Round Robin: Green and Growing

As usual, when I posted the topic for this week's Round Robin Challenge: Being Green, I had vague but ambitious ideas for what I personally was going to post. No St. Patrick's decor for me, no random green objects. No, I was going to show you that the desert can be green! At least, that's what I think I was thinking!

The desert near Biosphere 2, outside Oracle, Arizona.

But March is not the greenest time of year for Arizona, and my drive with Dad up to Oracle, Arizona last weekend was not the greenest area to drive through. Besides, my iPhone ran out of storage and my Canon was acting up, and the sun was in my eyes. No, really, it was. I got almost no decent shots that day, certainly nothing especially green.

 Gates Pass, March 8th, with an impatient motorcyclist speeding away.

I did a little better the week before that, photographing Gates Pass while driving it - which is not the safest thing in the world to do!

So, anyway, tonight I was looking around for something green indoors, and I happened to notice our little jungle of indoor plants against a midcentury modern pair of matching curtains. That would have to do, I thought. 

But in case that wasn't good enough, I added my dragon bank that I've had since 1970, and a teal clock.

Still, my photo archives can usually be counted on to give me what I want. Here is a shot taken at Saguaro National Park East on June 1, 2013.

And another one taken at the bird feeders in Madera Canyon on June 8, 2013. The big black bird is a wild turkey.

Is that green enough? If not, I'll try to do better after it rains.

Karen

Now let's see all the green things!

Linking List
as of Sunday, March 23rd, 2014

Karen - Posted!
Outpost Mâvarin
http://outmavarin.blogspot.com

Freda - Posted!
Day One
http://fredamans.blogspot.ca

Jama - Posted!
Sweet Memories
http://mummyjam.blogspot.com

Carly - Posted!
Ellipsis
http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.blogspot.com

Round Robin: Through a Window

I've been so distracted this week what the date for the Round Robin Challenge: In the Window is upon me and I haven't taken any usable pictures for it. Well, not recently, anyway. I did take a few tonight, but they're worthless. It doesn't matter, though, because I've taken lots of pictures over the course of this year that do qualify as looking in a window. Some of them are previously unpublished, at least on this blog. Here are some of my favorites:



From March: here is a peek in a window of St. Michael and All Angels. It was around Palm Sunday, and if you look carefully you can see the crossed palms inside the window.



From May: I rushed into the Mission San Xavier del Bac late one afternoon, just before they locked up for the evening. In the museum and gift shop area there was a large display case full of old statuary. I managed to photograph the icons through both the front and side windows of the display.

From Tucson Botanical Gardens

In June I visited the Tucson Botanical Gardens. Here's a view in through a window of a greenhouse there.

From Summer at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum

In July a friend was in town for the day, so I met her out at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum, essentially a desert-themed zoo west of Tucson. It was a hot, muggy monsoon day, so the animals weren't very active, including this ocelot, seen through a viewing window into its den.



This mountain lion was also sacked out in its windowed den.



These bobcats are seen here looking through a viewing window into their habitat.

That's enough. Now let's peek inside everone else's windows!

Linking List
as of Saturday, November 6th at 8:00 AM

Karen - Posted!
Outpost Mâvarin
http://outmavarin.blogspot.com

Monica - Posted!
Shutterly Happy
http://monica-frameofmind.blogspot.com/

Kara - Posted!
Hip chick photos
http://hipchickphotos.blogspot.com/

Jama
Sweet Memories
http://mummyjam.blogspot.com

Linda
Mommy's Treasures
http://mommystreasures.blogspot.com

Freda - Posted!
Day One
http://fredamans.blogspot.com

mairie
Word in the Hand
http://wordinthehand.blogspot.com/

Jeanette - Posted!
Net On The Net
http://netonthenet.blogspot.com

Ruth - Posted!
scrabblequeen
http://scrabblequeen.wordpress.com

Sandy - Posted!
From the Heart of Texas
http://sandyfromtheheartoftexas.com

ellen b - Posted!
The Happy Wonderer
http://happywonderer.wordpress.com

Kat - Posted!
In My Dreams I Can Fly...
http://inmydreamssfk.blogspot.com/

Rita aka Cashjocky (new blog!) - Posted!
Cashjocky"s Photos
http://cashjockysphotos.blogspot.com

Gattina - Posted!
Keyhole Pictures
http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.com/

Peg - Posted!
Who Can Discover It?
http://whocandiscoverit.blogspot.com/

Rue (Ethos) - Posted!
Passion in the moments
http://ethos-photographic.blogspot.com/


Manang Kim, USA - Posted!
My Photography in Focus
http://mgahulagwayko.blogspot.com
Karen

Weekend Assignment #327: Surviving Tucson...in Summer!

