Hike Siphon Draw, The Flatiron, and Ironview Peak Tonto National Forest, AZ

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Ranking among the most popular hikes in Phoenix, the Siphon Draw Trail leading up to The Flatiron is a classic Superstition Mountains jaunt. I'd hiked to The Flatiron years ago, but never to Ironview Peak above it. For this reason, and because I wanted to revisit this lovely (though crowded) hike, I decided to head over to Lost Dutchman State Park. The state park requires an entrance fee to park your car, but aside for the first quarter mile the hike is located completely in Tonto National Forest. You could park outside the park boundary if you can find a legal way and hike in from there, but I chose to just drop the few bucks and do the trail as intended.

After darting through the interpretive trail portion within Lost Dutchman, I ascended the extremely wide and gradual trail up into the Superstition Wilderness. Here the trail became more singletrack-like, though years of footsteps have created short detours and the official trail is no longer easily discernible. Taking a few short switchbacks, the trail keeps above the Siphon Draw drainage and traverses along the slope before descending into the mouth of the water-carved feature referred to as Siphon Draw. There was a trickle of water cascading down the center, a beautiful hangout spot that people seem to actually take care of, despite its popularity.

I hiked up the steep, sloped Siphon Draw watercourse to its head, a hundred feet or so above. The route can be a little tricky past here since there are social trails leading in multiple directions. Keeping too far left leads into the main drainage, and while this option would ultimately work fine, the official trail leads up a Class 2 slope to a notch between the pinnacles. The slope is eroded to death, so it shouldn't be hard too locate. Once at the notch, I got a great view of The Flatiron far above and the drainage scramble to come. The trail drops a few feet from this notch, leading down into the drainage. Once within the drainage, there's no getting off-route. It's a series of fun Class 2/2+ obstacles leading up the bouldery and often steep ascent. I imagine this was a dangerous route when it was first used, but I assume all loose rock hazards have long since been dislodged, leaving only fun upward progress on solid scrambling terrain. There's a path of least resistance, but you can always make it harder by pulling all sorts of moves on the many boulders.

After gaining about 1200 vertical feet, a final Class 3 move brought me out of the drainage and onto a nice trail that leads west, following the rim of The Flatiron and ultimately leading to the lookout point. The Flatiron is not a peak though it's a very cool feature. The majority of hikers turn around here, myself included on my first visit. This time my excitement was set on Flatiron Peak, a pinnacle-filled high point just to the east. The peak itself is popular enough to have a well-traveled social trail. I hiked back to the head of the drainage and started up on this social trail, which wrapped around an initial set of pinnacles and onto a slope at Flatiron Peak's base. This section is a little brushy, so the carved trail helped negate any unpleasantness. Suddenly the trail seemed to end at a bouldery headwall, but a Class 2/3 crawl led through a stack of these big guys. The trail continued ascending adjacent to the bouldery headwall and then entered another short boulder cave, an easy Class 3 move taking me out and up onto the final hundred feet of trail to the summit. In the distance I could see Superstition Peak at the end of the Superstition ridgeline and the rolling, colorful Superstition Mountains stretching away.

PEAKS ON HIKE
Elevation (ft) / Prominence (ft)

Peaks on hike

Elevation

Prominence

The Flatiron

4860 ft

40 rise

Ironview Peak

5024 ft

784 rise

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Starting out from Lost Dutchman State Park. You can't see The Flatiron from here, hidden top left.

Along the Siphon Draw Trail, a wide and gradual ascent. The Flatiron now visible poking out in the center.

Entering Superstition Wilderness, where the trail becomes more trail-like.

The trail ascends a bit on a human-eroded slope and then traverses above the Siphon Draw drainage. You can see Siphon Draw and The Flatiron in the center.

Siphon Draw.

Siphon Draw, The Flatiron looming above.

Toward the top of Siphon Draw. The route leads left and up to a notch.

View back down.

Close-up toward the bottom of Siphon Draw, as I leave the slickrock portion.

Class 2 out of the slickrock and up between the pinnacles above to reach a notch higher up.

More Class 2 leading up to the notch.

At the notch, a view toward the drainage. A trail descends slightly to enter it.

Close-up toward The Flatiron and the drainage.

View back toward the notch (left of center), just after entering the drainage.

Starting up the drainage.

Class 2/3 obstacles.

Lots of fun boulder-hopping.

View back down.

It's sort of like this the whole way, various obstacles of varying difficulties. I stuck to the drainage for pretty much the whole ascent, though there are often tiny detour trails used to wrap around harder bouldery moves.

Another shot back down, now well into the scramble.

It may look brushy, but there are carved paths through anything unpleasant.

Nearing the top of the drainage.

Looking back at the final move to escape the drainage, Class 3.

Above the Class 3 move at the top of the drainage, now heading along the trail to The Flatiron, seen left.

View down into Siphon Draw.

View toward Ironview Peak (left) from The Flatiron.

Heading back toward the head of the drainage, Ironview Peak seen ahead. A social trail leads up the slope in the center.

The social trail wraps around some initial pinnacles and enters this slope.

View back toward The Flatiron.

Along the base of a bouldery headwall.

The trail leads into this fun little pile of boulders.

Some more traversing beneath the headwall.

And then another short cave leads above the headwall. A trail continues to the summit from here.

View back just before reaching the summit of Ironview Peak.

Ironview Peak summit, view toward the Superstition ridgeline.

Wide shot east.

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Hire/refer me as a web developer or send me a few bucks if you find my site useful. I’m not sponsored, so all fees are out-of-pocket and my time preparing trip reports is unpaid. I really appreciate it!