The term “sky island” was new to me, but it now makes sense. Imagine an isolated mountain range surrounded by grassland. What is growing or living in the mountain is different from the surrounding “sea” of grasslands or desert. It is cutoff from other distant mountains. The Chiricahua Mountains rise to 9,763 feet. This “sky island” is home to 1,200 species of plants. Also the Chiricahua fox squirrel is found only in these mountains. The National Parks brochure lists various animals and birds that are present and special to see in these mountains, but we spent our time either watching our feet to avoid falling, or looking up in awe at the rock formations.
We had a great hike on the Echo Canyon Loop which is 3.3 miles. We hiked in the counter clockwise direction which gave us a steeper initial downhill and a more gradual uphill. Both of us noticed that our necks were tired from looking down at our feet and looking up over our heads, it was an awesome hike.