Funny how things work out. I had a very different entry planned for Weekend Assignment #327: Beat the Heat!

Weekend Assignment #327: Beat the Heat!


Summer is well underway now. If you live in the northern hemisphere, the days are long and the sun is on its way to being about as hot as it gets in your particular climate. How do you stay cool when the weather gets hot?


Extra Credit: If you've ever relocated hundreds of miles to a new home, did the climate play a role in your decision to move?

You know; it was going to be something about how this is the worst time of year to be in Tucson, when the humidity rises but the monsoon hasn't really gotten started, clearing away the heat with dramatic thunderstorms nearly every afternoon. Our monsoon was due a couple of weeks ago, so so far it's mostly sweltery, and hardly rainy at all.

I also was going to reveal that the white round thing in my Round Robin entry was indeed a fan, a standing fan that John just bought for his office. And that other thing, white with ice? That's the air conditioner in out den, frozen up because of the humidity.

Anyway, I was going to write about all that this morning, my entry having been delayed by my working every day since July 6th for one church or the other. (I may have had the 11th off, but Sundays are always busy for me anyway.) But then this morning I had a Facebook message from my friend Sherry Watson, the artist known as Sherlock. She and her sister Amy were in town for the day, and headed out to the Desert Museum. Did I want to get together with them? Well, yeah!


Sherry and Amy at the Desert Museum, in the pre-monsoon heat and humidity.

But mid-July at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum is not the most comfortable place in the world to be. There were clouds and storms on the horizon, but it barely sprinkled over the museum itself, which is essentially a modern, cage-free zoo in the desert. I was soon hiking around the desert in 100 degree F heat, with high humidity making things much worse than they would be otherwise. Even though I made use of almost every bench and almost every water fountain I came across, I was in a bit of distress after a while. Ultimately the Watson sisters meandered on toward the hummingbird aviary while I recovered at the coffee bar with a bagel and iced tea. (Yes, I did get to the hummingbirds eventually.)


a coyote in the shade

Along the way I did see a number of animals, but most of them (the mammals, anyway) were taking advantage of any shade they had available to them. In fact ASDM is set up for that, providing dens so the animals can wait out the heat of the day, just as they do in the wild.


Javalinas, sacked out under a bridge.

And me? I was really appreciative of the gift shops, the underground viewing galleries and the fake cave where the geology exhibit is. In my own way, I did my best to escape the heat the same way the animals did - by getting the heck out of the sun!

Oh, and yes, we knew about the climate in Tucson, and chose to move here in 1986. We were sick of winter in Syracuse and Columbus, Ohio, and had spent a few months driving around, looking for someplace it wasn't winter. Our first day in Tucson, it was 90 degrees in March, and we went to the Desert Museum. We soon hit an unseasonable storm, complete with hail(!). So it one day, and in the days around it, we hit a range of Tucson weather. And it was better than 278 non-sunny days annually in Syracuse.

But not in the weeks immediately before the monsoon!

Karen

EMPS: Arizona Does Its Spring Thing

It's always tricky when I try to cover a meme topic like Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #82: Goodbye Winter/ Hello Spring. The transition between winter and spring in Tucson, to the extent that those seasons exist at all, is subtle, erratic and seldom very visual. The coming of Spring in Tucson means more 83 degree days and fewer 78 degree ones, perhaps a little more sun and fewer clouds, and the end of the occasional chance of snow on the mountains. And if we're very lucky, and the winter has been unusually wet in our drought-ridden desert, we may get some wildflowers.

