Hacienda del Sol - 1

Last August, R. and I celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary. My mother gave us a two-day break at Haciendal del Sol, a Tucson resort. We stayed in a beautiful private one-bedroom casita situated on the edge of a deep wash.

Our Casita at Hacienda del Sol

Wall decoration

The Living Room (where we had a relaxing couples massage)

Dining Nook (where we had an excellent, beautifully served room-service dinner)

Our king-size copper sleigh bed had a view of the wash and the distant Tucson mountains

Bathroom

Our balcony faced the wash and a view of the foothills of the Santa Catalina Mountains. It was quiet and peaceful.

Yellow-eyed Junco on Mt. Lemmon

Although we live less than fifteen miles from the road going up into the Santa Catalina Mountains, it's been a very long time since I've been to Mt. Lemmon. Yesterday morning, M. drove me up there. Before going on a relatively easy hike (the only level I'm capable of these days), we had lunch at the Iron Door Restaurant at the Ski Basin at an elevation of about 8000 feet. While we were eating on the terrace, this beautiful bird came begging. I've identified it as a Yellow-eyed Junco*. This was a first sighting for me. (The photos were taken with a point-and-shoot camera that I had in my pocket. Click on each photo to enlarge. )


A little later, he was joined by a second one.

*The Yellow-eyed Junco can be distinguished from the gray-headed form of the Dark-eyed Junco by its bright yellow-orange eye and black lores and the colour of its bill (dark upper mandible and pale lower mandible). According to the field guides and web sites I've looked at, the Yellow-eyed Junco is resident in southeast Arizona, the extreme southwest of New Mexico, and down through Mexico to Guatemala. Mt. Lemmon is much farther west. Any local birders know whether this junco is common to the Santa Catalinas? 

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Image of the Day on Tortoise Trail Images: 

Curve-Billed Thrasher and Hungry Chick

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Gambel's Quail Family

One of the delights of springtime in Tucson is the daily visitation of Gambel's Quail families. This family (mother, father and nine chicks) was in our patio this afternoon. Only the mother is in the photos. The father was in a tree, keeping guard. The chicks are teenagers: starting to get their wing stripes and topknots. I didn't want to disturb them, so I took these photos through the kitchen window, about 50 feet away, as they foraged on the patio.It's amazing to see the strength of the little ones flying up seven feet to join their mother and landing gracefully on the top of the wall. (Click on the photos to see them enlarged.)

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Image of the Day on Tortoise Trail Images: Gambel's Quail (Male)

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Dove takes over planter

At my friend R's house in southeast Tucson.
This Mourning Dove took over the planter that's hanging from the eaves of her back porch and is sitting on a pretty pale pink egg (which I didn't see). There was a birthday party for a two-year old going on all around her while I was there, but she didn't budge.

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Image of the Day on Tortoise Trail Images: Cactus Pad Skeleton

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Great Botanical Gardens #9 - Tohono Chul Park

Abbie Kozolchyk, writing in the April 2008 Travel and Leisure Magazine, has selected Tucson's Tohono Chul Park as one of the world's greatest botanical gardens. The slideshow in Travel and Leisure includes ten gardens: Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Brooklyn, NY; Kirstenbosch National Botanic Garden, Western Cape, South Africa; Byodoin, Kyoto, Japan; Jardin Botanique de Montreal, Quebec, Canada; Reid's Palace, Madeira; Claude Monet Foundation at Giverny,Normandy, France; Seychelles National Botanical Gardens, Mahe, Seychelles; Biltmore Estate, Asheville, North Carolina; Tohono Chul Park, Tucson, Arizona; Andromeda Botanical Gardens, St. Joseph, Barbados.

Tohono Chul Park is one of my favourite places. An oasis in northwest Tucson, it boasts a variety of different desert gardens, 

a children's garden, a fine art gallery, a greenhouse and garden shop, two great gift shops, and a wonderful restaurant. There's no happier place to go for a spring breakfast than the Tohono Chul Tearoom, where you can sit among beautiful wildflowers and watch hummingbirds enjoying their own repast.  

