Hassayampa River Preserve, Wickenburg

Not far from Desert Cypress RV Park, just along Highway 60 is the entrance to the Hassayampa River Preserve.   The entrance road is quite narrow and we almost shot past.

 

The headquarters of the preserve are in this lovely old ranch house, which I believe was once a dude ranch.

 

After paying our entrance fee, $5.00, and retrieving our water from the truck we headed off to explore.   There are lots of short trails which in total add up to about 3 miles.  We decided to start with the River Ramble trail

There wasn’t a lot of water in this section of the river but there were lots of dragonflies flittering about.

Partway along we veered off to climb up to Lyles Lookout, although this is only a short trail, it’s steep and rocky, but has great views from the top. 

The trail to Lyles Lookout

Climbing up to the lookout

Some of the views from Lyles Lookout

The railway line runs close by the preserve.   At night as the trains pass through the sound of their whistles echoes across the dry river bed and all the coyotes sing like mad.   When we commented on this to someone, I forget who, we were told that the train whistles hurt their ears, is it true?   I have absolutely no idea.

 

I love to hear the coyotes sing, but it really does make the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end.  

Part of the trail along the dry river bed.

Our next trail was the Lion Trail this area had some very old Freemont cottonwood trees and was a bit like walking through bosque.

The preserve is a birders paradise, but even though we sat by the pond for quite a while and heard lots of different birds, we didn’t actually see any.

Have fun, we are!