A Couple of Interesting Places

Thursday Feb 7

Before the talk last night, which was quite interesting, we stopped at Mariscos  Chihuahua. There are a number of these restaurants around Tucson and Nancy has been wanting to try one. From the outside they look kind of like a fast food place. We were surprised to find that they are very nice, sit down restaurants with a mainly seafood menu, full bar, etc. Dinner was excellent.

As I said, the talk at the U of A was quite interesting, even though he started out talking about molecules and cellular structures. His main theme about the sources and spread of various types of flu was extremely interesting. It was a full house in Centennial Hall as well, about evenly split between senior and students.  

Friday Feb 8 through Saturday Feb 9

OK, so I procrastinated in updating my blog notes and now neither of us can remebr what we did at all!

Sunday Feb 10

After our short morning hike and the Sunday Morning on CBS we went into town to The Loft, which is an art house on the east side to see 56 Up. A film maker in England began following a group of children when they were seven years old, following up with interviews and life updates every seven years. They are all now 56 years old, so it was a very interesting movie.

Monday Feb 11

Weather has turned a bit cold the last few days, lows in the 30’s and highs in the 50’s. Beautiful sunny days though, with the exception of today! After the Monday AM meeting I decided to take the truck up to Eloy to fill it up. I also planned on stopping at a CB radio shop there to have the radio checked out. Turned out the shop there has closed up - oh well, some other time.

After filling up at the Flying J (144 gallons) I decided to splurge and have the truck washed at the Blue Beacon Truck wash across the street. They did a great job and the truck has not looked better since the hand wash jobs I was getting in Florida in 2010. Of course on the way home it started to RAIN! Halfway home in the rain, I got off of I-10 at Marana  before the pavement really got wet to avoid the spray  and took Sandaro Rd, which runs straight North-South in the Arva Valley. Still got fairly dirty, but I was able to clean it off pretty well when I got home and it still looks a lot better.

Nancy ran a few errands while I was gone, grocery store etc. Then we settled in out of the rain, which kept up steady all afternoon. It turned to snow in quite a few towns around the area, but none here.

For dinner we decided to brave the elements and run over to Tiny’s Bar for hamburgers. Not much atmosphere, unless you consider "Saloon" to be atmosphere, but really good burgers and ribs.

Tuesday Feb 12

Back to a beautiful clear blue sky today, still a bit on the cool side. We took a nice hike in the desert later in the morning after it started to warm up. 

We went to the Cup Cafe in the Congress Hotel for lunch, Nancy had been there with her sisters and it was very good. Then we walked a few blocks west to the Federal Building to pick up income tax forms. Seriously over-the-top security in the lobby and then they were out of form 1040 instructions!

The downtown area is still seriously torn up from streetcar construction. They were supposed to have finished it before the Gem Show opened - that was a laugh, the whole place is a mess, streets closed off, intersection with no traffic lights, just stop signs and pedestrians are on their own. There have been letters to the editor in the local paper referring to Tucson as a “third world city” considering the condition of the streets and the convention center, not to mention the areas of empty open land right close to downtown as a result of the failed Rio Nuevo project. A lot of unhappy people around here, with a lot of the blame going to the Republican controlled administration in Phoenix which has been moving gas tax money to other areas to balance the state budget at the expense of infrastructure in Pima County (which, coincidentally, is Democratic!)

After that we stopped at the Philabaum Glass Gallery. We had been planning on checking this place out for a while and it was worth the effort. An amazing callection of beautiful art glass, pretty much seriously pricy pieces. We were also fortunate that they were blowing glass today, so we were able to step right into the workshop where could watch them working and actually feel the heat from the ovens where they heat the glass to 1,200 degrees in order to work it. Very interesting and worth a stop. 

Back home for dinner and a Blackhawks game. They lost in a shoot-out but they are still leading the league at 10-0-3, not a bad way to start the season.

Wednesday Feb 13

Still around 31 degrees in the morning, but warming up quickly. We took another nice hike and then decided to go to Beyond Bread for lunch (and the second half of our sandwiches for dinner). Then we stopped at the Franklin Museum. I had seen a reference to this place a couple of years ago, but had not been able to pin down it’s location other than “the Tucson area”. Then I found a flyer at the Desert Trails office this year and it turns out it is not far from the Trader Joes on Campbell where we stop regularly! Actually though it is a bit off the beaten path, on a dirt road in the middle of the city!

Turned out to be a very nice collection of Franklins, mostly from the classic era of the 20’s and early 30’s, a few from the teens. The cars were in three buildings and we were given a nice guided tour of the collection of about 30 cars, most of them beautifully restored or in very good original condition. 

