Biking The Peavine & Iron King Trails

Bike trails are numerous in and around Prescott. Carolyn and I recently rode on the Peavine and Iron King Trails both developed as a part of the Rails To Trails program in which old railroad beds are converted to recreational trails.

The Peavine Trail, 4.15 miles borders Willow and Watson Lakes to the east and runs through the Granite Dells. It was made from a part of the old Santa Fe, Prescott and Phoenix Railroad bed. The Iron King Trail branches off the Peavine Trail and runs east to Prescott Valley is longer.





The Peavine Trail, so named because it winds in and out and around like a pea vine, begins about 3 miles east of our home. Here it passes the shoreline of Willow Lake.







It winds through the Granite Dells.












The Dells owe their distinctive look to the weathering of this very hard rock over millions of years. Geologists estimate the rocks are about 1.4 billion years old.








Here the trails goes by Watson Lake. In the distance Granite Mountain can be seen on the right. The granite there is different from that of the Dells. It is even older.








The formations are amazing. They are totally unlike the geology just a few miles away.










Many of the boulders are cube-shaped due to the nature of right angle fissures of granite.

The balancing rocks have withstood earthquakes over the millenia but eventually erosion will bring them down.












The Iron King Trail branches off from the Peavine and turns east toward Prescott Valley. Here it winds through pine forests.








Carolyn saw her first Road Runner. (Wiley Coyote was nowhere to be seen.) The road runner is to the immediate right of the two trees in the distance. (Look close, he's hard to see.)






As the Iron King Trail approaches Prescott Valley the view is a panaoramic of wild flowers.










When it's time to turn around and head home the only bad thing about the whole day is the uphill climb getting back to the Dells.