Arizon Route 188 to Mesa
October 28, 2006
We got up and enjoyed a cup of coffee and gazed at the reddish mountains noticing that pine trees grew in a few places. We watched two hawks soar; little house sparrows flitter and then decided to take a walk around the figure eight. Oh my! Someone had parked their pick-up on the back side. No wonder we saw people backing around. We decided it was time to head down the mountain. It was a steep ride down. We drove to a camping area and took showers, filled up on water and had breakfast. Then we continued our ride on AZ188
The saguaro cactus is everywhere. They do not branch until they are 70 –75 years old. The big ones are over 200 years old and can be 50 feet tall. How many trees can you say that about? The Gila woodpecker makes holes in the cacti and then the cacti secrete a bark like covering inside to protect itself making a little cavity. Although this national forest has few trees it has lots of saguaro.
There are small clusters of people in trailers, small towns, an occasional home, and lots and lots of open space. Thru a notch in the mountain and we took AZ87 up on to the plateau where the big city and its suburbs sit: Phoenix, Mesa, Fountain Hills, Scottsdale, Chandelier. There were no saguaro along this route; grass and scrub to one side and pine trees to the other of the four-lane highway. We crossed a mountain at 4383 feet in elevation, up from our 2800 feet. Then we flew down the road to 3400 feet! The landscape changed to large rounded boulders, rock
outcroppings, and desert. Once again we started to see the saguaro. They call this road The Beeline Highway. As you are flying down the hills, we are again at 2300 feet, you know why. We climb again. Twenty-three miles of nothing but a few dirt roads going off into wilderness. Beautiful country. We started to see signs of civilization; large homes on five-ten acre plots. They probably want thousands of dollars for a few acres of desert land with a view of he mountains. We are just a few miles from the city. We continue down; how low can we go? 1390 feet. Do you know the elevation where you are?
We arrived in Mesa and suburbs there in and found the Verizon store; our phone is not charging. After much discussion they finally gave us a replacement phone for $50. Next was CompUSA to see why our new laptop would not go into Standby or Hibernation modes. It turned out that Adobe Type Manager was stopping up the works. That took hours to decide, but we deleted it and all works well once again. Last was laundry which we did while taking advantage of their free wifi. From the laundry we made our way to Walmart where we made a salad, watched a movie and went to bed.
We got up and enjoyed a cup of coffee and gazed at the reddish mountains noticing that pine trees grew in a few places. We watched two hawks soar; little house sparrows flitter and then decided to take a walk around the figure eight. Oh my! Someone had parked their pick-up on the back side. No wonder we saw people backing around. We decided it was time to head down the mountain. It was a steep ride down. We drove to a camping area and took showers, filled up on water and had breakfast. Then we continued our ride on AZ188The saguaro cactus is everywhere. They do not branch until they are 70 –75 years old. The big ones are over 200 years old and can be 50 feet tall. How many trees can you say that about? The Gila woodpecker makes holes in the cacti and then the cacti secrete a bark like covering inside to protect itself making a little cavity. Although this national forest has few trees it has lots of saguaro.
There are small clusters of people in trailers, small towns, an occasional home, and lots and lots of open space. Thru a notch in the mountain and we took AZ87 up on to the plateau where the big city and its suburbs sit: Phoenix, Mesa, Fountain Hills, Scottsdale, Chandelier. There were no saguaro along this route; grass and scrub to one side and pine trees to the other of the four-lane highway. We crossed a mountain at 4383 feet in elevation, up from our 2800 feet. Then we flew down the road to 3400 feet! The landscape changed to large rounded boulders, rock
outcroppings, and desert. Once again we started to see the saguaro. They call this road The Beeline Highway. As you are flying down the hills, we are again at 2300 feet, you know why. We climb again. Twenty-three miles of nothing but a few dirt roads going off into wilderness. Beautiful country. We started to see signs of civilization; large homes on five-ten acre plots. They probably want thousands of dollars for a few acres of desert land with a view of he mountains. We are just a few miles from the city. We continue down; how low can we go? 1390 feet. Do you know the elevation where you are?We arrived in Mesa and suburbs there in and found the Verizon store; our phone is not charging. After much discussion they finally gave us a replacement phone for $50. Next was CompUSA to see why our new laptop would not go into Standby or Hibernation modes. It turned out that Adobe Type Manager was stopping up the works. That took hours to decide, but we deleted it and all works well once again. Last was laundry which we did while taking advantage of their free wifi. From the laundry we made our way to Walmart where we made a salad, watched a movie and went to bed.
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