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| - For living in Cave Creek, I realized I had only visited Bartlett Lake once before - and that was on a boat! Definitely not the same as checking a place out on foot. Today, my kids (ages 6 and 9) hiked out one of the trails - Jojoba Trail #511. Jojoba trail is part of the Tonto National Forest. You need to get a Tonto National Forest pass to park anywhere beyond the area where you enter off of Cave Creek Rd. We went on a Sunday, so the ranger station was closed. The marina store was open though, and we were able to pick one up there. They also sell snacks, soda, beer, etc. You can also pick up passes in Cave Creek/Carefree at Circle K and other places. Apparently the fine is about $100 if you don't have it visible. There were pot toilets at the parking area - although not well maintained and pretty gross and smelly.
For Jojoba Trail - Go until Bartlett Lake Rd. ends at the marina/parking lot. On the left side of the parking lot after you enter you'll see a sign for a hiking trail - that is Jojoba Trail. I would not recommend this trail for anyone who is unstable, and definitely not younger than 5 or so. My kids are pretty good hikers, but it was even a bit of a challenge for my 6 year old due to slippery rocky areas. It is also not terribly well marked, so if you go off the trail you might have trouble finding it again (as happened to us for about 10 minutes). Luckily, it was coolish 70 degrees and cloudy on this fine day, so it was a non-issue. Wear PANTS. Lots of brush, even in parts of the trail, and easy to slip and get scraped up.
We hiked to a cove, although I don't think it was Rattlesnake Cove, but who knows? Nothing is marked, and there are no maps for this trail that I could find either online or in the area there. Kids got to wade in and dog swam around to cool off. I think you could easily swim here in the summertime, and it's a pretty easy 1 mile hike to get to the cove we stopped at (and turned back at that point). It would be HOT in the summer though - so I would definitely do it very early in the morning in the hotter months. They had a great time exploring the little peninsula. We didn't have fishing poles, but it would have made a fantastic fishing spot!
The hike itself was awesome. So beautiful hiking right next to the lake, and with all of the beautiful cacti. I hear there's lots of wildlife here. We didn't see any, but it's pretty remote way deep in the canyons so I would expect that it would be easy to spot some desert creatures. So beautiful! I will definitely do this hike again. There was nobody else on the trail with us, so I suspect that it's not very well known. Which makes sense, since there's no maps or anything online.
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