Arizona Adventure Pt.3

Connor was going to be in Arizona a bit longer than I was because of his conference. So while it wasn't his last day in Arizona, it was mine. We met up with Brennan again (Sydney was at work) and went to the Tucson Botanical Gardens. There were just as many interesting critters around as there were plants.

After touring, we all sat down so that Brennan and I could paint a little. Brennan had been my art buddy back in college, so it was fun to be able to "art" again. I plopped down by the Mexican Fire Barrel to start with.

There were more than cacti to see at the garden, but I found the large variety rather inspiring.

It was sad to leave Brennan, but we had to drop him off so we could get back to Phoenix for the conference. Although, along our way, we stopped by the Casa Grande ruins. The Casa Grande ruins consists of a four story house that was built out of mud loaded with calcium carbonate. That made it stronger, but not immune to rain. A roof has since been built to help preserve the structure.

Around the grounds were lots of neat plants. I'm sure those of you from Arizona won't be nearly as impressed as I was, but I had never seen some of these plants. I didn't know that Prickly Pears could have any purple in them. I'd only seen the plain green kind.

I'd never seen a Palo Verde before this trip. When Connor and I first landed in Phoenix, we had a discussion over whether or not the bark had been spray painted; the green was so vibrant.

It turns out that the bark can perform photosynthesis even when the tree has no leaves

My favorite was the Ocotillo. It is sometimes used as a living fence. Often it doesn't have the green leaves, it just looks like spiney sticks. But after Brennan described them as Cthulhu emerging from the ground, that was all I could see. They all look like tentacle monsters to me now. Thanks, Brennan.

Of course while we were out and about in Arizona, we procured a few more patches and magnets for our collection. I've updated the patch map accordingly.

Even though I was only there for a few days, I came back feeling refreshed. It was good to see such a different landscape than I am used to.

Arizona Adventure Pt.2

Our next day in Arizona took us to Tombstone. Brennan and Sydney warned us that the town was extra touristy and that, "the whole town was in on it." They weren't wrong. We walked down the street and just about everyone was in period garb. Although we heard one individual in costume talking about geocaching, which was rather amusing.

The most famous event in Tombstone is the shootout at the O.K. Corral. There have been numerous movies about the shootout. The one Connor and I made a point to watch before coming out was the one aptly called "Tombstone" with Kurt Russell and Val Kilmer.

The town was fun, but just about everything had a fee to see, so I looked up the most historical aspects of the town. The first thing we chose to pay for was a tour of the Good Enough Mine. The shootout at the O.K. Corral might be why people remember Tombstone, but the Good Enough Mine is what put it on the map in the first place.

The story goes that prospector Ed Schieffelin was walking around the desert when he tripped over some silver ore. When he found the source of the ore, he staked a claim. The men at the nearby fort told him he was crazy to do so and that all he would find out there was his own tombstone. I guess Ed had a sense of humor because that is what he named his stake. It turned out he found one of the richest silver strikes in Arizona and as a result, supposedly all the Liberty Dollars with the "O" mint stamp of New Orleans from 1880-1881 came from silver mined at the Good Enough Mine.

How Ed ever recognized Silver Ore, I'll never know. It just looks like blackish rock to me.

The other thing we learned is that although the mine was in Apache country, the miners never really had a problem with the war-like Apache. According to our guide, the Apache were deeply religious and believed that the men who had gone underground into the mines would have communed with the devil. They believed that the miners were capable of stealing their souls and dragging them back underground with them.

Connor and I really enjoyed the tour. Afterwards we decided to walk around town and have a look at the courthouse. There are only a few remaining original buildings because Tombstone was burned down more than once. The courthouse, luckily, was brick, and survived. You could pay a feee to have a look around, we chose not to due to time constraints.

Instead we paid to go inside The Birdcage Theatre. I wish I could show you some pictures of the inside, but they had signs everywhere saying that you had to get written permission to post anything online. I've decided to respect that. What I can show you is the outside.

The Birdcage Theatre is one of the other original buildings to survive. If you choose to go inside you can see where Doc Holliday and Johnny Ringo had their Handkerchief Duel. There are also a fair number of bullet holes throughout the building. One of the paintings in the first room has six bullet holes and a hole from a knife. I guess things did get as wild as the movies would have you believe. There are many other interesting artifacts inside, but I think you'll just have to go see them for yourself.

The Valley of Fire, Baby!

I just got back from a trip to Las Vegas. I'd never been and Connor had a business trip, so I tagged along for a few days. The day we landed, we saw the Cirque Du Soleil show "O". I'd always wanted to see a show, but hadn't had a chance until now. I highly recommend it. I also learned a bit more about myself while in Vegas. Here's the thing: Vegas is full of bright lights, loud sounds, and lots of people. More people than Disneyland in summer. (There are also lots of stairs you have to climb in order to get anywhere... but that makes sense. Vegas is about an overindulgence in many things.) It was fun for a day, but that was enough for me. It got overwhelming to be in packs of people for hours all while trying to get to food, or see a show, or to just look around.

This was the line to check-in at the Luxor. It was this long from 2pm to well past 11pm. The only time it wasn't this long was at 7am.

Luckily Connor and I had planned to see other things on the one full free day he had. So we rented a car and headed out to the Valley of Fire. I had wanted to see the Elephant Rock and the Fire Wave, but after getting a map, I saw "Petroglyph Trail" and we had to go there instead. It's a there and back again trail that comes in under a mile. We walked all the way there without seeing one petroglyph. I was disgusted... until we walked back and realized that we were idiots. There are petroglyphs along the entire trail. We had been looking to our right and down (in case of Rattlesnakes) on our way out. The petroglyphs are on your left on the way out. 

It was quite hot. And even though we had brought lots of water, we were still overheating. We drove a little ways more towards the Fire Wave trail, still deciding what to do, when we saw a bunch of people on the side of the road pointing. This has happened to me before and it always pays to pull over. This time we got to see a Desert Bighorn Sheep family. So cool! And unusual, I'm sure. It was the middle of the day.

At this point we decided that it really was too hot to do the 1.5 mile trail to the Fire Wave. I was a little disappointed because that isn't a long trail, but heat exhaustion can be quite dangerous. We decided that we now have a reason to come back. So rather than hike more, we headed to our second destination: the Hoover Dam.

I didn't ever think I'd get a chance to see it in person, but the opportunity presented itself. A fun fact that I didn't know about the Hoover Dam is that it straddles two states as well as two time zones. We experienced Mountain Time in Arizona before walking back to Pacific Time in Nevada.

And in case you ever wondered, in the evening, Arizona is the hotter state. The Nevada side was quite shady by evening and it tricked Connor into leaving his hat in the car when we walked across the dam.

I got a nice collection of doodads from this trip. I've casually collected patches during trips in the past, but I've invented a new blanket project that would incorporate them better. It is our new treasure hunt. The hardest one to find this time was the Las Vegas one. We found it at the World's Largest Giftshop, despite talking to employees who didn't think they carried it. And who could blame them? It was a really big shop. The shop is divided into several different shops. We found it in the rightmost shop in the leftmost room. We've also taken to adding the occasional magnet to our fridge, but we are pickier about what gets added there.

Overall, it was a fun trip. I've love to go to the Valley of Fire again. But in the case of Las Vegas, I'd only want to stop overnight to see a show before continuing on our way.

Does anyone else collect patches? Are there any places in particular I should try to visit? In regards to the USA, I'm more familiar with Western states. What should I look for in Eastern states, like Rhode Island, or North Carolina (etc)?