Matt and Bianca were visiting and wanted a good, hard desert hike around Joshua Tree NP. Matt had done some research and suggested Spectre and Agua as an option. I knew it was exactly what he was looking for.
The day before the hike we met east of Twentynine Palms. I arrived early in the area returning from my eclipse trip and scouted for a good campsite as close as possible to the trailhead. Once I found a spot I let the other’s know and settled in. About an hour later John, Matt, and Bianca arrived. John had brought dinner prepared for us by Susanna and we enjoyed that after setting up camp. Fortunately, he had also remembered firewood. So we hung out around our campfire while waiting for Kevin who had to deal with horrible traffic. We called it a night early since we wanted to start early the next day. A hot day was forecast.
Alarms went off at 5 am, we left camp around 6:30, drove to the trailhead, and started hiking just after 7 am. It was cool, but the rising sun was warming things up quickly. We each carried 5-6 l water and had decided to stash an additional gallon of water at the foot of the mountain (Thanks Matt and Kevin for getting it there!).
The first 4 miles were fairly easy walking across the desert with gentle uphill. There were a couple of spots where we had to climb a little over dry falls. Lots of flowers and green this after a decent rainy season. We followed a big wash in a south-easterly direction until it narrowed and it became scrambly. Here we took a break and stashed the water. Now it was up a couple of hundred feet to a saddle, then down to another, bigger wash. This was the point where the real fun began, scrambling all the way to the top from here. It was getting warm. Time for another break in the shade. In the narrow canyons back here in the mountains there was no breeze at all.
We left our hiking poles behind since they would be more in the way than helpful and started up the draw picking our way through boulders. There was a cairned route, but it was easy to miss cairnes and we ended up just loosely following it. About half way up to the saddle between Spectre and Agua we found a nice shady spot under some trees and took another break. It was hot. Then we pushed on to just below the saddle where we found another shade spot for a break.
After that last break, we went to the saddle and then over to Spectre. Matt and Kevin were picking a route up Spectre that we all could do. Careful route finding is necessary here for those of us who are not rock climbers. It’s easy to end up in some really climby stuff. We all made it to the top of Spectre, found the register, signed in, and had our well-deserved lunch. It had taken quite some time to get up here. The combination of rough terrain and the heat slowed us down.
After climbing down to the saddle we looked at Agua and during our rest in the shade behind a huge boulder, we came to the conclusion that we just did not have enough water to add that climb. So down we went. The canyon was an oven by now. It was the middle of the afternoon, the sun had heated up the rocks and they were radiating back. Still no breeze. Sweat was dripping off me even going downhill. When we reached our water stash we all were out of water and glad that we got a little refill for the final 4 miles.
We studied the map and decided rather than taking the standard route, the route we had come in, we should follow the big, wide wash even though it took us a little in the wrong direction. We figured it would be smoother walking with no crossing of any obstacles. It worked and turned out to be almost the same distance as the way in. We got back to the vehicles just as the sun had set over the horizon. We were all dehydrated and tired. The big bowl of leftover fruit salad that John had in his ice chest in the truck was heaven-sent. There was even ice left to cool water for rehydration. After refreshing we all started our 3-4 h drives home.
What a great day!