Tucson Desert Museum

While it was cold this morning, Sue and I were off early to the Desert Museum. Beside a nice stroll our major stops were to see the Humming birds and the Raptor flight show. I have included a few pictures below with more here.

     

San Marcos, CA

The past week we drove over to San Marcos, CA to visit our son Matt. It was a beautiful 442 mile drive over with perfect weather.  The main attraction of the drive was the beautiful sand dunes just after you crossed over the AZ/CA border. 

Since Monday was a holiday Matt did not have to work. He took us on a 6 mile hike up Iron Mountain which is near his home. It was a 6 mile hike round trip. That is 3 miles up and 3 miles down. Matt and Sue were much faster than me. I made it half way and then took a separate route for to an overlook to view the town of Ramona, CA. Nice hike but I have to get in better shape.

 

On our own Sue and I went back to Callaway Winery which we visited two years ago. Of course we had to have some samples and the tour of the facility. This is a private winery and its products are not sold in stores. Each visit has been rewarded with some wonderful selections.

A drive down to Oceanside got us the photos of Pelicans on the pier.

You remember that it never rains in southern California. I am here to report that is a lie. It rained for there days. One day was dedicated to Quilt stores. Another day was a trip down the San Diego via the trains. This  provided a very relaxing trip and some good views of the ocean and countryside. It is not much for pictures however.

Our last day with Matt was spent at La Jolla to see the seals. More pictures can be found here.

For our NOVA friends we had a great meal here:

Our drive back to Tucson was rainy and foggy in the morning but much better in the afternoon.

Wings over Wilcox and Chirichua National Monument

The week started with Dave, Sue, and I going to the University of Arizona Center for Creative Photography. I had learned of the museum from a presentation at photo club by a former president of the University. He was a founder of the Museum. The current exhibit was “The Jazz Loft Project: William Eugene Smith 1957 – 1965 .  You can see more here.

Latter in the week the four of us took a bike ride up the Santa Cruise river for several miles.

On Friday we decided to got to Wilcox, AZ for the Wings over Wilcox event. This is where the Sandhill Cranes spend the winter feeding. At the visitor center the informed us that the best time to see them arriving in number was to be at White Water Wash between 4 and 5:30. We decided to take Chirichua National Monument since it was on our way sort of. What a pleasant surprise! When we think of Monuments the thoughts are of more museums rather than parks. We all agreed that this was a place to return to. The pictures should give you and idea. The first picture was along the highway on the way to  the Monument.

      

From here it was over to Whitewater Wash to see the  Cranes. The problem was they had already arrived and were too far away to get good pictures. I

 

A more complete set of pictures can be found at https://plus.google.com/photos/115188712460885370534/albums/5835938308745842017.

Our first exploratory trip

Yesterday we were finally feeling well enough to go out and explore a bit. First on the list was to find a FedEx office to ship the defective battery from my new laptop. It would not charge and was less than 3 months old. Lenovo shipped me a new one and provided the return shipping for the old one. It only took 3 days to get the new one.
Next was to find the Desert Trails RV park. This is a park John my brother-in-law was going to visit this winter but decided not to come. Took some pictures of the place and were allowed to drive through (next three pictures).



From here we headed to Saguaro West NP visitor center and a walk around there. Was sure nice to be out and not coughing a lot. Note, I did not say not coughing!

Find the pictures here. Sorry, I deleted the original pictures by accident an have reloaded them.
  

Next was  to find the parking lot for the Santa Cruz River Bike path. We are looking forward to doing this latter this week when it warms up a bit. While there we hiked up the trail a nice bit. Was sure nice with the warm sun even though the temps were only in the 40s. Along the way Sue took this picture of a road runner with her phone.

Sure nice to be out again.

Sickies on the mend.

You may have guessed  it but we have been holed up in the trailer trying to get well. After 3 trips to the urgent and 9 prescriptions, I think we have turned the corner.

There was one bright spot this week. On returning from the urgent care at midnight we saw our first javelina  in the wild. It ran across in front of the truck as we were entering the park. Finally 3 years latter finally success. Too quick for any pictures. Sue was sure excited.

Looking for a better week coming.

We made it to Tucson!

We have had kind of a rocky start to this trip. First I came up with a bad cough before we were to leave. This caused us to miss our new years eve party. Sorry guys, but we did not want to infect anyone else. After a couple of nights of Niquil I was feeling pretty good. We packed up and were on the road South on Jan 1 about 8:00am. After about an hour down 71 South traffic came to a stop. A large wrecker passed us on the median so there must have been an accident. This provide about a half and hour delay. No problem we were still fresh.

In the afternoon just south of Louisville, KY, we could see a large plume of smoke. Sure enough traffic halted again. This time it was the stop and go for the next several miles. Again costing us more time. The fire turned out to be a Semi truck that was completely destroyed, both tractor and trailer. I do not know if the driver escaped. There was no evidence of an accident. The truck was parked on the median. Four foot flames were still there when we went by. Sue caught this picture on her phone.

We continued on to Nashville. Thanks to Carolyn (our neighbor) we had a lovely dinner at Cracker Barrel and parked here for the night thanks to the manager.

We continued on to West Memphis, AK. By this time it  was obvious that I needed to see someone about what I had because it had gotten much worse. After spending all afternoon at the urgent care, we decided to spend the night at the Tom Sawyer campground nearby. We had a great site right on the bank of the Mississippi River and decided to spend two nights to allow for some get well time. This turned out to be Sue’s good decision. I needed the day to just rest.

The next three days were long driving days 500+ miles. Our last day of driving had several long stretches of fog, where you had to slow down because you could only see a few feet in front of the truck. We did not want to be part of those massive pileups that often occur.

 

We arrived a Rincon a day late but glad to be in one place for a while. Sue has now come down with the “crud” and we had to take her to the urgent care here in Tucson.  Guess we will spend the next several days getting better. It is sure nice to have the sun and 60 degrees to make us feel better.