Back home after a stop at Trader Joe’s and the second half of our sandwiches for dinner.

Thursday Feb 14

Off to our regular yoga class at Tucson Yoga this morning, then a stop at Food Conspiracy. For Valentines Day We went to Cushing Street Bar & Grille for a nice dinner - got dressed up and everything! - which was as good as our previous visits have been, Good food, good service and nice atmosphere. This place was a real discovery this year.

Friday Feb 15

Had not planned on doing a lot today, but we ended up running around most of the day. Our little travel humidifier (that we bought in November!) gave up the ghost last night. We called a couple of Ace Hardwares to see if we could find another, one over on the east side had a less expensive one so we drove over there. Turned out to be too small, only good for 4 hours - we sleep longer than that! Some may question the need for a humidifier in a fiver since humidity in cold weather is more often the issue. Well, we sleep with the window at the foot of our bed open no matter how cold it is and if it is above 40 we have the overhead vent open, over 50 the vent fan is running and over 60 the windows at the head of the bed are also open. So, here in the desert it gets dry at night.

As long as we were over there we stopped at Costco to stock up on meds. Then we stopped at BK Sonoran Hot Dogs for a late lunch.

Back home a neighbor mentioned to Nancy that Walgreens has small humidifier, so I called the closest one, They had one left, so I jumped in the car and went back and picked it up. 

Blackhawks won again tonight! 11-0-3 and closing in on the league record for the most games without a regulation loss to open the season. Can’t get to over confident though, last season they were leading the league at the halfway point and then slumped to where they barely made the playoffs and were eliminated in the first round.

Saturday Feb 16

Took a fairly short walk in the desert this morning as we wanted to get going as there was a movie we wanted to see - Quartet, which was excellent, if a little formulaic. But it was a nice “feel good” movie with a cast of excellent older actors. Very enjoyable.

After the movie we made a stop at See’s Candy since we were way over east at the El Con Theatre for the movie, then up to the Beyond Bread on Speedway for lunch. Back home in time to relax and catch A Prairie Home Companion. 

The Beck Sisters Visit

Thursday Jan 24

Nancy’s sisters both arrived today. Joan is staying near us and Connie is visiting a friend on the NE side of the city.

After getting settled in her rental at Rincon RV Park West, Joan came over here for a drink and then we went out to dinner and found a really nice little place right downtown near the convention center - Cushing St Bar & Restaurant. It is in a historic building in Barrio Libre, part of Barrio Viejo, and has been in one family since 1972.

A really nice atmosphere with a very friendly staff, great drinks and appetizers for happy hour and excellent food. We will be back!

Friday Jan 25

Friday morning Connie’s friend took her to see the new aquarium at the Desert Museum. We had seen it already (took the behind the scenes tour) and Joan plans on going back there next week, so we met them at the Museum later in the morning and, after a brief walk around - the hummingbird exhibit was more crowded than we have seen it - had lunch at the Ocotillo Cafe at the museum.

We came back home and visited in the afternoon and then went to Los Portales in South Tucson for dinner. 

Saturday Jan 26

Nancy, Joan and Connie went over to H. F. Coors in the morning and then spent the day shopping, mostly for shoes! Den stayed home and watched the beginning of the 24 hours of Daytona.

We were going to try Borderlands Brewing Co for dinner, but found that they don’t serve food! Just beer tasting. I must have gotten confused when I was looking at the various breweries on line as I thought they had food. So we went on over to Barrio Brewing for dinner. They have excellent hamburgers.

Sunday Jan 27

Connie came over here to the RV park for a hot stone massage from Angel. Joan came along a little later for a massage of her own. We had breakfast and watched the end of the 24 Hours. After Joan and Connie had their massages Nancy made french toast for a brunch for all of us and then Joan took Connie back to the airport.

Sunday evening Joan, Nancy and I went out to Fred’s Arena for pizza. This place is out in the middle of nowhere, eight miles west of here and about six mile south, on a dirt road. We had been here before, they have very good steaks and excellent thin crust pizza.

Came home and watched the Blackhawks win again - 6 and 0 - first time in team history!

Monday Jan 28

We went to the regular Monday morning meeting and then took a short hike in the desert before going over to meet Joan. The three of us then went over to Beyond Bread on Speedway, then spent an hour or so browsing through Bookman's Books and Annabell’s Attic. (Yes, I bought another book! But only one. I restrained myself since on reflection I determined that I am currently in some stage of reading four books on my Kindle, with several more sitting there waiting, and three actual books - with a shelf full in the trailer and a boxful in the storage compartment! Not to mention several magazines.)