So what can I show you of this year's transition? As it happens, the last day of rain to date was this past Tuesday, but I didn't have my camera with me that afternoon and my cell phone didn't get a very good shot. The sky had been overcast for much of the previous week or so, as you can see below:



This is Acme Sand and Gravel - and believe me, they are aware of the association with the schemes of Wile E Coyote. I captured this on my cell phone back on March 19th, when John was pricing sand to go under a walkway in the back yard. You can see the clouds over the Catalinas that day. I've always been curious about this place, which is next to the Pantano River. I was less pleased to discover that the river is where they harvest their sand. But I suppose more of the stuff washes down from the mountains to replace it. They have a rather poetic quote on their web site:

“Stones are primordial matter. Sand is matter ground by the infinity of time. It makes one mindful of eternity. Sand is matter, which has been transformed and has almost become liquid and spiritual.” - Unknown Author

We have had an unusually wet winter, so there is a certain amount of bloomage going on. I noticed this flowering shrub on the median in the middle of Kolb Road as I made my way back from my Round Robin photo shoot on Friday.



John has been in gardening mode this year as winter turns into spring. He's been buying plants for the front and side yards, mostly, the one he planted in back having been immediately dug up by Pepper. The tall red one here, which repeatedly blew over in the March wind, is a bougainvillea. Or is it an oleander? John and I both keep forgetting which is which. He also tried to transplant a few wildflowers he found near where he works, but so far they haven't taken well to being uprooted.



And here, on Palm Sunday afternoon, the sun is brighter and the wind has died down. John's newest purchases are standing tall.

Be sure to check Carly's blog Ellipsis each week for the Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot. And don't forget the Weekend Assignment, which this week is asking for your Culinary Review!

Karen

Round Robin: Across the Miles

Carly provided the topic for the Round Robin Photo Challenge this week, asking us to go up to five miles away from home and take pictures of what we found there. I initially intended to go five miles Southeast, but John's leaky water pump threatened to derail that plan.

1.5 miles West x NW:


John took my car to work, and I was left with his car and a book, waiting for the garage to open. Then I walked the mile and a half home. Several hours later, I walked a mile and a half back to pick up the car. The good news: I still had time to make a short drive for this shoot.

3 miles SW:


I must admit I chose my direction in the hope that I could find a nice bit of the Boneyard (Aerospace Maintenance And Regeneration Center) at the five mile mark. But John's car doesn't have a trip counter or show tenth miles, and I made a wrong turn and lost track of my distance. I got to the Irvington stretch of the Boneyard, but it turned out to be only three miles away.

5 miles SW:






Okay, so I bought gas because the light came on, touched base at home and tried again. This time I ended up on a desert stretch of Valencia Road - away from the airport, away from the remains of planes, away from everything. When the odometer clicked I was going 50 mph, with fast-moving traffic behind me and no turnoffs in sight. Then I found this little dirt road and pulled over. After taking some pictures I followed the dirt road for half a mile or so, but it only led to other pointless dirt roads that seemingly led nowhere.

And that's what's five miles away!

Now let's check out the other Robins' explorations:

Linking List
as of 1:10 AM MST

Karen (Southeast) - Posted!
Outpost Mâvarin
http://outmavarin.blogspot.com

Carly - Posted!
Ellipis
http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.blogspot.com

Gattina (South) - Posted!
Keyhole Pictures
http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.com

Linda (East)
Mommy's Treasures
http://mommystreasures.blogspot.com

Peggy - Posted!
Holmespunfun Memes and Themes
http://holmespunfunmemesandthemes.blogspot.com

Wammy (East) - Posted!
The Ellis Family Cincinnati
http://theellisfamilycincinnati.blogspot.com


Jama
Sweet memories
http://mummyjam.blogspot.com

Sherrie (West)
Sherrie's Stuff
http://sherrie-plummer.blogspot.com/

Sandy (Southeast) - Posted!
From the Heart of Texas
http://sandyfromtheheartoftexas.com

carolynUSA (north)
Ford Family Photos
http://carolyn1209.blogspot.com

Manang Kim
My Photography in Focus
http://mgahulagwayko.blogspot.com

Duane (east)
Meanwhile...
http://fdtate.blogspot.com

Mary
Mary Tomaselli's Photos
http://marytomaselli.blogspot.com

Ruth (East)
Scrabblequeen
http://www.scrabblequeen.wordpress.com

ellen b (East, North and South) - Posted!
The Happy Wonderer
http://happywonderer.wordpress.com

