Fall at the Wild Burro Trailhead Is a Working Season for the Tortolita Trails

Who keeps the Wild Burro Trail open? Many Dove Mountain residents have parked at 14810 N. Secret Springs Drive, a short way up the road past the Ritz-Carlton attendant shack. Fewer could say who looks after the trail once it climbs into Wild Burro Canyon. This fall the Town of Marana answers that on its calendar. It has scheduled nine mornings at Wild Burro Trailhead between Oct. 14 and Dec. 19. Some are guided hikes, some are trail-repair shifts, and some are invasive-plant pulls. Each one asks residents to help with the trails they already walk.

The schedule makes sense once you look at what the trail system is and how it was put together.

A trail system assembled one easement at a time

The Town says the Tortolita trails cover 29 miles. They cross easements on a patchwork of private, town, county, and state land. The Town of Marana, Pima County, and the Arizona State Land Department started building them together in 2004, and the Town says expansion is still going on. The northern and eastern ends reach into Pima County's 3,100-acre Tortolita Mountain Park.

South of the canyon, Marana's 2,400-acre Tortolita Preserve adds nine more miles of trail. The Dove Mountain Community Trail runs along Dove Mountain Boulevard for another seven. All of these trails are open for hiking, biking, and horseback riding. The Preserve is reached from the Moore Road side, at 6250 W. Moore Road. In 2023 Marana opened a lot at Moore Road and Wild Burro Road with spaces for both cars and horse trailers. That project also planned about three miles of perimeter wildlife fencing.

A network crossing that many kinds of land needs ongoing care. The Town's trail map is the 2024 edition, and its trail page gives route descriptions, not daily conditions. We found no published report on damage from the 2026 monsoon or on water levels at Alamo Spring or Cochie Spring. If a particular wash crossing or spring matters to your plans, call Marana Parks & Recreation before you go.

Picking a loop by what the morning allows

Marana grades its Tortolita hikes on a four-letter scale. Level D is under 3 miles with less than 500 feet of gain. Level A is 10 miles or more with over 2,000 feet of gain. The routes the Town lists from Wild Burro and the Preserve fall into a few groups.

Two Level C loops for a weekday before work

• Lower Javelina loop. 5.1 miles with 370 feet of gain. Take the Wild Burro Trail to the Alamo Spring Trail. Pick up the East Lower Javelina Trail until it drops back across Wild Burro Wash, then follow the West Lower Javelina back to the Wild Burro Trail.
• Upper Javelina loop. Also 5.1 miles, with 490 feet of gain. It starts by walking Dove Mountain Boulevard from the trailhead to the roundabout, then heads north onto the Upper Javelina Trail.

Alamo Spring routes for a cool weekend morning

• Wild Burro Canyon to Alamo Spring. Level B-minus, 7.2 miles out and back with 795 feet of gain. The route follows the west side of the wash, runs through the wash to the old stone line shack, and continues up to the spring.
• East rim loop to Alamo Spring. Level B, 8.2 miles with 1,145 feet of gain. It goes out on the Alamo Spring Trail, past the Lower Javelina and Alamo Spring Spur junctions, and returns through the canyon past the line shack.
• West rim loop to Alamo Spring. Rated A-minus or B, 10.4 miles with 1,330 feet of gain. It climbs by way of Upper Javelina and the Wild Mustang Trail.

The long days

• Rim loop around Wild Burro Canyon. Level A, 12.0 miles with 1,330 feet of gain. It joins Upper Javelina, Wild Mustang, Alamo Spring, and the Wild Burro Trail into a single loop.
• Cochie Spring Trail. Level A, 12.0 miles out and back with 645 feet of gain. It ends at the remains of a dam just past the windmill.
• Tortolita Preserve loop. Level B, 9.2 miles with 475 feet of gain, starting from the State Land and Moore Road trailhead. The East Boundary Trail runs beside Heritage Highlands and other developments. The North Boundary Trail follows The Gallery Golf Course for 3.5 miles.

On any of these routes, dogs must be on a leash and owners must pick up after them.

The mornings on the calendar

Several of these loops pass the same few landmarks: the line shack, Alamo Spring, and the Javelina trails. Those are also the places the fall work and guided walks focus on. Here is the Town's schedule at Wild Burro Trailhead, with dates checked against the listings as of early October 2026.

The calendar sorts into three kinds of mornings. On the Saturdays you learn the place, the Wednesdays are for working on it, and the one Monday is for the plants.

Trail Crew covers the physical repairs. Volunteers clear trail and fix erosion, the kind of upkeep a wash-crossing system needs after a summer of storms. The buffelgrass mornings are run by Marana Parks and Recreation as part of its Space Invaders program. Volunteers work with the Town's Natural Resources team to identify and remove non-native plants. Each session is capped at ten people, and the listing warns to expect some hiking with elevation gain. Sign up through the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum's invasive plant volunteer calendar, and wear long sleeves, long pants, and closed-toe shoes.

The guided hikes and the ethnobotany walk work the other way. They give you background that makes the loops above more interesting. Arizona Master Naturalists help lead the Saturday hikes. The Town's birding notes put the Tortolitas in Upper Sonoran Desert Scrub, the habitat where golden eagles nest.

The Highlands Hiking Club runs its own schedule

Residents of The Highlands have a separate option. The Highlands Hiking Club's October 2026 schedule includes a Thursday, Oct. 22 hike from Wild Burro to the Line Shack, leaving at 7 a.m. It covers 3.5 miles with 300 feet of gain and meets at Wild Burro Trailhead. A longer Friday, Oct. 16 outing goes from Ridgeline to Borax Bench by way of Hunter Spur and Alamo Springs.

The club has rules. Hikers must be members or guests of members, except on orientation hikes. Everyone completes an orientation before signing up, and you register by contacting the assigned hike leader. Hikes leave from the Highlands Clubhouse parking lot unless the description gives another meeting point.

Having a say in what gets built next

The Town's line about continued expansion comes with no named project. Residents who want a voice in Marana's future trail priorities have a date to keep. Marana Parks & Recreation will hold a public meeting on its Parks & Recreation Master Plan update on Thursday, Oct. 8, from 6 to 8 p.m. It will be in the MARC Community Room at 13455 N. Marana Main Street. The plan will guide the department's priorities for the next ten years or more. The notice doesn't mention the Tortolitas specifically. Anyone who has walked the Javelina loops or volunteered on a Trail Crew Wednesday will still know which parts of the system need attention.

After the trail, down the hill

The trailhead sits just above The Ritz-Carlton, Dove Mountain, and the resort holds a short ceremony every evening. At 5:15 p.m. on the Ignite Lounge patio, a Native American flautist plays traditional songs to mark the end of the day. The performance lasts about 25 minutes. The resort is also promoting a new concept, CORE, A Sonoran Grill, built around Sonoran Desert ingredients and traditions. As of early October, its page still says only "Join us for what's next early fall" and gives no opening date, so check before you plan dinner around it.

The next morning on the calendar is Wednesday, Oct. 14. That's a Trail Crew shift at Wild Burro Trailhead from 7 to 11 a.m.

Trail access is one of the things our clients ask about most when they compare Dove Mountain enclaves. Some homes are a short walk from Wild Burro, and others are closer to the Moore Road side of the Preserve. If you'd like to know which streets connect most directly to the trails you use, the Brenda O'Brien Team is glad to walk through the map with you. Contact Us.