After a couple stops for groceries and other stuff we came back to our place for drinks and relaxed to watch the news, then had the second half of our Beyond Bread sandwiches for dinner.

Tuesday Jan 29

Joan is off this morning to visit a friend in Phoenix. We went on a tour of the Tucson Water Southern Avra Valley Storage and Recovery Project (SAVSARP), which is out in the Avra valley west of Desert Trails. Pericles (Desert Trails owner) had arranged for two tours this week, which is something special since the facility is not normally open to the public. The land here was purchased in the 1970’s for the groundwater resources and the city began pumping water out of the aquifer. Around twenty years ago they started to bring in Colorado River water to supplement the ground water in the area, at first mixing it directly into the city water system. 

This mixing created unforeseen problems in the system as the higher Ph of the Colorado River water caused a flaking off of scale and build-up in the relatively old water system, causing problems with pumps and filters, along with breakage and other issues. At that time they decided to use the river water to recharge the aquifer instead of using it directly.

The water comes in through the canals of the Central Arizona Project. The water flows into a series of retention ponds, about twenty of them, from which it percolates into the aquifer at rate high enough that evaporation is not an issue. The ponds are three to four feet deep and one to two acre feet of water seep into the ground water PER DAY. This has replenished the aquifer and interestingly, created a dome of water storage in the area where they are pumping water out for usage by the City of Tucson. The horizontal movement of water within the aquifer is measured in feet per year, so what they are getting from the Colorado and putting into the ground pretty much stays there where they can pump it back out. At current usage and growth rates they have enough water stored to last the city until 2050, even if the flow from the Colorado were to stop completely. Currently they are getting their maximum allotment of Colorado River water as determined by the Law of the River agreements between the various states regulating use of Colorado River water.

As we found out from the curator at the Desert Museum Aquarium, the Colorado used to flow into the Sea of Cortez (Gulf of California), but virtually none of it gets there anymore as it is all consumed upstream. This is where the portion of Colorado River water used by the City of Tucson ends up before it is pumped into the city water system.

Joan is off to Phoenix today to visit a friend there, so we just relaxed at home in the afternoon.

Wednesday  Jan 30

Joan got back to town this afternoon and we decided to look at a couple of places we had heard about on 4th Ave for dinner. We looked at The B Line Cafe, but it was just a counter service place and we wanted a sit down dinner, so we walked south to Lindy’s on Fourth which is famous for it’s hamburgers. A tiny little place with just six or seven tables and the hamburgers were as advertised, overstuffed with additional ingredients - blue cheese, bacon, onion rings, anything you could think of.

Our experience was a bit tainted as the front door would not close fully and there was a cool breeze blowing. Add to that a loud mouthed patron at the next table who seemed unable to speak at any level other than shouting and it was a less than enjoyable experience. 

Back home I watched the Blackhawks game on the DVR. Had to happen I guess, but they lost in overtime, at least they came out with one point. 

Thursday Jan 31

Regular morning yoga today, then Joan met us at home for lunch. Nancy and Joan went up to the Desert Museum in the afternoon and I stayed home to work on installing the new rear fender on the truck now that I had accumulated all of the parts. One of our neighbors helped me with the final installation since it took a couple of pairs of hands.

We went back to our newly discovered favorite restaurant, Cushing Street Bar and Grille for dinner and it was just as good as the first time. 

Friday February 1 

February first?! How the heck did that happen. I have several projects that I had planned on doing “sometime this winter” - better get my butt in gear!

First thing in the morning we went over to Saguaro National Park East, visited the visitors center and took the eight mile drive through the park. Nancy picked up her senior parks pass.

After that we came back into town and had lunch at Little Poca Cosa in downtown. A cute little place with really good Mexican food and loud music.

We then came home and relaxed, cooked brats and chicken here for dinner.  Another Hawks game tonight, another shootout and another shootout loss, got 1 point again though.

Saturday Feb 2

Joan was leaving this afternoon, but she and Nancy wanted to get over to the H F Coors first Saturday seconds sale, so we hustled over to her place first thing in the morning and they went over to Coors. Came home with an impressive number of bargains. We had an early lunch at B K before Joan had to leave for the airport. 

Blackhawks played their worst game of the season tonight and came out with a shootout win that the did not deserve. Three shootouts in a row, they need to start scoring again! Should be interesting Tuesday night as they are leading the league and come up against the second best team in San Jose.

Sunday Feb 3

Got up early again this morning (this is getting to be an unacceptable habit!) and went over to the St Phillips Farmers Market on the north side. This turned out to be one of the better markets we have encountered, not as large as the one in Green Valley, but closer.