Freda (North and Northwest) - Posted!
Day One
http://fredamans.blogspot.com

Sandy - Posted!
From the Heart of Texas
http://sandyfromtheheartoftexas.com

Karen

Round Robin: Water in the Desert - Winter Edition

This week's Round Robin Photo Challenge, Water, happens to coincide perfectly with the lesser of Tucson's two rainy seasons, such as they are: the winter monsoon. The real monsoon is in the summer, but in January, if we're lucky, we get enough rain for get by for a few months thereafter. Note to anything considering a trip to Tucson: the best months to visit us are November, December, February, March and maybe April. Skip January unless you like rain, or are curious about what the desert is like when it's doing its best to approximate winter weather. Given the dramatic weather, the water I'm going to show you for this Challenge is nearly all in vapor form.

From Clouds Over Tucson

Let's start with this shot from last Saturday, the last image from my trip to the Catalina foothills to photograph snow on the mountain slopes. Even with Catalina Highway closed from the worst snowstorm in seven years the night before, the desert floor was dry by the following afternoon. All the water was either deep underground or up in the air as clouds.



By Monday the visible-from-a-distance snow was pretty much gone from the Catalinas, but we were far from done with clouds and rain. Late Wednesday afternoon, when I went to the main post office on Cherrybell to mail 1099 forms, the clouds dwarfed the Tucson Mountains that flank the western edge of the city.



Unsurprisingly, there were also clouds over the Catalinas (on the left in this shot) and the Rincon Mountains (straight up the road here). Incidentally, the two black dots in the sky are fighter jets from Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. It is extremely common around here to see two military planes in the sky.



Most rain in Tucson happens at night in the winter, late afternoon and evening in the summer. But Thursday we had daytime rain. Here is the scene that day on Wilmot Road by Carondelet St. Joseph's Hospital, one light south of St. Michael's.



The cloud cover was similar to the clouds that amazed us when we first visited Tucson in 1986, covering the tops of the mountains entirely. A right turn at the traffic light shown here takes you into the St. Michael's parking lot.



The drama of the clouds continued in front of the house that afternoon.

Now let's go see everyone else's water!


Linking List
as of 4:15 PM PST Saturday


Karen - Posted!
Outpost Mâvarin
http://outmavarin.blogspot.com

Carly - Posted!
Ellipsis
http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.blogspot.com

Jama - Posted!
Sweet Memories
http://mummyjam.blogspot.com

ellen b. - Posted!
The Happy Wonderer
http://happywonderer.wordpress.com

Mary / The Teach (new blog!) - Posted!
Mary Tomaselli's Photos
http://marytomaselli.blogspot.com

Suzanne R - Posted!
SuzyQ421's Photo Blog
http://suzyq421sphotoblog.blogspot.com

Linda - Posted!
Mommy's Treasures
http://mommystreasures.blogspot.com

boliyou
endomental
http://www.endomental.com

Nancy - Posted!
Nancy Luvs Pix
http://nancyluvspix.blogspot.com/

Teena - Posted!
Teena in Toronto
http://www.teenaintoronto.com

Sherrie - Posted!
Sherrie's Stuff
http://sherrie-plummer.blogspot.com/

Hagemor
Hagemor
http://hagemor.blogspot.com/

carolynUSA - Posted!
Ford Family Photos
http://carolyn1209.blogspot.com

Margaret
Facts from a Fact Woman
http://factwoman.blogspot.com/

Manang Kim - Posted! **Welcome, New Member**
My Life's Journey in Focus
http://kissess4u.blogspot.com/2010/01/roundrobinphotochallenge-waterniagara.html

Jenn Posted!
My Muskoka
http://mymuskoka.blogspot.com

Gattina - Posted!
Keyhole Pictures
http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.com/

