More from the desert

Thursday proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that on the inside I am still a pale Northwesterner. The temperature hit 82, which is well out of my personal comfort zone of 68 to 73 degrees. We went for a hike, came back and were just pole axed from the heat. I can only imagine how tough the first summer would be if we lived here full time.
Today was cooler. We did the breakfast ride to the University. This is some mosaic work on arches that are by the rest rooms on the trail we take. It's a nice trail, it goes along the Santa Cruz River.


This is the same retail courtyard as before. Apparently the days are getting long enough that the pigeons are thinking about love. I missed the love shot, but did get these guys taking a bath. They were really into it. Do you know why you never see baby pigeons, or rarely, anyway? It's because they basically stay in the nest until they are adults. Baby pigeons have it good. No terrifying fledging before you're really ready; no, just sit in the nest and wait for your next meal.


After breakfast we did a social ride out east on 3rd, down Wilmot and back on the Aviation Parkway bike trail, which was very nice. It's a good way to get across town without traffic. There are two really cool bridges at the end. This is the Rattlesnake Bridge. It has a motion sensor and when you enter it, you hear a rattlesnake. And there is rattlesnake tail sculpture at one end. Very enjoyable route.

We ended up near downtown, so we went out to lunch and had good pizza al fresco. This is a photo of some downtown retail.


All in all it was an extremely pleasant day in the desert. A front moves in tomorrow and then it will rain on Sunday. Bummer, dude!