Back home I did some work on the truck, cleaning and polishing the taillight bars and replacing all the lights while Nancy did some laundry. 

After our tire debacle in Texas we had two broken taillights (along with the damage to the fender and the smart) and all they had at Flying J to replace them we newer style LED lights. The truck lights are practically universal, they are all common connectors and size, round taillight assemblies that just pop into rubber gaskets in the housings, so they are easy to change. We have two lights on the back of the frame like most semis, but we also have light bars on each side behind the fenders with three lights apiece. 

When I replaced the two broken lights on the left side in Texas I put the new LEDs in the outside positions on both sides, but decided I did not like the appearance. So on the way out to AZ I picked up six more of the LED lights and these are what I installed today.

Of course we watched the Big Game, but we bailed in the third quarter as it was time for Downton Abby!

Monday Feb 4

Stayed close to home today, Monday morning meeting and then a walk in the desert - we have missed that morning exercise over the last week. After lunch Nancy puttered around and I removed the wheel covers on one side of the trailer, cleaned them and replaced the outside tire valve extensions. We had a tire going soft pretty regularly on our trip out here and I finally determined that it was the valve stem extension. I had to take the wheel cover off to remove it and put the Pressure Pro sensor on the short stem, but that meant I could not access the sensor without removing the wheel cover. 

I had replaced the braided hose extensions on the inner tires when we bought new tires last year, but the outer ones were old and the seals were getting dried out. I decided to get new ones. I will do the other side some morning this week as the left side is in the sun in the afternoon. 

Tuesday Feb 5

First time in five days that we did not have to set the alarm and get up with the sun. After a nice hike in the desert I did the wheel covers and valve stems on the left side of the trailer before the sun got over there. Nancy did some laundry and we pretty much just putzed around home, enjoying the fact that we did not have to run off somewhere.

Blackhawks beat San Jose tonight - they are now 8-0-2 and running away from everyone else in the league!

Wednesday Feb 6

Nice walk in the desert this AM and then off to Fry’s Grocery to take advantage of their First Wednesday Senior Discount Day - Geezer Discount!

Tonight we are going over to Centennial Hall on the campus of the University for a talk about the 1918 Flu epidemic. 

A Few Pics and REALLY Nice Weather

Tuesday 1/22/13

First a picture from last winter that I never posted. We call this guy "Gumby", he is along the western approach to Gates Pass and easily seen from the road. We say "Hi" every time we drive by.

Now back to your irregularly scheduled blog:

Jan 11

33 degrees this AM, but it was clear and sunny with no wind and we had a pleasant walk in the desert. It warmed up into the 40’s, but with the bright sun and clear skies it was a really nice day. Supposed to turn cold tonight though.

Nancy had lunch at the soup and salad pot luck here at the RV park, I skipped it since soup and salad are not my thing.

Jan 12

22 degrees at 7:30 AM today. 

However, not a cloud in the sky and a bright sun coming up. Put on our silk underwear, wool sweater and a cotton sweatshirt, added a cotton scarf and a wool toque and headed out into the desert. Very comfortable! A lovely morning, well into the 40's now at 11 AM. Just now walking around outside in a cotton shirt and light sweatshirt.

We came across this giant saguaro, which we had passed numerous times without really looking closely at it. This one must be 200 plus years old! It is really large compared to most of the mature saguaro in the area. 

There are a lot of younger generations around as well, this one is most likely between 50 and 60 years old.

And this little guy is probably 15 to 20 years old!

We went to the movies this afternoon to see Lincoln - an excellent movie, go see it if you have not yet done so. After the movie we had an early dinner (no lunch) at Los Portales in South Tucson (this is a separate city completely surrounded by the City of Tucson). A mexican place recommended by our neighbors here in the park. Very good with a nice atmosphere, we will definitely be back.

Speaking of neighbors, the electrical post in the site next to us apparently shorted out the day before yesterday, burned the power cord to the fiver and fried the TV set! A good argument for having an Electrical Management System (EMS) like the one from Progressive Industries that we installed right after we purchased the Newmar. Good for peace of mind and it has detected a couple of defective hookups for us.

Getting cold again tonight, already down to 32 at 8 PM.

Jan 13

21 degrees at 7 AM today. We bundled up like yesterday and got in our morning walk. We still have not broken out our heavy winter jackets that we have with us - a point of pride I guess.

Jan 14

19 degrees this AM! OK, this is getting old. We have been able to keep our water from freezing by keeping a trickle going all night. We could have disconnected and used our on-board supply, but that would no keep the spigot from freezing as they are not protected. In fact there was a break in one of the water pipes leading away from our spigot this morning. We slept in and skipped the Monday morning meet. Finally got out for our morning hike around noon. It was cool - mid-40’s - but a beautiful sunny day. Otherwise we did some house cleaning and took it easy today.

