Here is the second batch of photos that I took while hiking the Voaz MTB Loop Trail at Dreamy Draw at the Phoenix Mountain Preserve over the past weekend.
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| Location of Dreamy Draw Trailhead in Phoenix |
Some of these photos are quite decent.
I don't know about you, but I really like desert landscapes. They are fascinating to look at.
Enjoy.
This past Saturday, April 27th, I drove back down to the Phoenix Mountain Preserve and hiked the Voaz MTB Loop.
Why did I hike the Voaz MTB Trail?
Like I mentioned in previous posts, I recently exchanged my size 10.5 Zamberlan Vioz GTX Hiking Boots for a pair at size 11W at the REI in Paradise Valley in eastern Phoenix. Since the Camelbak hydration system that I used in Iraq back in 2006 has recently started leaking, I picked up a Gregory Nano 22 H2O Hydration Pack - Plus Size. Lastly, since the weather is starting to get warmer, I went ahead and bought the Sahara Sun Hat with Cape by REI. I already had a sun hat for hiking that I bought from Amazon a couple of years ago, but "Why not?" I reasoned.
As a result, I was itching to hit the trail.
In my previous visit to Dreamy Draw at Phoenix Mountain Preserve a couple of weeks ago (the subject of a future post here on my blog), I had a rough time using Google Maps to navigate my way on the Perl Charles Memorial (1A) Trail. The information for Dreamy Draw on Google Maps was spotty and incomplete. This time, I was going to use the All Trails app on my cellphone.
Before going to bed, I spent nearly an hour of time looking at all of the trails for the Phoenix Mountain Preserve on All Trails.
My main criteria for choosing a hiking trail was a hike that would be about four or five miles in length. I wanted to give my new hiking boots a good workout, but I didn't want to go on a seven or eight mile hike just yet. I just wanted a medium-length hike without too many issues. I also wanted to try out my new Gregory hydration pack and sun hat.
Since we are at the end of April, the temperatures in the Phoenix area are already in excess of 90 degrees Fahrenheit. Checking the weather forecast, I noticed that the temperature for Saturday, April 27th, was predicted to be in the low 80s due to a storm moving through central and northern Arizona.
With all of that criteria in mind, I decided upon the Voaz MTB Loop.
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| Map of the Voaz MTB Loop |
The Voaz MTB Loop isn't an official trail on the City of Phoenix Parks and Recreation website for hiking trails. The Voaz MTB Loop is a combination of several trails, the VOAZ Trail, the Perl Charles Memorial Trail, and the Dreamy Draw Nature Trail. According to All Trails, the Voaz MTB Loop has a length of 4.1 miles and an elevation gain of 793 feet.
With all of that in mind, I managed to go to bed at 1:30 AM and then get up at 7:30 AM. I got a solid six hours of sleep. After a short trip to my local Safeway to pick up some bottled water for my hydration pack, I managed to arrive at the parking lot for Dreamy Draw at around 10:00 AM. I even managed to find a parking spot at the parking lot on a Saturday morning. Nice.
I took off my New Balance shoes and put on my new Zamberlan hiking boots. I then laced up the boots. Perfect fit, so far. I wanted to know how my feet would feel after hiking four or five miles.
Then, things started to get a little crazy.
I filled up the bladder on my Gregory hydration pack to up to the 3-liter limit. After tightening the cap, I put on the hydration pack on my shoulders. The back of my shirt was SOAKED. There was water all over the exterior of my hydration pack. When I opened the hydration pack, there was water inside the compartment where the bladder is stored. A large amount of water was missing from the bladder. What the hell happened? Fortunately, I bought three 1.5-liter bottles of water when I was at Safeway, so I had plenty of water for my 3-liter capacity hydration pack. I replaced the water that had leaked out and then waited for about one minute. No leaks.
I then put on some sunscreen on my face, neck, and ears. I put on my sun hat. I then made my way to the trailhead.
When I reached the trailhead with the map of the entire Dreamy Draw area, I opened the All Trails app on my cellphone. I located the entry for the Voaz MTB Loop and then clicked on Start.
Almost right away, I started to have problems using the All Trails app. The beginning of the Voaz MTB Loop was improperly marked on the map. I had to walk around and match the landscape to the terrain on the map on my cellphone. I eventually found the starting point. While holding my cellphone in front of me, I walked forward for about one minute. I observed my location on the map update in real-time. I saw the bright blue line that indicated the part of the Voaz MTB Loop that I had hiked. I was on the correct trail.
Then, just a couple of moments later, I heard a loud chime originate from my cellphone. I was hiking on the wrong trail. I looked at my cellphone and then looked at the terrain. I tried to figure out where I was supposed to be. After about one minute of looking, I found the trail I was supposed to be on. The Dreamy Draw area of the Phoenix Mountain Preserve is littered with hiking trails. There are more trails that what is indicated on the City of Phoenix Parks and Recreation Trail Map.
