Arizona Winter Loop | Friday, February 3, 2023
After spending a day walking among the saguaros near Tucson it was time to continue heading north as we started the long drive back since we wanted to make it home late on Saturday evening. We had hotel reservations to spend the night in Camp Verde later today, but there were a couple stops we wanted to make along the way as we left the Sonoran Desert and made our way over the Black Hills to the Verde Valley. We were up well before sunrise on Friday morning, packed up our camp ...
Return to Saguaro National Park & Petroglyphs of the Tucson Area
Arizona Winter Loop | Wednesday – Thursday, February 1-2, 2023
After leaving the Sky Islands late on Wednesday afternoon we headed northwest into the Sonoran Desert near Tucson so we could spend the next day hiking in the Tucson Mountain District of Saguaro National Park, which we had not been back to since our Honeymoon Adventure in 2017. During that previous visit we really only had time to tour the park roads and go on a short hike to the petroglyphs of Signal Hill, so I was looking forward ...
Chiricahua National Monument to the Pedregosa Mountains and Dragoon Mountains
Arizona Winter Loop | Monday – Wednesday, January 30 – February 1, 2023
After a brief stopover in Petrified Forest National Park we continued south through Arizona on our way to the Sky Islands of the Chihuahuan Desert in the southeast corner of the state. A Sky Island is a mountain range that is separated from other mountain ranges by distance and by surrounding lowlands of a dramatically different environment. The result is a habitat island- such as a forest surrounded by desert. After leaving Holbrook we would cross the ...
Return to the Three Rivers Petroglyph Site
My 40th Birthday Foray into Arizona and New Mexico
Saturday, February 15, 2020
After spending an amazing night at White Sands National Park, we stopped in Alamogordo for a quick breakfast and then headed over to the Three Rivers Petroglyph Site so we could spend the rest of the day there. Just like with White Sands, we had visited the Three Rivers petroglyphs Site during our Honeymoon Adventure three years ago, but back then I didn’t realize just how many petroglyphs are found here and we did not have nearly enough time ...
White Sands National Park: Same White Sand, Different Name
My 40th Birthday Foray into Arizona and New Mexico
Valentines Day | Friday & Saturday, February 14-15, 2020
Three years ago Diane and I had visited White Sands National Monument for the first time while we were traveling through the deserts of the southwest on our Honeymoon Adventure. We really enjoyed our experience camping within the world’s largest gypsum dunefield, so when I started planning my 40th birthday trip I had considered returning for another overnight visit and added it to the possible list of places we could go. While it ...
Our First Time Backpacking Among the Saguaros
My 40th Birthday Foray into Arizona and New Mexico
Tuesday – Wednesday, February 11-12, 2020
Today was the part of the trip that I was looking forward to the most since I first started making these plans last year. I have wanted to hike through the perennial waters of Aravaipa Canyon, sometimes referred to as the Grand Canyon of the Sonoran Desert, for a long time and this experience was one of the main reasons I had planned this birthday trip into southeast Arizona in the first place. Back in November I secured ...
Wednesday – Saturday, April 24-27, 2019
Earlier this year two of my favorite bands, Architects and While She Sleeps, announced a tour that started in late April and went through May. These two bands don’t tour in the US very much so I knew that I really needed to go to this one! I’m just glad the tour dates closest to home didn’t coincide with a weekend that I had already made plans for! We were unable to go to the Denver date, which was the closest one to us, so we decided to go to the Phoenix date instead ...
Tour of the Deserts | Honeymoon Adventure
Saturday, March 18, 2017
The last day of our Honeymoon Adventure was finally here. Thankfully, we weren’t out late on Friday night at the concert since we woke up early on Saturday morning so we could visit Petroglyph National Monument before starting our eight-hour drive back home. Even though we still had another day before we had to return to work, we wanted to spend Sunday at home resting and getting things back in order.
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Tour of the Deserts | Honeymoon Adventure
Thursday & Friday, March 16-17, 2017
After spending the previous day driving from Tucson to Alamogordo and visiting the Three River Petroglyph Site, it was time to finally visit White Sands National Monument. I have long wanted to visit these white gypsum sand dunes located in the Tularosa Valley of southern New Mexico and made sure that this park would be a stop on our Honeymoon Adventure. We headed over to the Visitor Center early and arrived about 30 minutes before they opened at 9:00am so we could get one of the ten ...
Tour of the Deserts | Honeymoon Adventure
Wednesday, March 15, 2017
After spending a nice evening at Saguaro National Park it was time for another day of driving. This time we would be heading further east into the Chihuahuan Desert of New Mexico. It was a pretty uneventful drive through a new area of the country for both of us. We arrived in Alamogordo just in time to check into our hotel and then we continued driving north through the Tularosa Valley so we could visit the Three Rivers Petroglyph Site.
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Tour of the Deserts | Honeymoon Adventure
Tuesday, March 14, 2017
While we were in Phoenix I had hoped that we would’ve had enough time to visit the Superstition Mountains, but unfortunately that was just not in the cards this time. We will definitely have to come back on a future trip and make sure we have enough time to spend there. Since we decided to skip the Superstitions, we slept in a little later than usual on Tuesday morning and then left for Tucson later in the morning. After the two hour drive we would be spending the remainder ...