Jan 15

15 degrees this morning! I do not like this trend. Record low in Tucson today, lowest official temperature in 39 years in Tucson!

Supposed to start a warm-up tomorrow and into the 70s by next week. Stuck around home and stayed warm today. 

Jan 16

OK, better today, 23 degrees this morning! The heat wave has begun, supposed to be in the 70’s by early next week.

Took a ride down to Green Valley to the weekly Farmers Market and browsed around.

Should mention here that we are enjoying the Weber Q100 that we bought before we left home. It works really well, much better than the cheapo portable grille we have been using for years.

Jan 17

Yeah! Low of 35 last night and it was over 40 when we left for our regular yoga class. Hit 69 degrees today.

Received the new fender for the Volvo today, then determined that the mounting bars were bent by the flailing tire cap! Need to get a few more parts before it’s done. New ones ordered and should be here next Thursday.

Jan 18

Into the 70’s today, a beautiful sunny day. We went all over town today, over to East Speedway where Nancy had an appointment, then the Lowes east of there for Scott RV TP, then Beyond Bread for lunch and Trader Joe’s. Then down to the SE side and a quick stop at Camping World.

Arizona Road Runners jazz band at the rec hall tonight. Only had five pieces (the composition of the group varies by who is available on a particular night) but they put on a great show. They are a group from the Tucson Jazz Institute consisting mostly of high school students from The Ellington Band. The Road Runners also usually include the band director and a teacher or two. Tonight Max Goldschmid, who graduated last year and is currently on a music scholarship at The University of Arizona was with the group. He is an amazingly talented young man on a wide variety of instruments. The saxophone player tonight is a sophomore who has won a statewide competition twice.

Jan 19

Blackhawks hockey is back! And they started out with a bang, beating the Kings solidly in their opening game this afternoon. We decided to sign up for NHL Center Ice on Dish this season so we will be able to see all the Hawks games that are on Comcast Sports Net just like we could have if we were at home.

Jan 20

Finally got in our long hike to Gilbert Ray campground, made it all way there, which was good because it enabled us to refill our water bottles! Six and a half miles out and back and over four hours. It was a beautiful day with just enough of a light breeze to keep things comfortable.

We had determined that none of the trails in Tucson Mountain Park actually lead anywhere close to directly there, so we decided to strike out across the desert on our own, using our GPS to navigate. Just after we left one of the east/west trails and headed north we came across the tracks of a horse heading straight north just like we were and we were able to follow the horse’s trail more than halfway to the campground. As it turned out we should have tried harder to stay with the horse trail when we lost it, since on the way back we took a little more direct route and came across the same trail closer to the campground than where we had lost it. A nice day and a great hike in desert, no climbing other than up and down in and out of washes.

Along the way we came across this unusual barrel cactus, it seems to be a genetic mutation much like the crested saguaro. Normally this cactus would have yellow fruit on the top rather than the additional growth.

We were beat when we got home and just plopped down and relaxed. This evening the Hawks continued their sterling start to the abbreviated season by beating Phoenix. Yea!

Jan 21

Monday morning meeting at the RV park this morning. Weather has improved back to normal, lows in the 40s and high around 75 the last couple of days. Later in the morning we took a short walk in the desert and after lunch we headed into town and did a couple of errands.

Then we stopped in at the Tucson Jazz Institute. When the Road Runners were here Friday evening the  director said they would be recording a couple of arrangements for their submission to the Essentially Ellington competition for best community jazz band - which they have won the last two years. He said people were welcome to come and watch so we decided to stop by. 

The school is in a store front in a small mall on the East side. We were surprised to find that as soon as we walked in the door we were in the room with a live recording session going on! We very, very quietly took seats along the edge of the room.

It was quite interesting and the band was in great form, we listened as they recorded three selections, critiquing them between takes. These are all high school kids - I think he said they only have two seniors this year - and they are an amazingly talented group. There were four trumpets, four trombones, five saxes, guitar, drums (two different drummers), bass, and piano.

On the way home we decoded to check out Borderlands Brewing Co. but they have not yet reopened from the installation of larger vats. First visit will have to wait. We ended up going back to Barrio Brewing Company for dinner.

Jan 22

Decided that we felt so good Monday morning after our long hike on Sunday (yeah, I know, hard to believe) that we would try a little longer hike again. This time we went East along the south fence line of Tucson Mountain Park and then turned into the park. It was flat most of the way, but the last mile or so that we walked East was a steady upward grade and there was a fairly good climb as we went North into the park. We were close to the base of the Tucson Mountains and up on a plateau that gave us a pretty nice view out into the Arva Valley.