Nesa ** Welcome, new member ** - Posted!
Frozen in Time Photos
http://frozenintimefotos.blogspot.com

Rita aka Cashjocky - Posted!
Cashjocky and the Old Salt
http://cashjocky.blogspot.com/2010/01/round-robin-photo-challenge-and-weekend.html

Sandy - Posted!
From The Heart Of Texas
http://sandytrefger.wordpress.com/2010/01//30/the-round-robin-photo-challenge-water/

Ruth - Posted!
The Scrabble Queen
http://scrabblequeen.blogspot.com/2010/01/30/round-robin-challenge-water/

Karen

P.S. The new Weekend Assignment and roundup of the current one, Weekend Assignment #303: To Tweet Or Not To Tweet, will be posted Saturday evening. And don't forget the Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #74: Houses Of Worship!

Our Winters Are Not Like Your Winters

Unless you live in Tucson, of course!

Pantano Wash, dry but with gullies from last night's rain.

From the Picasa album The Desert in Winter

I deliberately waited all week for the right opportunity to take photos for the Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #73: Winter Landscapes. Partly I was really busy at church, preparing for the parish's annual meeting that takes place later this morning; but also there was the weather to consider, and access to a really nice landscape. I spend most of my days in the city, and although it's fairly suburban it's not ideal for dramatic pictures of nature. Also, it's been raining several evenings this week, including over an inch on Friday night. I was hoping to get photos of the local washes with actual water in them, and explain about winter rains in Tucson. And if I was really lucky, I might be able to get some snow pictures as the temperatures dropped.

But I got a late start out the door today, from sleeping in, from messing around online, and from more last-minute stuff on the financials for the parish meeting. By the time the dogs and I headed out, Alamo Wash was dry. The rain has been spread out over several days, with time to soak in and replenish the parched ground.

Next we headed over to Pantano Wash, also called the Pantano River. As you can see from the photo above, the story was the same there. The river bed was gouged from a flash flood, but held no remaining puddles, much less a river flow.



The good news - for photographic purposes, anyway - is that there was a fair amount of snow on the mountains, especially the Santa Catalinas above the 3500 foot elevation. So we headed out to Catalina Highway to take a look. But when we got to the base of the mountain, it was blocked to all traffic. From what I read later online, Friday night's storm hit Mount Lemmon hard, with high winds knocking down power lines and leaving the mountaintop village of Summerhaven in the dark. Not good news for them!



Well, okay, so I couldn't drive even partway up the mountain, where I had hoped to show Cayenne and Pepper some snow. I turned west on Snyder Road, hoping to at least photograph a few snowy mountain vistas. And I did!



Snyder Road dead-ended into a small neighborhood I've photographed before, years ago. I turned back and headed north on Bear Canyon Road. This dead ended less than a mile later, into a short dirt road at the Bear Canyon trailhead. We're here, puppies! Everybody out!



The dogs did not see the bunny or the quail, or even the pit bull in the truck next to us. But they did a lot of sniffing. I expect they smelled dogs, and at least one horse. They probably smelled bunnies, too.



We went a little way up the trail, but I didn't have the time or the proper shoes to go very far. It sure was pretty, though. We met a woman with a timid dog, and a few other hikers. And that, Carly, is Tucson's idea of a winter activity - hiking!



It was late in the day, not quite sunset, when we headed back.



I had work to do in the office, or I would have stayed for sunset.

Karen

EMPS: The River, the Bats and the Bridge

What shall I show you for Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #58: Bridges And Walkways? In past Round Robin Challenges and other entries, I've already posted photos of my favorite old bridge in downtown Tucson and the walkway beside it, the Diamondback Bridge and the walkway leading off from that, the little blue bridge over the Alamo Wash, a stone bridge in Sabino Canyon built by the CCC, the bridge over Pantano Wash during the monsoon, and the bridge with the stylized lizards on it. Most recently I showed you just one shot from the hundred or so I took of the underside of the bridge over the Rillito at Campbell Ave on Bat Night. I think this is my cue to show you more from that event.

Just an ordinary overpass, seemingly, except for an extraordinary sky.

From the Picasa album Bat Night 2009

Batman makes a personal appearance on the walkway along the river's north edge.

