December 2013 Day Trips

In December, we took several day trips while the kids were here to visit. One day was spent near Tucson, visiting the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. This site is a combination of botanical garden and zoo, featuring desert plants and animals in natural habitat settings. The hummingbird enclosure was fun, as the tiny birds buzzed by your head as they flew from flowers to feeders.  If you were wearing red or pink, they would even stop momentarily and explore your clothing. Trails, surrounded by cacti and brush, led to enclosures of bobcats, coyotes, prairie dogs, javelins, desert tortoise, etc. The Earth Sciences Center had a limestone cave and hands-on mineral and meteor displays. An art gallery, aquarium, and restaurants are also part of the complex.



On the way to the Desert Museum, we drove through parts of Saguaro National Park.   This park preserves some of the densest stands of giant saguaro cactus, a symbol of the desert southwest.  These giant cacti can live up to 200 years; they reach heights of 50 feet, with arms reaching out in unusual configurations.  They are slow growing plants, taking up to 15 years to grow a foot high, and up to 75 years to form their first "arm".



Another trip was to Rooster Cogburn's Ostrich Ranch just south of Casa Grande. An hour or so of fun was had by all, feeding and interacting with the animals on the ranch...including donkeys, deer, goats, ostrich, prairie dogs,and geese. Most exciting was the Rainbow Lorikeet Forest, an enclosure of noisy colorful birds, the lorikeet, These birds would fly to you and eat nectar out of the cups you were holding (even removing the lid from the cup if you hadn't already done so).


On the way to the airport in Phoenix, we spent a while walking in Papago Park and climbed up for a close view of landmark "Hole-in-the Rock".  Hole in the Rock is a natural geological formation where the sandstone hill has been eroded to create a hole clear through the rock. It was a fairly easy climb on rough trails up the back side of the hill and into the hole. Historically the formation was likely an observatory used by early inhabitants to record positions of the sun during different seasons. Markings on surrounding rock correspond to seasonal solstices and equinoxes, creating a type of calendar system.