Tucson - Part 2

After our dear friends headed back to Boulder, Joan and I moved to the west side of the valley, near the entrance to Saguaro National Park. We stayed at Mira Vista, a great little resort.

As usual, we seem to find sweet spots off season, when the crowds are small. This changed on Super Bowl weekend, though, when we enjoyed a great game with a mixed crew of Cardinal and Steeler fans.

Situated as it is on the edge of the park, there's a lot of wild life. We saw these javelina, deer, coyotes and a pair of great horned owls.

One of the goofier things we did in the area was to visit Old Tucson, which is the site where several old westerns and TV shows were filmed. Much of it burned and has been replaced with new construction. This fellow with Joanie is a stunt man in a pretty good show on the Old Mission set - many gun shots, fire and explosives. He took a twenty foot fall backwards off the side of the building, while others fell forward between twenty five and thirty feet. They all walked away.

Hard to see the writing on this one, but it's a cannon used on the set of one of my favorite childhood movies - The Alamo.

Tucson - Part 1

When we left Organ Pipe, we headed northeast to Tucson to meet with good friends Mitch and Barb at a B&B in the Catalina Mountains. On the way, we toured the observatory installations at Kitt Peak. Kitt Peak is run by a consortium of Universities, hosting several large optical telescopes (upto 4 meter diameter) along with some solar telescopes, too.

The best thing about this B&B was the fact that Barb and Mitch could sleep inside and we had a spot to hook the 5th wheel up outside. It was a good spot for us to meet.

We had alot of fun together, touring the Sonoran Desert Museum was one of the highlights. They offer a great raptor program, highlighting barn owls and Harris hawks.

This parrot wasn't flying free like the owls and the hawks. Instead, we found it in an enclosed aviary. This parrot is native to the southern Sonoran.

Organ Pipe - Hiking

Even though a large portion of the monument is closed due to safety concerns, there is still a substantial portion of great desert to hike in. We spent quite a bit of time in the Ajo mountains, both in the canyons and on the ridges.

Here Joanie is hiking to the high Bull Pasture, where you'll find a spring flowing down the rocks. Ranchers in the area once trailed their cattle to this high pasture. Good grazing is sparse here.

In Alamo canyon we found water on the surface, along with several bed rock mortars, such as these shown here.

We took our boots off and soaked our feet for a bit in Alamo Canyon.

I never cease to be amazed by the beautiful patterns in which cactus grow. This one looks soft and fuzzy, though the reality is quite different!

Organ Pipe - Animals

We heard some coyotes in Organ Pipe, but didn't see anything. Most of the animal life we saw was rather small, beginning with this Walking Stick, which is quite hard to discern from a twig.




We saw several western fence lizards, fairly small, perhaps eight inches nose to tail. Still have not seen a Gila Monster in the wild!

This common garter snake approached Joanie when she sat down along the trail to remove a stone from her boot. She was glad it wasn't poisonous. We've not seen an active rattlesnake since November in Joshua Tree, and we're hoping they will continue to slumber for another month or two.

A curve billed thrasher on our campsite grill ...

A red tailed hawk prepares to take off from it's perch atop a Saguaro Cactus...

One of those non-native species, we came across these in the campground. I figure these flamingos may have spent some time in Colorado, since they seem to have developed a taste for Coors beer ...

Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument

We headed south from Tonapah down into Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. January's full moon rose over the Ajo mountains. This moonrise is the largest and brightest of the year, because the moon is at it's closest to earth this month. We spent two weeks in Organ Pipe. Its' a great place to be in January!

Here's a view of the campground from a hill to the west. We're camped in the center of the campground.

I found these water bottles at moonrise on a hill overlooking the campground. They're tied together with rope so they can be readily carried. I'm not certain why they were painted black. Perhaps the illegals they belong to were planning to come down after dark to get some water from the camp.

A ranger named Kris Eggle was killed by illegals in Organ Pipe on August 9th, 2002. When my daughter Elise and I were there earlier that year, we saw several illegals entering the country in the remote south western corner of the Monument. The problem has become so bad that several sections of the Monument are now closed to the American public. While we were there, one of President Bush's final executive orders became effective. This order now allows concealed carry permit holders to legally carry our weapons in a National Park or Monument. I carried my pistol on every hike we made in Organ Pipe.

This is the view from inside an old mine building on one of our hikes. The trails are closed to the American public past this point due to safety concerns. We saw several parties of illegals that were captured during our two week visit. The border patrol is quite active here.

Tonopah - Petroglyphs and Hot Springs

We spent several days in the desert west of Phoenix. On the Gila River south of the Buckeye Hills we found many petroglyphs on boulders marking the top of what may have been the ancient river bank.

We camped at El Dorado Hot Springs and enjoyed the waters and good people that we met there. We seem to meet the great folks when soaking at hot springs, and El Dorado was no exception. On New Years evening Joanie and I took the cold plunge to renew our membership in the Polar Bear Club. We met Dave, Lisa and Lisa, they joined us in taking the plunge. Not quite as cold as Boulder Reservoir, but the contrast between the hot and cold pools was significant. Dave and his wife Lisa were just passing through, but we got to enjoy single Lisa's company during several soaking sessions. We also enjoyed visiting with Bill next door at Casa Blanca Hot Springs. Bill and Camilla developed El Dorado, then sold it to the current owners several years ago.