Altogether we covered almost four miles and kept our moving average at 2.4 MPH, which is almost as good as we do walking on pavement at home! The hand held GPS we bought last winter has proven excellent for what we wanted on our hikes here. It is a real help in figuring out where we are in relation to the RV Park and I have marked waypoints at various spots so we are able to decide which way to go at trail junctions.

On the way back we came across this group of saguaro - there were at least eight of them under this palo verde tree. We though this might be a good spot to look for infant saguaro (which are very hard to spot) and ... after a fair amount of searching ...

sure enough we found one! It was only about an inch high, probably three to five years old. You have to look closely, but it is just to the left of the tip of the trekking pole in the picture below. It's spikes are bigger than the main body!

We were thrilled to find it!

Another beautiful day, in the 60s when we took our hike with just a light breeze. After lunch we went over to the pool for a nice swim. Bright blue sky, not a cloud in sight, palms trees around the pool, it just doesn't get any better than this for January 22! Right now, 4 PM, it is 81 degrees!

Getting Cold Here

January 8

Well we did get in our longer hike, but only about 3-1/2 miles. It was sunny, but cool with a fairly stiff south wind that was chilly. We wanted to see is we could get to Gilbert Ray campground, which is 2-/12 miles due north - I made a GPS waypoint there last week. However, we spent our time zig-zagging back and forth as all the trails in Tucson Mountain Park  seem to run primarily East and West! Since we had to face into the wind coming back home we decided to cut it a bit short. We’ll try again later and just strike out straight across the desert using the GPS.  If you look at the map in this link, our RV park is just above the junction of Bopp and San Joaquin Rds.

Still a bit cooler here than it has been the last few winters. For the last week the highs have been in the 50’s with lows in the 30’s. Supposed to continue into next weekend, with lows Saturday down into the mid-20’s! Then a warm up next week. Guess we should not complain as those snowbirds over east in the Rio Grand Valley have had rain, snow and sleet.

As a result of the weather we have been pretty much sticking around home the past week. Today though we did have a very interesting day.

The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum opened a new aquarium on Saturday, which features the fresh and salt water fish of the Sonoran desert. The Museum covers the Colorado River valley which runs into the Sea of Cortez in Mexico. At least it used to run into the Sea of Cortez, it no longer supports any water flow into Mexico because the communities to the  North from Las Vegas to Phoenix, Tucson and Southern California are using all of the water in the Colorado!

The new Warden Aquarium is open to small groups at scheduled times so you need to make reservations. They do however offer a “behind the scenes” tour each morning. We went on line and reserved a “behind the scenes” tour for this morning. We skipped Monday as we wanted to go to the weekly meeting at the RV park. That turned out to be a good choice - we had a private tour for just the two of us! The curator said she had 11 people on Monday morning.

So we got an in depth tour (an hour and a half!) from the young lady who assisted with the design, selected and acquired most of the fish. It was fascinating and we got to go behind the exhibits and watch her feeding the very unique fish and marine life on exhibit. The most unusual were Sand Eels. Yes, they are tiny eels that live in the sand and stick their bodies out to find food. They look like waving stalks of grass! If a fish swims over they suck back into the sand in a flash. They are less than an 1/8th of an inch in diameter and up to 18 inches long. Never saw anything like it.

SO ... that was enough for one day, but there is more. In last week’s Tucson Weekly, a free alternative newspaper, we saw a tiny blurb about a conversational Italian group that meets at Beyond Bread on Tuesday afternoons. Well ... what could be better, we love Beyond Bread and we are going to Italy on the Prairie Home Companion cruise next summer. So we went over there this afternoon. They were a really nice group of 7 or 8 people and very friendly and welcoming. Although we didn’t understand most of what they were saying, we did pick up a few words and plan on going back again. Who’ed a thought we would find a conversational Italian group in Tucson!

Jan 10

Walks in the desert have been a bit short this week because it has been cold and windy in the morning. It’s been warming up into the 60’s during the day. There is going to be a cold snap this weekend though, they are forecasting lows in the 20’s for the next four days! Friday’s high will be around 40! We are planning on going to the movies.

Thursday morning we were off to our regular class at Tucson Yoga, then, after we each had a short massage from Angel here at the park, we went to Agustine Brasserie for lunch and checked out the Mercado San Agustin Market. We were walking through the market and we came across the man who organizes the Conversational Italian group! He was selling Sunchokes (Jerusalem Artichokes) which are actually sun flower roots.

Still 60 degrees at 9 PM but the wind is blowing and they say the cold front is going to be here sometime after Midnight.

