Settling In

Jan 1 - Happy New Year! Beautiful weather here in Tucson! Started the day with a nice long walk in the desert, really a pretty place. Then we took advantage of the holiday to do a bit of exploring in the downtown area while traffic was light. Scoped out the fourth avenue shopping district, we will definitely return when the unique looking shops are open. Had lunch at the Epic Cafe, a counter-culture type of place, and one that we will probably return to again.

1/2 - Started the day with another long walk in the desert. Desert Trails backs up against open land with foot trails that go into Tucson Mountain Park, a county park that then blends into the Saguaro National Forest. So we could hike farther than either of us is capable of! The trekking poles that Nancy gave me for my birthday last year are great hiking aids! I can hike for an hour with no knee pain at all! Then we took a ride out to Kitt Peak to check out the observatory. It is just an hour west of us and we have a reservation for an evening experience there on the 15th. Should get to look at stars through one of the telescopes. Stay tuned for more.

1/3 - Lazy morning and did not get our hike in until later in the day. I have been working at cleaning the outside of the trailer little by little each day, almost all the way around as high as I can reach, then I will start on the upper part using our collapsable ladder. Somewhere along the line since last summer we lost the large bottle of Ecover dishwashing liquid we bought in Chapel Hill, NC. So I went on line to see who carries it in this area and that lead us to the 17th Street Market - an amazing place with lots of fresh vegetables and fruit, meat and an amazing variety if fresh fish. Add in a large oriental market and it is a pretty interesting place. Had dinner at Tiny’s Saloon, a local bar with pretty good hamburgers. Not much to look at, but the food was good.

1/4 - First Monday morning info meeting at campground this AM. All kinds of activities going on all week, but not a lot that we are very interested. A few things that we are going to take a look at though. After the meeting we took our daily walk in the desert (it is 75 degrees here today - sorry folks), and then we took a ride down to San Xavier Mission. A pretty amazing building with an interesting museum. TV reception is not so hot here, only over the air station we can get is CBS, but I did get the satellite dish set up so at least we have that. Oh, did I mention that it was 75 degrees today!