Guest Blog by Adrían Moran
Adrian Moran is a student of Environmental Science Engineering at the Universidad de Sonora and a member of the Caminantes del Desierto collective. The following hike was coordinated by Sky Island Alliance and APFF Bavispe-CONANP and part of the recent Sky Islands Festival. Thanks to Rancho Tonibabi for access to the sierra and for their hospitality that made this adventure possible.
This is my third time attending the Sky Islands Festival and participating in the fair representing both my degree program and the collective. I enjoy attending this event because it keeps me close to the great community working for environmental conservation in Sonora.
The activity that caught my attention most this year was the hike to Sierra La Madera, so I didn’t hesitate to sign up. On Saturday, Oct. 18, at six in the morning, I arrived with my friends at the central plaza of Moctezuma to kick off the day’s activities. Some chose the yoga workshop and others of us preferred the hike. To get to the location, we piled into the cars and passed by Rancho Tonibabi, about 15 minutes away on the road from Moctezuma to Huásabas. We traveled more than a kilometer on dirt road until we reached a small stream with hot springs. We explored it quickly and continued climbing to reach the point where we would begin the hike.
During the trek I felt quite tired from the celebration the night before, but I really wanted to see and experience these landscapes. I walked alongside two friends from the university for about half an hour while we ate our snacks and identified the plants we saw. At one point we decided to take a short break in the shade of some bushes.
We were lucky that one of the ranchers from the area came by and offered us a ride. We climbed into the truck bed, along with other students from UniSierra and biologists from the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, and we thought we would only catch up to where the rest of the group was, but we were invited to visit the ranch at the top of the sierra, so we agreed.
We traveled 9.5 kilometers for an hour along the rocky dirt road and took advantage of the time to talk about the ecosystem, the droughts, and the vegetation that was changing as we climbed the sierra (we eventually reached about 1,400m in altitude). It was gratifying to observe how the oaks became increasingly more frequent.
We arrived at the ranch house, and they welcomed us with boiled corn on the cob and good coffee. We got to see a small dam, growing beds for their own consumption, and the cattle facilities they had. After a while, we accompanied the rancher to an incredible waterfall with good flow at that moment. There I realized that the time I spent under the sun and getting up early had been worth it. We took advantage of the opportunity to swim in the small pool of the waterfall. The water was very cold, and it helped energize me even more.
The complete festival experience, from the booths to the dances, was really great and allowed me to meet even more people who dedicate their time to the environment.