![]() ![]() ![]() Camping The Cochise Stronghold Campground is an intimate shaded campground. The 0.4 mile Stronghold Nature Trail loops across the slopes bordering the south edge of the campground, and has notices identifying some of the common plants, while the main hiking path - the 4.5 mile Cochise Trail - branches off to the south. However, restrooms are available at the trailhead. Fees are $10 per night, $5 for day use or hiking. The camp is open all winter but closes for three months in summer, when high temperatures make hiking less enjoyable. All is shady, set amongst large oak and pine trees, resulting in only dappled sunlight on the forest floor, and limited views of the mountains, but the place is very popular, and may fill up at weekends during spring and fall. The campground is a quiet and peaceful location, suitable for RVs up to 30 feet long, as well as smaller vehicles, and tents. One short side road leads to Kerwin and Carlink canyons, two wooded, trailless, steep-sided ravines also within Coronado National Forest, but most people are here for the Stronghold. The road is bumpy where it crosses the streambed (five times), but the amount of water is usually very low, and there should be no difficulties in reaching the campground, where the road ends. ![]() Cochise is buried amongst the rocks in an unmarked location that was known only to his immediate family and friends, and is now thought to be lost.īeyond the junction, Ironwood Road, now gravel, continues west a short distance across even emptier land, past a few side tracks to potential free camping places, and also several residences, then bends south and enters the wooded valley of Cochise Creek ( Stronghold Canyon), which also contains a few houses, and other buildings. The many narrow ravines, sheer cliffs and other hard-to-reach places made this an ideal refuge for the Chiricahua Apache Indians and their famed chief Cochise, who dwelt here for several years in the 1860s, following the battle of Apache Pass. All the mountains are part of the Coronado National Forest. Within the Stronghold is a hiking/equestrian trail that goes from the East Cochise Stronghold Campground, over the Stronghold Divide and down into the West Stronghold Canyon. Most of the hills are traditional in appearance, with wooded, rounded peaks and ridges but at the Stronghold, over an area approximately 2 by 3 miles, the underlying brownish granite is largely exposed, and weathered to form a varied array of domes, fins, pinnacles and boulder piles. Another, not so well known location is Cochise Stronghold in southeast Arizona, part of the Dragoon Mountains, which are a relatively small range, extending north-south for 20 miles, between the wide expanses of San Pedro Valley to the west and Sulphur Springs Valley to the east. Outcrops of eroded, rounded boulders feature in many places across the Southwest, in such diverse locations as Joshua Tree National Park and Pinnacles National Park in California, Granite Mountain in north Arizona, and Hueco Tanks in Texas. ![]()
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