like the prickly pear decorating the forests of Central Arizona.

Finally, Northeastern Arizona sits atop the Colorado Plateau. Elevations of 5000 to 8000ft bring cooler temperatures, Pinyon-juniper woodlands, grasslands, and ponderosa pine forests. Cities like Flagstaff and geographic marvels like the Grand Canyon and Petrified Forest National Parks interrupt the landscape with their unusual beauty and vast splendor.

South Mountain Park and Preserve, the topographic target of my project, paints a classic Sonoran Desert scene amidst a bustling metropolitan area. If you have ever been to Phoenix, AZ or one of the surrounding cities, you have seen South Mountain. Rising high above the grid of streets and homes on the south end of the city, one can’t take in the entirety of the park without a turn of the head. At night, locals identify the mountain by the blinking red lights of the radio towers on the mountain’s peak.

From 1933 to 1942, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), a program developed as part of Roosevelt’s ‘The New Deal’ whose primary aim was to provide “relief, recovery and reform” to those struggling through the Great Depression, provided education, income and on-the-job-training for more than 3 million young men. Three CCC camps were built on South Mountain Park. CCC volunteers would go on to construct power lines, pipelines, erosion control dams, roads, 26 miles of trail and parking for 1500 cars. They installed guardrails, landscaping and signage and built recreational facilities like ramadas, picnic areas and more, which laid the foundation for modern-day South Mountain Park and Preserve.

Today, South Mountain, at over 16,000 acres, hosts over 100 miles of trails and three mountain ranges (the Ma Ha Tauk, Gila and Guadalupe ranges). Dobbins Lookout is the highest point in the park at 2,330 ft but there are many opportunities to get your climbing legs dirty on trails like Gila (formerly Pyramid trail), Mormon and Holbert trails. South Mountain can be accessed from the surrounding neighborhood at many points along the mountain’s perimeter, which makes the mountain’s vast trail network uniquely accessible. I intend to take advantage of this unique feature as I aim to traverse every trail on the mountain as part of a personal project and fundraiser for The Cairn Project.

It might seem crazy to start a project like this in the summer months, and maybe it is, but sometimes we must take advantage of the momentum that a newly sparked idea casts on our ambitions. The desert can be a beautiful landscape, but also one that invites caution and good sense. The warmer and hotter months of Arizona catch many hikers and outdoor adventurers off guard, who are not accustomed to the dry air and blistering sun or who overestimate their capabilities. Local trail and mountain rescues are a constant reminder of how nature demands to be respected. The city of Phoenix issues closures on many popular trails during hot days, including some on South Mountain. It is important to heed all closures and take extreme precautions when adventuring out on warm and hot days.

If you have read my first post, you know that I am in the preparation phase for completing an “Every Trail” project on South Mountain. This project serves as a platform to raise money for The Cairn Project, a nonprofit organization that supports and champions gender equity in outdoor adventures through women’s storytelling. But it also serves as a platform to reconnect with my love for the outdoors and push my body after a long illness has isolated me from my enjoyment of physical activity and an inherent trust in this physical body.

As I prepare to hike and/or run every trail on South Mountain, a project created entirely by me with my own rules, I am keeping the following in mind: