Farmers Market in Tucson

On the way out of town we stopped at a Farmers Market.  Lemon trees lined the street.

 The market was pretty small but artfully displayed.  A few artists selling their handmade goods as well as vegetables, honey and breads. 

After the market we headed to the Southern Pacific Railroad Museum.  Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp personal friends of Bruce's met us at the front door. 

This is an actual control panel from a cab of a locomotive.  You could sit and pretend you were an engineer. 

The 1673 Engine was built in 1900 and was donated to the City of Tucson by Southern Pacific in 1962. 

The Presidio Trail - A Historical Walking Tour of Downtown Tucson......

This morning we headed for downtown Tucson.  On the way we stopped at a 31,000 sq. ft. antique store the 22nd Street Antique Mall.  This place was amazing - great prices, lots of sales.  If we had our truck.....  After a couple of hours of shopping we decided to get lunch at Chick-Fil-A and head to the downtown area for the walking tour I found on line.  Sounded like a plan until we arrived near our destination.   The next three pictures are borrowed.

 The Wishing Shrine - El Tiradito (The Castaway)  -- didn't see this! 

 Pima County Courthouse -- didn't see this!

 Road signs that actually mean something -- didn't see this!

We did see this sign - it led to a closed road.  The detour was nowhere to be seen. Garmin couldn't help, she just kept yelling "recalculating, do a U-turn when possible, recalculating!"  We ended up in a terrible traffic jam so we headed back to the motel to recover.  The walking tour of downtown will have to wait for another time. 

This is what we can see tonight - a full moon and a great sky. Arizona has been great. Tomorrow we fly home.  Another great vacation in the book!

Willcox and Dragoon, Arizona

 On the road to Willcox this morning we saw our very first rest stop!  It was nice - the scenery was spectacular.  Giant boulders teetering on giant boulders.  I do love rocks!

 The first stop in Willcox was the railroad depot.  This is a phone booth from the early days - the phone numbers of all the other railroad depots were written on the wall.  The depot is now used as the city hall.  Nice to see a wood railroad depot still being used. 

Do you know who this guy is?  No not Bruce!  The statue is Rex Allen the Arizona Cowboy.  We toured his museum and learned about this famous singing cowboy.  Of course, next weekend is Rex Allen Days in Willcox with a special appearance by his son Rex Allen Jr.  A famous country singer in his own right.  Missed it by that much.... (Agent Maxwell Smart quote)

 This is a great clothing store - reasonable prices and pretty cool merchandise especially if you are a cowboy or cowgirl. 

 The Texas Eagle Amtrak passenger train came through while we were in town - the train was flying no stops in Willcox!

 Antique store, filled totally with stuff.  Another shop we stopped at looked like an episode of Hoarders! I didn't last long - pretty gross.  Especially the bedroom with clothes piled to the ceiling. 

 Why don't they write?  (quote from the movie Dances with Wolves)  Lots of decorating for the celebration of Dia de Muertos - Day of the Dead.  Kind of creepy!  All of the shops had signs saying this stuff is for sale - we're not a museum!  One of the shopkeepers told us everything was negotiable "We are all dying here."

 Amerind Museum near Dragoon.  This is an archaeological research facility.  Lots of artifacts from the Native American culture. 

This is another shot of a boulder teetering on the top of a giant rock.  Looks like a gust of wind could knock it off.  It's been sitting that way for ions so I'm pretty sure it's not going anywhere.  Another beautiful day of southern Arizona. 

Visit with old friends

 This morning we fueled up and headed to Hereford Arizona.

We plugged the address into the Garmen and headed south.  The drive was about 100 miles from Tucson.  We did great until we took the King's Ranch Road off the highway.  After driving in a circle a few times we called Bob and asked for help. Apparently the road sign "Clinton" had been stolen.  Bob stood on the road and signaled our arrival. 

 Bob and Carrine have built an oasis in the desert!  Their place is beautiful  - here's a picture of Bruce and Bob talking about growing stuff in the desert.  I loved the swimming pool, yard art and of course their home.  The colors are amazing - the living room is crimson and silver with a yellow accent.  Perfect colors for their location. 

 We headed down the road to the town of Bisbee. 