For the next three hours of hiking, I had the same problem over and over again. I would hike for several minutes before getting a beep from my cellphone, inidicating that I was off the Voaz MTB Loop trail. I would then have to orientate the map on my cellphone to the terrain IOT figure out where I needed to be. At first, it was really annoying. Then it became mildly irritating.
During the hike, I quickly realized that I was largely hiking the same trail, the Perl Charles Memorial Trail (1A), that I had hiked a couple of weeks ago. There were some differences as the Voaz Trail itself is only 0.5 miles long. After I ascended to the saddle point, the highest point of my hike, I realized that I had been at this very location three weeks prior. I recognized the shape of the mountains. I recognized the rest benches made out of stone where I ate a Clif bar and drank some water. Since I have been struggling with allergies and/or a virus for the past two weeks, hiking up to the saddle point was a little on the slow side. However, I wasn't in a hurry. When I needed to take a break, I took a break. After I ate my Clif bar, I had A LOT more energy. After reaching the saddle point, it was literally all down hill from there. Despite the temperature being in the low to mid 80s, I was drinking water like crazy, especially on the way down.
When I returned to the trailhead, I sat down. During my first visit to Dreamy Draw, my feet were pain at the end of the hike. This time, there was some discomfort in my feet, but the difference was like night and day. After sitting down for a few minutes, I was able to walk back to my car at a relaxed pace. Big difference.
Yes, I did take some photos during my hike. To be honest, it was a hassle trying to switch between the All Trails app and taking a photo with my cellphone. For a brief moment, I considered giving up on taking photos during the hike IOT focus using the All Trails app. However, I decided to go ahead and take some photos despite the problems using the All Trails app. To be fair to the All Trails app, my cellphone is nearing the end of its lifespan. It took an agonizing minute or two for my cellphone to switch from the All Trails app to the camera app. It was painful. Then again, I wasn't in a hurry to get off the trail, so I adapted to the situation.
Lastly, my Samsung Watch 4 ran out of power. Again. This time, I waited until I started hiking to turn on my watch and record my hike. No effect. In addition to my cellphone, I just might have to replace my watch as well. Ugh. If I were to get a new watch, would I get a new Samsung watch or would I go with an Apple watch? I can't say. Before getting a new watch, I will have to play around with the settings on my Samsung Watch 4 and see if I can fix the issue.
All-in-all, I had a somewhat mixed experience with using the All Trails app on my cellphone. Yes, it was a hassle switching back and forth from the All Trails app and the camera app on my phone. I kept forgetting to press the Pause button on the All Trails app before taking a photo. In addition, there were times when I forgot to press the Resume button on the All Trails app. Plus, there is a limit to how far you can zoom in on the digital topographic map on your cellphone. Once you turn on the real-time update on the app, the feature can rapidly drain power from your phone. You definitely need to make sure that you have a backup charger for your cellphone with you on the trail. However, like I wrote earlier, the Phoenix Mountain Preserve is criss-crossed with trails. Many of these trails are either unmarked or poorly marked. The All Trails app is really good at displaying the trail you are hiking and your real-time location. That is a really convenient feature that makes the All Trails app useful. I am not too happy with having yet another service that I have to subscribe to IOT use. I can always go back to using a paper map, I suppose.
Here are about half of the photos that I took. I will make a second post with the other half.
A couple of days ago, I reached section "1.4 UTP Cabling" in the "Network Address and Basic Troubleshooting" online course over at the Cisco Networking Academy.
As a result, I drove west down Bell Avenue to the Home Depot in Surprise, AZ.
While at Home Depot, I picked up a 100 foot length of Category 5e Ethernet cable by Southwire, a box of RJ-45 CAT 5e connectors and boots, and a Ratcheting Modular Crimper/Stripper/Cutter made by Klein Tools.
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| Ethernet Cable, RJ-45 Connectors, Crimper |
These are items that I have been meaning to purchase for some time. Since I am making my way through the "Network Address and Basic Troubleshooting" online course, I thought that it was time to buy these items. I thought about buying a LAN cable tester, but I changed my mind at the last moment.
As I made my way through section "1.4 UTP Cabling", I eventually came to the section about straight-through and crossover cables.
The straight-through Ethernet network cable is the most commonly used type of networking cable. Straight-through network cables are used to interconnect different devices, such as connecting a host to a switch or a switch to a router.
Meanwhile, a crossover Ethernet cable is used to interconnect similar devices, such as connecting a host to a host, a router to a router, a switch to a switch, etc.
If you need to use a crossover Ethernet cable to connect a router to another router, for example, then you have to make the cable.
