Trail Overview
Rocky, technical, and very scenic unimproved trail through the heart of SW NM's Barry Goldwater aerial gunnery range SE of Yuma. Range permits from the Luke AFB Range Control Office are required, however, they're free and easily obtainable online at HTTPS://luke.isportsman.net. This is a very harsh, arid desert environment so plan to bring plenty of water to keep hydrated. Expect to see plenty of cacti of all varieties, ironwood trees, and desert flora of all varieties. Fauna includes desert lizards, snakes, horned toads, and an occasional bighorn sheep on the high rocky slopes. It is recommended that you plan this adventure around favorable weather conditions as this area is known for intense flash flooding during monsoons.
Difficulty
Very rocky, rutted and off-camber trail with erosion, loose rocks, sand, washes and obstacles up to 3 feet tall, including ledges and short, steep grades.
History
The Dripping Springs Trail (also called Woodcutters Pass was originally created by woodcutters harvesting Ironwood lumber used for timbers by the nearby Fortuna Mine in the mid to late 1800s. Parts of the trail were subsequently obliterated by several severe monsoon rains during the '30s '40s and '50s. A dedicated group of off-roaders took on the project of rebuilding the roads and over a period of 10 or so years were able to re-open the trail for off-road use. As a side note, yearly monsoons can alter, sometimes radically, the terrain and difficulty of this trail. There was a noticeable increase in the level of difficulty between last fall and this fall when we traveled the trail a few days ago on Nov 28, 2020.
