Search This Blog

Thursday, September 15, 2016

Saguaro National Park (9/12/16)

Lorelei in the rain at the Saguaro National Park Visitor Center
Saguaro Cactus
We arrived in Tucson, AZ on Sunday evening.  On Monday, Lorelei and I headed out by ourselves after school to check out Saguaro National Park and to add our 2nd stamp & sticker to our National Parks Passport book.  We arrived to the visitor center just in time to catch the last showing of their movie.  I wasn't too impressed with the movie since it was basically just a slide show with narration in the background, but after the movie, the screen goes up and the window behind it opens to give you a beautiful view of the scenery.  We had a few minutes to poke around the visitor center before it closed and then we headed outside to take a few pictures just as a storm was starting.

I figured we could wait it out around the visitor center but the lightning was pretty intense so we headed to the car for safety.  We set off to drive through the park and since I didn't do much more than glance at the map I didn't think it would take very long to make the loop.  The road was a dirt road with quite a few rocks sticking out of it and random holes washed into it from the rain so it ended up taking us quite a bit longer to make the drive than I had anticipated.   Lorelei was getting a little grumpy because she wanted to read Harry Potter but I wanted her to look around and enjoy the scenery as we were driving. It was so amazing; definitely unlike anything I've ever experienced so I thoroughly enjoyed it, despite Lorelei's grumpiness.
Desert Tortoise hanging out in the middle of the road
Lorelei checking out our road block
We had only been on the road for a few minutes before we encountered a road block!  We got out to examine it and decided we would just have to wait for it to move along.  I didn't think there was room to drive around it since it was a one way road and pretty narrow.  Had I been in my Highlander, I would have just driven over it but the C-Max is so low to the ground that I wasn't sure we could do that without injuring it.  The tortoise didn't want to move while we were close to it so we backed off and eventually, it continued its slow journey across the rest of the road and we were able to pass.  I was hoping this distraction would perk Lorelei up and she would start to enjoy our visit a little more, but nope... after a few minutes she feel back into the depths of despair and continued to moan about needing to read Harry Potter.

Our journey through the park continued and we got some nice post storm photos.  I took way too many and I've narrowed my selection down a bit.  I hope you enjoy them!

She wanted to take it home for a pet... NOPE!
We had a bit of excitement on our way back home after we left the park.  First, we saw what I am pretty sure was a fox (possibly a coyote but the tail was very fox like) and then a few minutes later, we saw what was definitely a coyote.  I pulled over to watch the sunset, but Lorelei missed it because she was reading her book.   Oh well, at least she can see the pictures.

After the storm
Then, when we were on a back road (with no cell coverage) the low tire pressure light came on in the car.  I got out to look at the tires and got nervous because they all looked the same to me so I was worried I punctured all of them on the gravel road in the park.  I had noticed I had a cell signal a few minutes back so I back tracked to call David to let him know what was going on.  He told me I should keep going despite the low tire pressure warning and that there was an air compressor in the car if I needed to use it to refill the tires if they got worse.  I didn't feel very reassured but we continued our journey on the back road with no cell coverage and low tire pressure.  Fortunately, we made it back safely so David didn't have to come rescue us with the RV!  When I took the car in to the tire store the next morning, they checked them out and said they were fine, just needed a top off because of the temperature change (and I imagine coming from Denver probably contributed to that as well).
 
Saguaros
View of the scenic road we traveled along through the park
Wild and crazy cactus; looks kind of like 2 cacti riding piggyback
Lorelei, the cactus 
More Saguaros
Lorelei's fake smile when I made her get out of the car for another picture
Hill covered in Saguaro Cacti

Prickly Pear

Releasing the sun rays
I tried to warn her not to touch it but she just wouldn't listen 

Very tall Saguaro

I believe this is a Barrel Cactus
Barrel Cactus close up


Moon rising and close up of a Saguaro
Even closer picture of a Saguaro
View of the mountains when I stopped to watch the sunset
Moon rising over the mountains 
Lovely desert sunset
Good Night!

2 comments:

  1. Very cool pics. We visited this park on our recent Spring Break trip and Lucas loved it. Such a unique place. Glad you enjoyed it! Keep getting those stamps :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. wow - that is beautiful - thanks for posting those! the post-storm pictures are my favorite.

    ReplyDelete