Wind Caves and Elephant Knees - 4.3.2024
Located in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park we drove Fish Creek Wash 4 miles and parked at the trailhead for the 'Wind Caves'... four wheel drive is recommended... but our Subaru Outback has all wheel drive and 8.7 inches of clearance... and had no difficulty.
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Leaving the wash and heading up hill on an obvious trail.
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We will gain ~300 feet of elevation in a half-mile to reach the caves.
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Denali Girl heads over to the caves.
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Denali Girl poses in one of the wind caves.
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This is my cave.
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So many caves, so little time.
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More caves.
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I took this pano while standing above most of the wind caves... and on the left horizon I can see the 'Elephant Knees' which we will visit later in the day.
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Exploring the wind caves.
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Continuing to explore the wind caves.
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Continuing to explore the wind caves.
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Continuing to explore the wind caves.
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Continuing to explore the wind caves.
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Continuing to explore the wind caves... with the 'Elephant Knees' on the far left horizon.
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Denali Girl took this photo of me above some of the wind caves.
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I walked over to a little bump and took this photo of the majority of the wind caves.
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A pano from my little high point... looking south at the 'Elephant Knees' formation in the left center of the photo.
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A pano from my little high point... looking north at the 'Wind Caves'.
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A zoom shot of the 'Elephant Knees'.
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Leaving the main section of the wind caves and heading back to the car.
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This wind cave was kind of separated from the others.
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A fellow hiker took this photo of us in a section of the wind caves that are located a hundred yards from the main section of wind caves.
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Almost back to our car in the Fish Creek Wash... the wind caves hike was a total of 1.2 miles, gaining 300 feet of elevation.
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After finishing the 'Wind Caves' hike we drove another .4 miles in the Fish Creek Wash and parked at the trailhead for the 'Elephant Knees'.
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Most of the hike will be in the Mud Hills Wash... and that is the Elephant Knees out there on the horizon.
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Hiking in the Mud Hills Wash toward Elephant Knees... the wash will lead us around to the back side of Elephant Knees... where we will find a fairly easy route up to the top.
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Continuing to hike in the Mud Hills Wash... here looking back at Elephant Knees.
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Continuing to hike in the Mud Hills Wash as we work our way around to the south side of Elephant Knees.
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Continuing to hike in the Mud Hills Wash as we work our way around to the south side of Elephant Knees.
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After hiing 1.8 miles in the Mud Hills Wash we have left the wash and started hiking up the south side of Elephant Knees.
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Continuing to gain elevation on the south side of Elephant Knees... here looking south toward the border with Mexico... located 25 miles away.
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We aren't the first people here.
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We have reached the top of Elephant Knees.
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Looking down on some of the elephant knee formations.
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After hiking a total of 2.2 miles we are standing on the high point above the elephant knees... looking north at the Vallecito Mountains.
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Hiking back along the top of the Elephant Knees formation.
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Looking down at some of the elephant knees.
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Tracing our steps back down to the Mud Hills Wash.
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Tracing our steps back along the Mud Hills Wash.
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Tracing our steps back along the Mud Hills Wash.
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Tracing our steps back along the Mud Hills Wash... now back on the north side of the 'Elephant Knees'.
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Tracing our steps back along the Mud Hills Wash.
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Tracing our steps back along the Mud Hills Wash... here looking back at the 'Elephant Knees' formation.
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We have made it back to our car... the 'Elephant Knees' hike was a total of 4.3 miles, gaining a little over 500 feet of elevation.... a 4.4 mile drive back out of the Fish Creek Wash will put us on pavement.
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