February 15, 2002

Today Colleen and I took in some of the scenery of the greater Tucson area.  We rented some mountain bikes and went to the eastern portion of the Saguaro National Park located about 10 km east of Tucson.  The Saguaro cactus is the principal attraction (pronounced "sawaro").   This cactus is the classic icon of the American southwest and it is interesting to note that it only grows in Arizona and the state of Sonora in Mexico.  Many plants are shared between the deserts of California and Arizona such as the ocatillo (pronounced "ocateeo") and cholla (pronounced "choya") but the saguaro is uniquely Arizonan.  The summer time monsoonal moisture flow of water from the Gulf of California explains this narrow range of habitat.

There are several places in Tucson to rent bikes.  The price is $25 per bike for the day and you get helmets and small tool kits in case of flats or other mishaps.  We arrived at the eastern park and found a pleasant 8 mile (14 km) loop road to ride the bikes on.  The weather was perfect - 75 degrees F (25 degrees C).    The ride took us about 2 hours to do since there were a few areas that were not too flat... kinda steep actually.  But the scenery was very attractive with many birds and cacti to view as we peddled by.  Over 400 species of birds are found in the Sonoran Desert and the largest number of hummingbird species are found in this region.   The diversity of life - both plant and animal - is rather surprising since one generally perceives a desert as being a "wasteland".  Southern Arizona is anything but that I assure you!

At the end of the day we took a drive up to Mt. Lemmon - at over 9000 feet.  On the way up there is a great overview of the city of Tucson.  We stopped there for a few minutes and took it in before moving on up to the summit.
 

I also prepared two mpg files that pan the region.

MPG1    MPG2

Tucson!

We pack up and leave for home on Sunday the 17th.  I will be visiting the show briefly today to tie up a few loose strings then will start to get everything packed up for the trip home.