Creating a crossover cable entails stripping the Ethernet cable, separating the individual wires, re-ordering the wires, inserting the wires into a plastic RJ-45 connector, and then use the Ratcheting Modular Crimper/Stripper/Cutter to crimp the plastic connector.
When I took the class for the CompTIA A+ IT certification back at UMBC a few years ago, students were given a length of Ethernet cable, a crimping tool, and a RJ-45 connector. Creating my own crossover cable quickly became a mess.
How could something so easy become so difficult?
Well, when you create an Ethernet crossover cable, the wires have to be in a certain order for the cable to work.
That's where the infamous T568A and T568B wiring standards chart comes in.
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| T568A and T568B Wiring Standards |
To create that Ethernet crossover cable, one end of the cable has to meet the T568A standard and the other end has to meet the T568B standard.
When you buy a length of Ethernet cable, the cable is already at the T568A standard, so half of your work is already completed.
That just means that you have to get the other end of the cable to meet the T568B standard.
While writting this post, I found a short, informative video by Ideal Industries on Home Depot's webpage (just click on my hyperlink) that gives you a step-by-step guide on how to create an Ethernet crossover cable.
All of this information about how to create an Ethernet crossover cable is all well and good. However, there is a catch.
While reading "1.4 UTP Cabling", I read the following section:
Crossover cables are now considered legacy as NICs use medium-dependent interface crossover (auto-MDIX) to automatically detect the cable type and make the internal connection.
Basically, what that means is that creating Ethernet crossover cables is now considered to be obsolete. However, that doesn't mean that Ethernet crossover cables are going away anytime soon. Given that there are millions and millions computers, printers, switches, and routers that are in use today, you will probably need to know how to make an Ethernet crossover cable for some time to come. New equipment, on the other hand, will have this new technology that allows them to function without an Ethernet crossover cable.
In the meantime, keep making those Ethernet crossover cables.
They aren't going away any time soon.
Yes, I realize that I haven't posted to my blog for the past couple of days.
I just got busy doing other things.
As a result, I NEED to update all of my social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter/X, Blogger).
Now, it looks like I am going on an afternoon trip over to Wickenburg, AZ, so I might not be able to start posting until later tonight.
Things happen...
I am planning for several future posts on my blog here at Blogger.
Yesterday, I spent some time using the Snipping Tool on Windows to capture maps of hiking routes from the All Trails website.
Since I have dozens of photographs that I took while hiking on various hiking trails here in Maricopa County over the past couple of months.
My goal is to create posts about hiking that consist of the following:
The idea is to expand upon what I would normally do when I make a post to Facebook about hiking or riding my bike.
The difference would be that I can go into greater detail than I would in a Facebook post.
Looking over my blog, I haven't forgotten about some previous posts that need to be re-written and/or started from scratch all over again.
Yes, I need to re-write my post about the song "Seoul Music" by the Yellow Magic Orchestra.
Yes, I need to FINALLY write my LONG-AWAITED posts about movies that I saw at the Cine Core movie theatre in Seoul, South Korea.
Of course, this will take time and effort to accomplish.
Plus, I cannot butcher myself about my posts not achieving some high standard achieved by other bloggers.
It's an easy pit to fall into.
Stay tuned.
This afternoon, I made some progress in my new online course over at the Cisco Networking Academy.
Thus far, I am at section 1.3 Copper Cabling in the "Network Addressing and Basic Troubleshooting" online course.
Copper cabling consists of the following:
When you think of cables used in computer networking, you are probably thinking of STP and UTP cables. These two cables are commonly referred to as Ethernet cable.
Coaxial cable is the kind of cable that is typically used for cable television.
Fiber-optic cable consists of a strand of glass encased in wire, so it will be covered in a later section.
Progress is slow.
The topic might be beaten to death, yet it is a good idea to review the different cable types used in networking.
Believe it or not, technology does change when it comes to networking cables.
As always, I am taking copious notes.
Yes, I am familiar with the saying "If everything is important, then nothing is important".
I am probably permanently scarred from both CompTIA A+ certification exams where anything and everything can be a test question.
Based on my experiences with two previous online courses, Cisco isn't much different from CompTIA.
Back to studying...
Last week, I found myself making the long drive from my mom's house in Sun City to the REI store located in the Paradise Valley area of Phoenix. It's a long drive no matter what route you take. Usually, I drive east along Thunderbird Road to Cactus Road to the Paradise Valley Parkway. This time, I drove east on Bell Avenue through Sun City, through Peoria, through Glendale, through Phoenix until I got to Tatum Blvd. From there, I drove down Tatum Blvd until I got to the Paradise Valley Parkway. From there, I FINALLY managed to arrive at REI.
It's a good thing that I like the Paradise Valley area.
My primary reason driving along Bell was that I wanted to see what was beyond the intersection of Bell and 43rd Avenues.
