Week ending Jan 12, 2017 Huachuca City, Douglas, Patagonia Lake, Sierra Vista

Friday, we went back to Fairbank, but parked across the highway at the road to Little Boquillas Ranch and the Southern Pacific Railroad Depot foundations, a walk of about 5 miles return.   On the way out, we were surprised to see a pickup driving up the rail bed, near the road. After talking pictures at the ranch, we had lunch at a concrete slab picnic table built on cinder blocks.  

Blacksmith Shop

Ranch house

 

Saturday we decided to head to Douglas, which is on the Mexican border south of Willcox.   We stopped at Bisbee on the way, at a viewpoint overlooking the open pit copper mine just past town.  We had missed this on our visit to Bisbee in 2014.

 

Our next stop was the San Bernadino Ranch Historic Site which was the home of Sherriff John Slaughter. 

 

We did a self-guided tour through the 6 buildings on the ranch. 

Then went past the duck pond, based on a spring which was the reason for the location of the ranch.  We were lucky a family noticed an owl in a tree by the pond. 

 Great Horned Owl

Then we went up a little hill where the US Army built a small fort in 1911 to defend the border during the Mexican Revolution.   We got a good view of the fence along the border with Mexico.  Given the number of border patrol trucks we saw on the drive to the ranch, this area might be a priority for Trump's wall. 

Border Fence

Back in Douglas, we planned on visiting the Air Museum at the Douglas Airport, but it was closed (on a Saturday?).  It was a women's pilot training center.  Amelia Earhart received training here.  Eleanor Roosevelt had something to do with getting it created.

Then we stopped at the Hotel Gadsden, which has a beautiful marble staircase, and stain glass windows in the roof of the lobby.

Hotel Gadsden

From Douglas, we drove north to the ghost town of Gleeson.  It was a prosperous copper mining town from 1909 until the the 30's and was closed by 1953.  We stopped at the Jail Museum, which was purchased and developed by the son of the owner of the main store in town.  He has created web site of the history at http://www.gleesonarizona.com .  At this point, all of our information indicated that the road from gleeson to Tombstone was unpaved, but the museum guy told us it was paved.   The 15 mile drive through the hills was quite picturesque, and is about 30 miles shorter than the route the GPS recommended.  

Monday, we drove through Sonoita and Patagonia to Patagonia Lake State Park ($15/vehicle).  The lake was created by a dam on Sonoita Creek.  It is an important birding area.  They have birding walks two mornings a week, and have a board in the visitor center where they track the last date each species of bird and animal has been sighted in the park.  There was a warning about a mountain lion in the area.  We did the 1 mile walk along the lake to where Sonoita Creek comes into the lake.   We spotted several ducks, and several types of birds, as well as  a group of cows.  There is a feeder that a lot of birds enjoy. Unfortunately, the flock of pyrrhloxia flitting back and forth wouldn't sit on the feeder long enough stay in focus. 

There was a birding group looking for the resident  Elegant Trogon. There was a cormorant out on the lake.  We did get decent shots of the following birds, but aren't sure what the 'wren' is. We would need a side view of the head to confirm what it is.

Northern Shoveller

Ladder-backed Woodpecker

Wren?

Then we got a permit (free) to enter the Sonoita Creek State Natural Area adjacent to the Park.  We did the 1.6 mile, 300 ft elevation Outlook Trail, which loops around to the top of a little hill overlooking the lake.  On the way up we had to encourage a cow to get off the trail, so we could continue, and  on the way down, a calf was lying on the trail.  

Cow Trail

Small section of Patagonia Lake from Overlook

There are miles of hiking trails in the Natural Area.   From the outlook, we could see Nogales, about 10 miles away.  We decided that it would be a good idea to go to the Dairy Queen there.  We discovered that the Dairy Queen was being remodeled.  Instead of going to the next nearest Dairy Queen, 5 miles south in Mexico, we got shakes at the McD's next door.  On our way back to our highway, we noticed that the railway crossing ahead was closed.  One of the barriers was leaning on the cab of a  semi.  The semi moved forward slightly, and the barrier fell between the cab and the trailer.  A train was whistling steadily as it slowly approached the crossing.  It looked like it might stop, but the semi wasn't on the tracks, so it carried on.  We were around the corner before the barriers lifted, so we don't know if it cleared itself okay from the truck.   We stopped at the historic marker for Camp Crittenden.  It was an small army post to protect people from Apaches in the Sonoita valley. 

Wednesday, we drove into the visitor center in Sierra Vista to pick up the booklet they call the Historic Treasure Hunt - Sierra Vista's Unique Story.  The booklet is an important part of the tour because less than half of the structures described are still there. One of the most interesting ones is the McDonald's Restaurant.  It is famous for being the first McDonald's with a drive-through window, added on Jan 24, 1975.  The drive-through was added because soldiers from Fort Huachuca were not allowed to wear their fatigue (work) uniforms in the business in town at the time.  This enabled them to drop by and pick up food without going into the restaurant.  It worked so well, that now almost every stand-alone fast food restaurant has a drive-through window.   We were also amused to notice that the DQ downtown is closed for the winter season.  There is another one that is open on the highway.  On the way back to the truck we stopped in at the Philadelphia Baking Company of Arizona.  In addition to having a selection of baked items, they have an extensive menu of sandwiches. Joan had a sweet potato loaf, and John had the buffalo chicken philly cheesesteak.  Both were quite tasty.