The Prickly Pear Cactus State

After a six year absence, we were back in the grand canyon state, arizona. In our previous trip (see the story) we traveled mostly the northern and central parts of the state. This time, we were going to explore the southern desert.

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day 1: wednesday, march 15
We arrived wednesday afternoon in phoenix. After a quick quesadilla at the matador restaurant, we walked the two blocks over to the us airways arena (formerly the america west arena) for a matchup between the phoenix suns and the los angeles clippers. While the clips have been a much improved team this year, it was a 30 point blowout by halftime and pretty much a snoozer. (See my suns pics.) After the game we drove two hours to our motel in tucson.

day 2: thursday, march 16
Today we were going to explore the far southern end of the state. After a quick driving tour of downtown tucson, including the saint augustine cathedral (see my pic), we headed off to tombstone. Unfortunately, we ran into a huge traffic jam on interstate 10, which was caused by a tractor trailer overturning at 5:30 am and spilling 40,000 pounds of cooking oil on the highway. We were diverted onto some back roads and made it into tombstone in time for lunch at a local saloon. Then we headed over to the ok corral for a reenactment of the famous shootout (see my old west pics).

Afterwards, we drove south to the border at nogales. We stopped first to sample some wine at the arizona vineyards, and then walked across the border into mexico, with our duty free purchases. Funny story: usually with duty free, you buy the alcohol in another country to bring it into the USA. Here, the duty free shop is on the arizona side. When you buy it (limit: one liter per person per month), you MUST export it by walking across the border into mexico. Then you turn around and come back across. There is even a guard at the duty free shop that escorts you to the border after your purchase. I asked why we had to go through this procedure, and he said it didn't make sense to him either.

Oh well, after our purchases in nogales, we headed back to tucson for some mexican food, margaritas, and mariachi music at la fuente restaurant (see my around town pics).

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day 3: friday, march 17
Our first stop today was at the mission san xavier del bac, which is an indian mission known as the white dove of the desert. This was a fairly impressive structure and grounds, which also included a school. Then we headed to the arizona sonora desert museum, which is really a zoo of desert wildlife and plants. I've been to my share of zoos, but this place was fantastic. Everything including the walkways is set in the desert landscape. I saw coyotes, mountain lions and other unusual animals that just aren't seen in most zoos (see my desert museum pics).

Then we drove just north of the zoo into saguaro national park, which is the nation's largest protected area for the saguaro cactus. The saguaro (pronounced "sah WAH roe") is the iconic cactus with the large straight vertical trunk and two branches pointed to the sky (see my saguaro park pics). The park has two halves on both sides of tucson — the western desert region that we visited, and an eastern mountain region. We hiked a bit in the park and then headed to scottsdale for some st. patrick's day revelry (and sleep!).

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day 4: saturday, march 18
We were meeting up with our relatives in apache junction for breakfast, just like we had in 2000. Back then, their town was a sleepy suburb which seemed far away from bustling phoenix. Well, the incredible growth of this region has made it seem much closer to phoenix, and it's now just one continuous suburb after another on the interstate out to apache junction. After breakfast, we headed back to scottsdale for a cactus league game featuring my giants vs. the seattle mariners. Unfortunately, barry bonds was nowhere to be found, and the mariners were missing ichiro, who was still playing for japan in the world baseball classic. The ballpark was very nice, and they even serve san francisco's anchor steam beer! But the game was a blowout and not of much interest (see my giants pics). The one funny thing was when a group of about 20 dodgers' fans took a stroll around the walkway inside the park, getting lots of jeers from the fans (and even a few peanut shells thrown their way). For dinner we headed just south of phoenix to the campy rawhide western theme park for a hayride, cowboy cookout, and some entertainment under the stars. It was okay but way overpriced at around $60 per person.

day 5: sunday, march 19
On an unusual rainy day in the valley of the sun, we went to mass at saints simon and jude cathedral in phoenix, and then checked out the beautiful state capitol grounds. Soon enough, it was time to head over to the airport for our short flight to las vegas.

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