The last time I bought a new pair of hiking boots was during the Autumn of 2011. I had recently returned from working six months in Afghanistan and needed a new pair of hiking boots. At the time, I was was living in Reston, VA. The nearest REI located in Fairfax, VA near the Fair Oaks Mall. Since I was wanted to do some hiking in Virginia-Maryland-West Virginia, I bought a pair of Solomon hiking boots for $230.
That was twelve long years ago.
When I moved back to Arizona in November, I took up hiking again. After a couple of hiking trips in the area, the idea occurred to me to buy a new pair of hiking boots. The Solomon hiking boots still worked on hikes to the Thunderbird Conservation Area in Glendale. However, I couldn't let go the idea of buying a new pair of hiking boots.
Anyway, this past December, I noticed that the Zamberlan 1996 VIOZ GTX hiking boots were on sale on REI's webpage. Regularly priced at $350, the hiking boots were on sale for around $230. These hiking boots weren't your typical Merrell hiking boots that would you buy at, say, Dick's Sporting Goods for "day hikes". These Zamberlan hiking boots were designed for extended hiking and backpacking. I had always wanted a pair of hiking boots like the Zamberlan 1996 VIOZ GTX hiking boots. Without driving to REI in Paradise Valley to try on a pair, I bought a pair of the hiking boots at size 10.5 in the grey color.
The hiking boots arrived in the mail two days later.
The first time I wore the Zamberlan hiking boots on the trail was a mixed bag. At the beginning of my hike at Deems Hills in Phoenix, the hiking boots performed remarkably. I felt and hiked like The Terminator. Near the end of my hike, however, my feet felt painful. I couldn't wait to get back to my car, take the hiking boots off, and put on my New Balance running shoes. Little did I know that I would spend the next couple of days recovering from my six mile hike in mountainous desert terrain.
I figured that my new Zamberlan hiking boots just needed to be broken in for my feet.
Subsequent day hikes in Peoria repeated the same pattern. At the beginning of the hike, my feet felt great. After hiking a couple of miles, my feet would begin to ache. I couldn't wait to get back to my car and change shoes.
Two weeks ago, I went hiking in the Phoenix Mountain Preserve. The pattern repeated itself. When my moderate four or five mile hike accidentally turned into a difficult six or seven mile hike, my feet felt as if they were on FIRE by the time I returned to my car. I could barely walk.
A subsequent hike at Papago Park the following week confirmed my hypothesis that my hiking boots were too small and needed to be replaced.
Remembering that REI allowed customers to return purchased items up to one year after purchase, I cleaned off my Zamberlan hiking boots and made the drive to Paradise Valley.
The whole return item procedure at REI was a breeze and without any hassles. Plus, the REI employee that processed my return, Jennifer, was quite helpful. I picked up another pair of Zamberlan 1996 VIOZ GTX hiking boots. This time, I picked up a pair that are size 11W. I even put on the hiking boots and walked around the store for several minutes. Just to be on the safe side, I made a point of walking a couple of miles prior to going to REI.
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| Zamberlan 1996 VIOZ GTX Hiking Boots |
What a relief!!!
I am planning to go hiking this weekend with my new hiking boots.
We'll see what happens and how my feet will feel after a five or six mile hike.
While at REI, I also picked up the Nano 22 H2O Hydration Pack - Plus Size by Gregory.
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| Nano 22 H20 Hydration Pack by Gregory |
The reason for the purchase?
Well, the Camelbak hydration system that the Army gave me to take to Iraq way back in 2006 has probably neared the end of its usefulness. For the past couple of months, my trusty Camelbak has started to leak through the drinking tube. The leak started to occur when I would use my Camelbak bicycling. The Camelbak would leak all over my right thigh. Recently, the drinking tube started to leak while hiking. In fact, just 10 days ago, my Camelbak leaked all over my map during a map and compass course given by REI down at Papago Park. When I went hiking after the class was over, I noticed that my water didn't last very long.
As a result, it was probably time to buy a new hydration system.
Moreover, I doubt that I could buy replacement parts for my Camelbak hydration system.
Why did I choose the Gregory hydration pack over hydration packs made by Camelbak and Osprey?
I really cannot say. The Gregory hydration system just appealed to me. Granted, Gregory produces more elaborate hydration systems than the Nano 22 H20 Hydration Pack. Just check their webpage. For now, I was happy that the Gregory hydration pack that I chose had a 3-liter bladder and a large pocket for storing my rain jacket, Clif bars, headlamp, first aid kit, cellphone charger, USB cable, etc. Now, I no longer have to use my waist pack and fill up the cargo pockets on my shorts.
Since I recently received a notification from REI that Kayaking 101 class scheduled for Saturday, April 27th, at Lake Pleasant has been cancelled, I guess I am going hiking this Saturday. It's time to try out my new gear.
