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Parting Shots...Goodbye Southern Arizona

COOOOOOOL!!!

Ok, so I'm a bit biased, but being the travelling companion of an engineer does bias you in certain ways and AMARC no matter how you slice it is COOOOOL! AMARC stands for Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Centre. The whole war-thing aside and looking at it purely from an engineering point of view, this place is amazing! Approximately 4200 aircraft at any given time, all of them have had their weapons, engines and classified info stripped. On one side of the road that runs into AMARC are the planes that can or will fly again, on the other are planes that will be stripped for parts or "destroyed" because of some arms treaty or another. You'll notice that all the planes have layers of white stuff on them - well the desert gets hot. They seal the holes, spray a black sealant on and then a white sealant. It dries to a plasticy-like material that can just be pulled off as necessary - say if you need to fly the plane again - just put the engine back in and off you go. All in all this is mostly a civilian operation - actually mostly a lockheed martin operation if I was listening closely enough, there are 2 flyboys (or girls) onhand to test the planes if necessary, but mostly they just check them out, repair them or put parts together for the people in the field as necessary. Total amount of hardware on site...something like 3 billion US dollars worth.

Tombstone

What trip to Southern Arizona would be complete without a trip to touristy Tombstone?
You can saunter down the mainstreet and then go for a cool afternoon drink - a prickly pear margherita :)

The complete desert experience

What desert experience would be complete without a day of ATV-ing?
All in all no one got hurt - well only bruises, but those rocks and hills aren't as easy to go up and over as they seem! At the end of the day we were all a bit dusty and grimy but happy after having seen some beautiful scenery and a few of the local residents...big horned sheep :)

Urban Sprawl...and home depots

Welcome to Phoenix - or the greater Phoenix area, i'm not quite sure what it's called, but it's massive. The main streets are 6 lanes wide, the cars seem like they are all SUVs or trucks, they have drive-through banks and restaurants and liquor stores - plus they have restaurants where drive up, order and they server you while you sit in your car - weird! The houses are all clustered together in gated or psuedo-gated communities, each group of communities seems to have one or two massive mall complexes with a Target, grocery store, pizza place, bank and Home Depot! Plus you can't go a block without hitting a car store of some sort - breaks, fluids, parts you name it...these people must worship their cars. You'd think that they'd never get any exercise driving everywhere, but once you see the size of the parking lots you start to reconsider that.

Have you hugged a cactus today?

Cactuses Galore!

The desert is filled with all sorts of cactuses. I'm not sure what the first one is...but it reminds me of brain coral :) The second one is an agave, looks similar to aloe, some have unique patterns on their leaves. Some cactuses have barbed thorns that stay in you after you accidentally met them, while others have straight thorns that get softer the farther you go up the trunk. The ribbed trunks of the Saguaro are so that they can expand when it rains. The Saguaro can absorb hundreds if not thousands of litres from a good rain over a few days. The Saguaro generally starts it life being sheltered by another plant, once its mature it becomes very efficient at absorbing surrounding moisture from the light rains (10-12" a year) and the tree that once sheltered it, dies.

Usery Mountain Park

Welcome to Usery Mountain Park!
We're just east of Mesa, which is east of Tempe which is east of Phoenix - but really they all kind of mesh into one gigantic area of urban sprawl. Thankfully all the cities are in a flat valley surrounded by these picturesque little hills covered in scrub brush and cactuses (the tall ones are called "Saguaro" and they can be up to 300 years old!).

Phoenix/Tucson Arizona: An Overview

Language: English/Spanish
Currency: US
Geography: Mountains surrounding desert plains
Standard Fare: Standard north amrican fare, southern american food and mexican foods are commonly available
Highlights: Lots and lots of cactuses (or cacti if you prefer), blue sky, weird landscapes, AMARC