Thousands of people gather in the riverbed. The river is dry most of the year.

Once upon a time, the Rillito was a "real" river. As recently as the 1930s, I think, there was water in it year round. Then people came, watered their families and their livestock and irrigated their fields.

Balloons represent the falling water table.

When air conditioning hit the market in the 1940s, Tucson's population exploded and the water table dropped precipitously. Now there's only water in the river after a major rain storm, or when whatever snow falls on Mount Lemmon melts away again. During the summer monsoon, though, a storm can cause a major flash flood to fill the river and others like it, washing away the occasional car and, at least once down near Marana, a building.

People costumed as bats.

But this was September, and the monsoon was over, making the riverbed a safe place to gather. Bat Night is a chance for people to see bats, real and otherwise, and to learn the history of the river and what humans have done to it. Part of the event involved these folks, rather bizarrely costumed as bats.

People watching real bats.

The main attraction of the night was a colony of about 40,000 Mexican free-tailed bats, mostly female, flying out from under the bridge at sunset for a night on the town. As the name implies, they spend their winters in Mexico, but they migrate north to Tucson to breed. They eat mosquitoes and other bugs, and are thus highly beneficial from humans' point of view.

Bats take to the skies for a good meal.

A speaker from the Rillito River Project outline's the river's sad history.

Members of the departing crowd cross the bridge at sunset.

Unlike Carly, who just get some great ones at the zoo, I never got a really good or close-up shot of the bats. But Bat Night was still an amazing and visual experience.

Karen

EMPS: Islands in the Sky, part one

As promised, I drove up Mount Lemmon Highway on Monday afternoon to gather photos for the Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot: Earth Day, and also just to get away from the computer for a while. I'm going to show you the results in two parts. This morning's entry covers the drive from the base of the Santa Catalina Mountains up to Babad Do'ag Vista, Molina Canyon Overlook and Seven Cataracts Vista. Next time we'll cover Windy Point and San Pedro Vistas, and perhaps a few surprises.

The view from Babad Do'ag

The 27-mile road (or something like that; depends on what you choose as the end points) up Mount Lemmon has another, fancier designation these days, the Sky Island Scenic Byway. The concept is this: each elevation has its own habitat, isolated from surrounding ones and rising as high as almost 9000 feet above sea level, more than a mile above the desert floor where Tucson is located.

Sagauros at Babad Do'ag Vista mark a typical Sonoran Desert habitat.

From Mount Lemmon Highway

First stop is Babad Do'ag, which is Tohono O'odham for Frog Mountain. I've photographed this place before, breaking in my first Canon digital in 2005 with some sunset shots, and later for at least two Round Robin topics. It's only 2.6 miles miles up from the beginning of the byway, which makes it rather handy. It features a good stand of giant saguaros, the huge, iconic cactus native to the Sonoran Desert. Here, too, you can look down at the valley below, toward a part of the city that looks remarkably green.

Next stop, just before the fee station, which was closed, is the Molina Canyon Overlook. This is almost a trailhead, with a more extensive network of improved paths, some of them paved, than last time I was here. Here we start to leave the saguaros behind and move into the grassland that comes in at this elevation.

My intrepid canine explorers.

Oh, did I mention that I brought the dogs along?

A little farther on is Seven Cataracts Vista. This is the wrong time of year to see much flowing water, but I think there's a little bit in the distance there.

I also managed to photograph this mildly cheeky rock wren.

John was positively jealous when I told him I'd made a 2-hour drive partway up the mountains; he reckons I should be more productive around the house while I'm unemployed, not larking about. But sometimes I need to get away from the house and the daily routine. For a truly restorative rut-breaker, nothing beats a drive into the Catalina Mountains, where there is more natural beauty than can be captured in a thousand photo shoots.

Karen

See also:

EMPS: Islands in the Sky, part two

EMPS: Islands in the Sky, part three

and from April 2005:

Diary of a Day Trip, Part One

Diary of a Day Trip: Mount Lemmon, Part Two

Diary of a Day Trip: Mount Lemmon, Part Three

Diary of a Day Trip: Mount Lemmon, Part Four