a Taj MuttHall Dog Diary: Home Again

Saturday, June 05, 2010

Home Again

SUMMARY: Another whirlwind vacation to Arizona.
Whew!
  • Days on the road: 8
  • Miles driven: 2150
  • Photos taken: 2775
  • Weddings attended: 1
  • National Parks, Monuments,  Forests, Recreation Areas, and Historic Landmarks visited: 9
    • Tuzigoot national monument
    • Coconino nat'l forest
    • Grand Canyon nat'l park
    • Prescott nat'l forest
    • Kaibab nat'l forest
    • Lake Mead nat'l recreation area
    • Hoover Dam nat'l historic landmark
    • Joshua Tree nat'l park
    • Taliesin West nat'l historic landmark (Scottsdale)
  • State Parks visited: 3
    • Fort Tejon SP (Tejon Pass, CA)
    • South Mountain SP (Phoenix)
    • Red Rock SP (Sedona)
  •  Tourist-trappy kinds of fun places visited: 6
    • Casa da Fruta (Gilroy)
    • Pea Soup Andersen (Santa Nella)
    • Alien Fresh Jerky
    • Mad Greek
    • Peggy Sue's '50s Diner
    • Nevada casinos
  • Educational, culturally meaningful places visited: 8
    • Arizona Natural History Museum (Mesa)
    • Harvey House, plus Railroad Museum and Route 66 Museum (Barstow)
    • Twenty Mule Team Museum (Boron)
    • Borax "mine" tour (dang, closed, photos from outside only) (Boron)
    • Calico Early Man archaeological dig site (Yermo)
    • Tehachapi Loop (railroad) (Tehachapi pass)
    • Jerome, AZ
    • My sister's house in NV
  • Geocaches found: 1 in Arizona, 2 in Nevada.
  • Dog petted (that I remember): 3 (Shiba Inu at wedding, Labrador at Tuzigoot, terrier at Harvey House)
  • Photos involving dogs: A few
  • Agility sites visited: 1 (Westworld, although there was no agility there at the moment)
  • Wild mammal varieties seen: 5 (jack rabbit, elk, deer, cottontail, big horn sheep); photographed: latter 4
  • Wild reptile varieties seen: a bunch, mostly lizards (some photos), a couple of snakes (no photos), desert tortoise (wow! Yay!); also big red-eared sliders in a domestic pond
  • Wild birds photographed--none very well or very close: quail (from a distance), scrub jay, raven, though maybe condors but now I think they're just turkey vultures (sigh) from a LONG distance, lesser goldfinch (I think), white-winged dove
  • Wildflowers photographed: Wow, were there a lot of wildflowers this trip! Identifying them all will take a while.

Dogs were very happy to see me; I'm very tired and have unpacking to do plus go through all those photos! I think I'd better do the wedding first and get to the others later, but just because I've already edited this one, here's a white-winged dove on a blooming saguaro.

5 comments:

  1. Hey, welcome back! I'll have you know I was starting to get worried about you, hearing neither hide nor hair of you here or on facebook. Then I remembered you were on vacation, and all is well.

    I had to laugh out loud at the number of photos taken. I often find myself in a similar boat, though perhaps a slightly smaller one. Ah, the joy of digital photography. Will be a big job working through them all but I'll look forward to seeing the keepers. Speaking of which -- whoa, cool looking cactus.

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  2. I don't remember ever seeing a Saguaro in bloom or with fruit before, so this was especially cool.

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  3. Welcome back! There is nothing like a good road trip. It sounds like you had a great time. Hope to see you soon :-)

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  4. Thanks! My next trial is July. I *almost* dropped in on Turlock on my way home, but it was getting late & I was tired, so didn't.

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  5. Welcome back! I know you had a great trip, just from the # of photos taken! LOL! That's just the most fun, taking pictures on a road trip! Can't wait to see some (or all) of them!

    Pet the girls...and take a nap!

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