Happy New Year!

Saturday night before we left for home it rained off and on most of the night. When we took our walk in the desert in the morning everything was dripping with water and beautiful. There was a white fog bank lying along the base of the Tucson Mountains to the east. Unfortunately we did not have a camera with us, I need to put it in my hiking pouch. It was really pretty with the mountain tops thrusting up out of the clouds.

Hope everyone had a nice Christmas holiday, ours was pleasant and uneventful, but ten days was as much of gray damp weather as we needed! It is really good to be back in sunny Southern Arizona.

We headed back on Wednesday morning, taking the train into the city. With plenty of time to spare we stopped and spent a couple of hours at the Art Institute. Then we took the El out to Midway, had dinner at Harry Carry’s there and then found that our 7 PM flight was delayed. Several flights were backed up at the gates. We finally boarded about an hour late, then after the usual haranguing from the flight attendants to hurry up and take our seats so we could be underway (hey! I’ve been sitting in the gate for two hours, ready to go! I’m not the one that has been holding things up!). Anyway, after being abused for our sluggishness we were all seated and ready to go when the pilot announced that we were waiting for passengers from a delayed incoming flight! So ... a half hour later the delayed passengers appeared, then they announced we were waiting for their baggage.

Finally we backed away from the gate and then sat another ten or fifteen minutes waiting to be deiced. A young boy sitting behind us finally shouted out “Hurry up, lets take off!” to which Nancy replied “He is the only one with the nerve to say it out loud.”

We finally got off about two hours late, with the benefit of free drinks in return for the delay - yeah! And I must add that our particular steward was excellent, with a great personality. We finally got into Tucson around midnight and it was 45 degrees, which was very nice.

Weather has been a bit cool since we have been back, highs in the 50s the last few days. We were wiped on Thursday and did not do much other than some grocery shopping.

Friday morning was around 30 degrees, so we waited until afternoon to take our hike in the desert. We went to Beyond Bread for lunch and then stopped at a car wash where we had the car washed last month. I had noticed a week later that the antenna was missing, I saw them take it off, but did not remember to check if it was replaced. I looked around the drivers seat, expecting that they would have put it in the car. So we asked about the missing antenna and the attendant found it under the passengers seat! So we had it all the time, just did not look in the right place.

Saturday morning we did get out for our early walk, and then we went up to the Desert Museum, which was pretty crowded, and then ran a few errands.

January 2, 2013

Weather continued cool with occasional rain showers through the weekend. Of course what they call rain showers here would not even rate mention in a lot of places. Lows have been around 30 degrees with highs in the 50’s. Really odd though, we get a brief shower, then bright sunshine for a few hours and then another brief shower.

New Years Eve we went to the dinner here at the park. Really good steak and ribs with backed potatoes. We did not stick around for the dance with the 50’s cover band that followed.

A couple of quiet days this week, not a lot to write home about. It is nice weather now, high’s around 60 but still down around 30 at night. We are going to try to get in a bit longer hike later this week while the weather is still on the coolish side.

Happy New Year!

Rain In The Desert

12/6

This year I will try to avoid posting a daily litany of what we are doing as that seems to get a little repetitive, and just try to hit the interesting highlights. This week we did some settling in housekeeping. Nancy got over to the pool and got in a swim on two or three afternoons. It has been in the high 70’s all this week, supposed to cool off a little this weekend, then warm back up next week. 

The entertainment here at Desert Trails is right up to par this year. We already missed a couple of performances that were reported as excellent. Tuesday evening we went to see Mariachi de Atzlan, a group of high school students from Tucson High School who put on an outstanding show.

We did get over to Beyond Bread for lunch the first week we were here and have hit BK Sonoran Hot Dogs a couple of times already. There is a new French restaurant in Tucson that we want to try out.

We’ve been to our regular restorative yoga class at Tucson Yoga the last two weeks and made a stop at Food Conspiracy on the way home. We also made a quick visit to the Desert Museum on Wednesday. We can dip in and out since we are members, so it does not have to be an exhaustive visit each time.

We were looking forward to shows at UA Presents at the University of Arizona this winter, but we were disappointed at the mixture of shows they have scheduled, nothing of the quality that we saw last season. Not one show of national stature or any that we would be interested in.

12/11

The desert is always changing. We have been taking our regular morning walks in the BLM land just north of us. I have used my new GPS to create a map of all the trails in that section. It will come in handy when we venture out into the web of trails in Tucson Mountain Park.In years past we found it was easy to get confused out there as there is no good map of the trails and they don’t always match the map we have.