 This is the end result of an open pit copper mine.  I thought the red water looked a lot like blood.  Pretty sad sight - can't imagine why they haven't started clean-up. 

 Carrine and Bob

 Me and Bruce.  My camera is not doing timed delay so I can't do the group shots I love. 

 Bisbee Post Office -this is the imaginary town of one of my favorite authors J.A. Jance and the Sheriff Joanna Brady series.  J.A. Jance also writes the stories about J.P. Beaumont in Seattle.  Love her location stories.  Now I will be able to really picture Sheriff Brady's locations. 

 Bruce taking a break, his feet were tired and he had a couple of new books to read.  I found lots of nice antique stores.

 Museum

Looking across the street - the whole town is built on hills.  Notice there are four levels of houses in this photo?  We had a wonderful day catching up with old friends. 

Great day in Tombstone

 We arrived inTombstone around 10 am.  The building in the background is the Tombstone Courthouse. 

 The famous gunfight didn't actually happen at the OK Corral - it was in an alley.  We learned a lot of the history of Tombstone from a presentation at the OK Corral and from a trolley tour we took. 

 Tombstone is a tourist attraction for sure.  We arrived at the same time as a busload from Australia did.  They were friendly and were enjoying their trip to the USA.

 Big Nose Kate was Doc Holliday's girfriend.  Sounded like Doc Holliday did a lot of couch surfing in his day.  His constant coughing drove him out of most homes.

 All the shopkeeper's dressed in period clothes.  They were all very informative and seemed to love their jobs.

 This is the theatre where most of the traveling companies performed. 

 Loved the very modern trash compactor in town. 

 The gold panning was closed for the day. 

 The mine tour was also closed.... what's the deal?  They hear the Oergel's have arrived and they close the doors!

 This is the real house of Wyatt Earp -

 Cowboys and sheriff's walked the street - this fellow looked a lot like Kurt Russell's version of Wyatt.

 The original Boothill - lots of interesting grave markers.
On the way home we headed to a historical site - at least we thought it was.  It is actually a very large, very busy Army Installation.  What's that in the sky above Fort Huachuca you ask?  It is the tethered Aerostat radar blimp.  You can see the blimp for miles and miles.  The blimp is used to detect low level air travel mostly used for drug trafficking. 

Outside of Benson we passed through our second road block set up by the US Border Patrol.  We got the wave both times.  A couple of things we've noticed in Arizona - no rest stops.  Those porta-potties were the closet thing I've seen and I don't thing they were for us, and the amount of law enforcement we've seen on the highways and city streets.  Wow!   

South to Green Valley

Our morning started with a visit to the Tu-Swap indoor swap meet.  There was about 5 tables set up for a Monday.  The owner said the place is usually packed all weekend. We did find some paperback books - 3 for $1.00. 

I loved the outside of the building - the cactus mailbox holder and the cactus were really nice. 

 Barrel cactus in bloom.

 A bird kept going in and out of the saguaro cactus.  Pretty cool house!

 We followed the signs to Old Tucson expecting the old part of town.  It is actually a movie studio - closed until Friday when it opens for the new season. 

 Looks like a fun place - hopefully we can go back on Friday for a tour.

Mission San Xavier del Bac - the White Dove of the Desert. 


 Chapel built in 1692

 Dome - the mission is an amazing white color. 

 This picture is for Marc - the last time we were there Marc was starving and bought a mystery meat burrito from the vendors.  The vendors were just setting up today. 

 There is a mini mall across the street from the mission now.  

 Two shops open.  No snacks! 

 Such a beautiful sight. Amazing to think the building was started in 1783. 

 School was in session.

 Our next stop - Titan Missile Museum near Sahuarita Arizona.  Amazing tour!

 A real missile inside the silo.

Bruce checked out the jeep.

And I was the Captain on duty when the alert was received - this is a picture of me turning the key with my Lieutenant Tom.  All the lights lit up in order and a siren blew.  Made me jump!

I received this certificate for doing my duty - even though I answered most of the questions wrong.  The one that sticks in my mind was what to do after the missile launches - I said "get out".  Not the right answer, apparently there was 30 days of food and air in the silo to protect us.  This whole experience reminded me of a Jack Reacher story I recently read...... especially when we climbed the 3 stories of stairs to get out!