(I first heard of Kirstenbosch in Tai Haku's fabulous blog: Earth, Wind and Water. He led me to Charlie Moore's postings and beautiful photos on Kirstenbosch in Charlie's Bird Blog (now part of 10000 Birds).)

Evening Walk - Barrio Libre

Last August, I went on an early evening walking tour in Barrio Viejo, south of the Tucson Convention Center. The tour was led by Alan Kruse, director of KruseArizona Tours, who takes on the 1870's persona of John Spring, the second public school teacher of Tucson, when he conducts local historic tours. Here are a few of the photos I took of some of the architectural features on the tour.


The complete photo set of the Barrio Viejo Walking Tour is on my Flickr photo site. 

El Tiradito Shrine

Last summer, I went on an evening walking tour of Barrio Viejo near downtown Tucson. The tour started at the El Tiradito ("little outcast") Shrine. Unlike most shrines, which are dedicated to saints, this shrine is dedicated to a sinner. The story varies a bit, depending on who is telling it, but the basic tale, dating to the 1870's, tells of a young shepherd who fell in love with his mother-in-law and was subsequently murdered by her husband. Because the shepherd had indulged in one of the seven deadly sins, he could not be buried in a traditional cemetery. Instead, he was buried where he was killed, and the shrine was built at that site, apparently the only shrine in the United States built on unconsecrated ground. 

As you can see from the photo, the shrine consists of the adobe wall of a ruined building, in front of which is a rack for candles. Large glass-encased candles are lit and left burning at the shrine. Small slips of  paper containing prayers and other religious objects are stuffed into the cracks of the old wall. 

Legend has it that if you light a candle and make a wish, your wish will come true - provided that the candle is still alight the next morning. Longtime residents tell of mothers creeping out in the middle of the night to blow out the candles lit by their daughters, when their daughters have wished for love and union with someone their mothers deem unsuitable. 

Cardinal waiting ...

Here's another shot of the Northern Cardinal that frequents our feeder. I hear him singing in the morning, perched on the privet hedge outside our patio wall. A couple of days ago, I took the birdseed out late in the morning. The cardinal flew right at my head and then went and waited on the wall by the feeder.  His mate is coming around now. She's much shyer than the male. 

Saguaros in the Ridge

These are some of saguaros growing in our neighborhood gardens. I passed them on my walk this morning.
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Snow Day!!

Well this is a first -- a snow day for Tucson's schools!

From the Arizona Daily Star, January 22, 2007:

Sunday's snow left behind closed schools and treacherous road conditions throughout the metropolitan area this morning.The Pima County Sheriff's Department and the Tucson Police Department report that numerous roads and bridges were closed due to icing early this morning. In addition, the National Weather Service has issued advisories for snow and dense fog. The fog advisory remains in effect until 9 a.m. while the snow advisory expires at 5 p.m. today.

Kids across the greater Tucson area are experiencing something their counterparts in the Northeast take for granted: A snow day. Schools across Tucson were either closed or starting late today. School bus service was eliminated in most Tucson school districts.

It snowed last night starting around 7:30 pm - large wonderful soft flakes. At our elevation, about 2300 feet, we received about an inch of snow, but we're in the lowest part of the valley. Other areas received as much as three inches.Two Red-tailed Hawks huddled together on the eucalyptus tree across the street. A third flew in with its prey, but it was still too dark to get a clear photo. The Mourning Doves were waiting for me when I went out to feed the birds and the sunflower seed I scattered on the surface of the snow was gone in a flash. All the gang were there: Cactus Wrens, the Cardinal pair, several charms (don't you love that word?) of House Finches, Curve-billed Thrashers, a Gilded Flicker, Abert's Towhees, Gambel's Quail, Lesser Goldfinches, White-crowned and House Sparrows. A Roadrunner hopped up on the wall, and the Gila Woodpeckers were out in force. The Santa Catalina Mountains had 12 inches of snow at 10 this morning and it was reportedly still snowing there, so there may be some good skiing on Mt. Lemmon (the southernmost ski slope in the US). By 2:00 pm today the snow in our neighbourhood had pretty much melted, but we're expecting a hard freeze tonight.

t.beth of The Firefly Forest has posted some great shots of desert vegetation in today's snow and Daniel of cowjumping.net presents us with a Tucson-sized snowman.