Pine-Top May 15

May 15, 2021, Saturday Day 11

It was a slow day today. Just relaxing after the traveling the past few days. 

I went into town and ended up in the welcome center. I spoke with the volunteer who told me that the town's hyphenated name resulted from the 1984 merger of Pine Top and Lakeside. It has a small year-round population of less than 5000, but greatly expands in the summer, and to a lesser extent in the winter, when residents of desert Arizona flee to the mountains to escape the heat or to go skiing. It is forested and has lots of vacation and second homes. 

I then went shopping for food for our stay. The local supermarket had competitive prices.

After breakfast in the condo, I went swimming in the large pool and then lounged in the hot tub. Both facilities were empty in the morning. After air drying in the sun as the temperature began to rise, I checked out a basketball and practiced shooting on the basketball court. My skills have deteriorated from lack of use.

In the afternoon I hiked on the Old Hactery Trail. This was accessed through a gate in the back of the resort which placed me in the middle of the trail. It was a relatively short trail, only 3.6 miles, but part of the much larger White Mountains trail system. I elected to go left, which I thought was the shorter portion. The trail was a rocky and I had to pass through several gates along the route. I crossed a stream and passed a fish hatchery. I ended up at the Poplar Drive trailhead. An adjoining trail took me up to the end of the resort. I retraced my steps and returned after about 1.5 hours.

  

We prepared and ate a barbeque dinner featuring chicken kabobs.