I took the GPS with me when we went to the Desert Museum last week and marked a waypoint at the southern end of the pathways there. Turns out that the museum is only 4.25 miles due north of us - however, Brown Mountain (3,064 ft.) is directly between here and there! So the hiking route to the museum would be somewhat longer and circuitous.

The effects of this summers heavy rains are readily apparent in the desert, most obvious being the saguaro which are puffed up with moisture, their folds fully expanded. The palo verde are very green, and all of the various cacti are looking quite healthy. There are places where we can see the scouring of the desert floor by the flowing water, outside of the arroyos. There is one saguaro standing well clear of an arroyo where there is mud plastered 18 inches high! Obviously there was a considerable amount of water flowing across the area.

Monday morning we jumped on line and signed up for next years Prairie Home Companion cruise in August. We skipped the one last year that went from Amsterdam to Barcelona. The one next August will be a ten day cruise going from Barcelona to Venice, with stops in Marseilles, Monte Carlo, Livorno (a port near Florence and Pisa), Civitavecchia (near Rome), Naples, Montenegro, San Marino, and finishing in Venice. We decided to take this one since almost all of the stops are places we have wanted to see, but will probably not get another chance to do so.

  

The weather continues really nice, although we did have our first frost of the season last night. Supposed to high sixties today. Just what we love about the climate here, cold clear nights which are great for sleeping and warm sunny days.

Last evening we went to Barrio Brewing for dinner and some good fresh beer. Very good hamburgers and excellent beer. On the way home we came across Gates Pass and stopped near the Iron Mountain picnic area in Tucson Mountain Park to look at the stars. Just an amazing sight for those of us that are usually buried in the light pollution of cities. A great view of the Milky Way and millions of stars.

Last Friday we went to the 4th Ave Winter Street Fair. Walked the entire length of the fair. Many of the downtown streets are blocked off and torn up with the new streetcar construction project. In fact the southern end of 4th Ave was blocked off only a week before the fair. Nancy picked up several items and at the very end, actually after she had almost given up hope, she found her favorite vendor of hand and face creams.

Today we are headed into town with stops planned at Beyond Bread, Bookman’s book store and Trader Joe’s. Not sure why we are going to the book store since we both have  a Kindle Paperwhite now, but we are addicted to books and bookstores. In fact I picked up a fascinating book about the Fred Harvey restaurant chain when we were at the Desert Museum. We’ll struggle to keep our money in our pockets today!

So not to bad at the bookstore, we came out with five books, which is light for us, the most expensive was $8. Lunch at Beyond Bread takes care of dinner tonight as well, the sandwiches are big enough for two meals.

Over the weekend we skipped a couple of shows in the rec hall, from what we hear the comedians Friday night were not well received. Apparently the show was a bit raunchy and this is definitely not a a raunchy humor crowd - a very conservative senior crowd.

This evening (Tuesday 12/11) we went to see the Dusty River Boys, a bluegrass group,  five guys that put on a really good and entertaining show. The mandolin and banjo players were particularly good. 

Wednesday morning we spent at the Desert Museum. It was a beautiful morning, temp in the 60’s and not a cloud in the sky. We spent some time in the aviary and then the hummingbird exhibit. There is a brook running through the aviary and it is a great shady place to sit and just listen to the birds and the water falling over the rocks. Same thing with sitting and watching the hummingbirds. The great thing about weekday mornings at the museum is the lack of crowds, it is almost like our own private preserve.

Late in the morning we made a run down to Green Valley, south of Tucson, to the weekly outdoor market there. Nancy was looking for some special skin cream, but the lady was not there this week, or at least we could not find her. We did pick up a couple of things and I found a nice pair of kidskin work gloves for a very reasonable price.

Thursday morning was our regular yoga class at Tucson Yoga. The in the afternoon we checked out the farmers market at the Mercado on the west side of downtown. Not real big, but better than any of the farmers markets we have found in the area so far.

RAIN IN THE DESERT!

The Tucson area finally got some rain on Thursday evening, started just around dusk and rained lightly off an on through the evening. Notable since this is the first rain they have had since sometime in October!

It rained off an on all evening and through the night. Still raining when we arose Friday morning. Friday was cool, in the fifties with occasional rain mixed with sun. Going over Gates Pass this morning we could see snow on the Rincon Mtns. Northeast of the city.

Stopped at a Barnes and Noble late in the morning and spent an hour or so perusing travel books for next summer’s cruise. Ended up with a half dozen books on the ports we will be visiting. Then lunch at Beyond Bread.

Merry Christmas

We will be heading home for Christmas tomorrow (12/16) so I won't be updating the blog until after we return on 12/26. Merry Christmas to all.