Week ending Jan 04, 2018 Tucson Tubac and Tumacacori

Friday, we went to the Loma Alta trailhead in Suguaro NP.

We started out on the Ridge View trail which climbs slowly  .8 mi toward Tanque Ridge, which we had done last week.  Apparently we should have gone about .3 mi past the end of trail sign to get to the flat rocks.

From Ridgeview Trail

 When we returned from Ridge View we headed up Hope Camp Trail, which connects to a section of the Arizona Trail, which runs north and south through Arizona.   We were passed by 3 people on horses.  About .7mi further on, we came to the  junction with North Coyote Wash Trail.

From there the sign said it was .5 mi further to the Ruiz Corner, or south 1.5 mi to Ruiz wash.  We figured that was a good distance to do the loop until we went about  a mile south and realized that the 1.5 miles wasn't back to the Hope Camp Trail, but was to a junction further south, so would be about an extra 1.5 miles or so than we expected.  At this time were only about 300 yards from the road we had come in on, so it would be shorter to head to the road.  We got stabbed by a few thorns heading across.  When we got to the road, the barbed wire fence was too high to cross.   We had to carry on parallel to the road for about .3 mi before we got to the trailhead where we could cross the fence.

We decided to stop at the DQ we had passed coming to the trailhead.   It was closed until 2:00 pm to install some new equipment, which another half hour.   So, back to the trailer instead.
 
Sunday we walked the 4 mile road loop around the outside of the fairgrounds.  There are a lot of motor sport parks along this route.   There is a warning in the campground rules not to complain about the noise of events. 

MC Motorsports Park
Tucson Speedway

Musselman Honda Circuit
Tucson Kart Speedway
Southern Arizona Modelers radio controlled Flying Club

 Modellers at play

Tucson Dragway

Monday, New Years Day, we went to the  Desert Diamond Casino with Helen, Rupert and Keri.  There was a bit of a mix-up, as there are two locations with this name.   We each wound up at different ones, one about 6 miles north of the intersection of Nogales Highway and Pima Mine Road, the other west of the intersection. Thanks to cell phone communication and help from the Buffet staff, we found we had gone to the wrong location, and got directions to the one where Rupert and crew were waiting for us.   Very nice buffet.   

Tuesday morning we booked our seats for our flights to Aruba.

On our way to Tubac Community Library , we were able to get a picture of a crested saguaro that Helen had told us about.  These are few and far between.

Crested Saguaro

 later with the sun from the west

At the library we were able to use one of their computers to print the confirmation for our flights, even though the librarian was in a meeting. 

Then we went to the Tubac Presidio, the first Spanish fort in Arizona.  We watched an informative 8 minute video narrated by Will Rogers Jr who owned a ranch near Tubac later in life.   We found out a few interesting details we didn't know.   Tubac was the first European settlement in Arizona.  Juan Bautista de Anza https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Bautista_de_Anza  made a trek from here to California in 1774, founding San Francisco on his second trip in 1776.  This was in response to Russian expansion down the west coast.  
The schoolhouse on the property was very interesting.  They had blackboards with several different things on them, several boards covering how many lashes a child (boy?) would get for various offences.

 There is also a collection of maps of Arizona at different points in time.  There is on of North America in 1836 before Texas independence showing 'British Territories', the USA which included British Columbia as far north as the Queen Charlottes, Mexico which included California, part of Oregon, Utah, the Republic of Texas which included  parts of New Mexico and Colorado, Alaska owned by Russia, and the Yucatan Peninsula separate from Mexico.  
They had an area with historic working tools including an arrastra for grinding.

Arrestra

The ocotillo fences would have worked better than barbed wire, but would have been a lot more work, particularly tough on the hands, to build.

Kitchen and thorny Ocotillo fence

In Ottero Hall, there is a gallery of beautiful oil paintings 'Cavalcade of History' by Bill Ahrendt that are beautiful representations of local history, some from Tubac and area, others from the rest of Arizona. We bought a pamphlet with the pictures and descriptions.  Check out his website  www.williamahrendt.com.

From Tubac, we went a few miles south to Tumacacori, which was the site of a church that was part of a chain of missions established by Father Kino to work with the peaceful Pima Indians who had a village there.

Tumacacori garden

Tumacacori Church

Wednesday, we did laundry, cleaned up the trailer and packed a couple of back packs in preparation for going to Aruba on Thursday. 
We got a text to that our flight might be cancelled due to severe weather on the east coast (it went through Newark NJ, which we think is  the long way around, but that's airline routes).  After supper, we saw that it was cancelled, so we called United.  After waiting for an agent for a couple of hours we decided we would hang up at 9:00.  About 8:50 (2h 42 min of waiting), we got through.  We were able to change our flight to leave one day later (we're sure the agent appreciated our co-operation on that).  This flight goes through Chicago instead of Newark.


Thursday, we phoned Joanne at our accommodations to let her know we would not be arriving until Saturday.  She sent us back an e-mail with instructions on how to get in if she doesn't happen to be there when we arrive.

We will attempt to post the blog from Aruba next week from Joan's tablet.  Hopefully we will be able to add photos.