Return to the Tortolitas Again

We went back out to the Tortolitas today.  It was a gorgeous day, not too windy and not too hot.  Jim wanted to to Upper Javelina, and so we did.  This is the first time I’ve ever been able to photograph a road runner.  Generally they run away too fast.

Look at that sky!  Just spectacular.

The desert in the Tortolitas looks so much better than it does in Tucson Mountain Park.  They have gotten more rain than the southern end of town.  The desert north of Tucson is a lot greener.  The ocotillos are leafing out nicely

We departed the Upper Javelina trail and hiked the Wild Mustang trail up to the intersection with the Cochie Springs trail.  We haven’t been up that far on the trail before.  It is just stunning up there.

This is looking north-ish.

Looking a little right, with cropping.  That’s Picacho Peak in the far distance.

Cactus.

Jim surveys all that he sees.  For those of you have noticed he is wearing a grey shirt again (see last post), he has several of them.

Other than blue skies and rocks there is nothing much to report.

More of Same

Jim surveys all that he sees.  We were back at the top of the Ammunition Box trail.  I like that hike, it’s hard but there is stuff to look at.

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I have linked to an article written by Sally Jenkins.  She’s the daughter of Dan Jenkins, who wrote the book Semi-Tough.  Ms. Jenkins is a sports reporter for the Washington Post.   Her article about Larry Nasser is just damning.  The Olympic Gymnastics organization has a lot to answer far.

Return to Warmer Weather

Greetings Earthlings!  Here in the desert we are recovering from three days of cold weather.  It actually went below freezing three nights in a row.  The first two were predicted, so we trickled the water over night, the third was not.  It went down to 28, and we’re pretty happy about not freezing any pipes or the water filter canister.

Today was much better, although the wind is gusting to 30-35 mph.  We hiked out of the Sarasota trail head and did the clock wise loop with an additional 40 minute jaunt out into the bowl.  We’re moving faster now than we were, so distance has to be added to keep us on our feet longer.

The horse riders were out in droves today.  There were two other trailers out of frame.  We did not see them riding, but we did see their by products on the trail.

 It was a glorious day.

When we got back to the trail head, the wagons were being loaded.  Horse back riding is a device intensive hobby.  There must be trailers, saddles, horse care and etc. It does look pleasant, however, to be ambling across the desert with your trusty steed.

I learned a new fact recently, reading about hummingbirds.  When they go in to torpor, they frequently hang upside down.  They slow their metabolism to get through the cold night until it’s time for breakfast.

Online Live Writer has quit on me!  I'm getting the dreaded 500 internal server error.  The internet is remarkably uninformative about what to do.  It will upload a text only post, but will not load photos.

This is just totally aggravating.  After months of using it, I've finally gotten used to Live Writer, and the blogger editor just seems cumbersome.  Plus pictures look better when loaded with Live Writer.  Does anyone know how to fix this?

El Guero Canelo Won a James Beard Award

El Guero has won a James Beard award!  An article on the subject can be found here.  The Sonoran dog is a wonderful thing.  One or two hotdogs are wrapped in bacon and grilled.  Then they are stuffed into a soft sweet roll and covered in beans, jalepenos if you dare and other condiments.  If you’re in Tucson, you should go.  They also make a really good torta.
Below is what the James Beard Foundation had to say about El Guero Canelo and the Sonoran Dog.

The Sonoran hot dog evinces the flow of culinary and cultural influences from the U.S. to Mexico and back.
Decades ago, elaborately dressed hot dogs began to appear as novelty imports on the streets of Hermosillo, the Sonoran capital.
Today, Tucson is the American epicenter, and Daniel Contreras is the leading hotdoguero.
A Sonoran native, Contreras was 33 in 1993 when he opened El Guero Canelo.
The original stand is now a destination restaurant, outfitted with picnic tables and serviced by a walk-up order window. Fans converge for bacon-wrapped franks, stuffed into stubby bollilos, smothered with beans, onion, mustard, jalapeno sauce, and a squiggle of mayonnaise.
Contreras operates three branches in Tucson, one in Phoenix, and a bakery to supply the split-top buns.

No doubt this award will result in longer lines at the window to order.
The Sonoran hot dog stand is ubiquitous in south Tucson.  Before we started wintering here, I had no idea that it had become a thing.  I don’t remember there being any when I lived here from the mid-70s to the mid-80s.  Of course, at the time, I didn’t venture very far south from the university.  Now, in south Tucson, they are on almost every street corner.  Some are totally mobile, others deploy tents covering tables and chairs.  I frequently wonder how any of the smaller stands make enough money to cover expenses.  You will not find them in Marana or Oro Valley, you must come south of St. Mary’s.
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The Circus Came to Town

The run of glorious weather ended today.  It was cold, it was windy and then it rained.  The hummingbird living on the feeder is totally and completely out of sorts.  Tomorrow is forecast to be fairly cool, but not wet.

This morning we set out to find a giant tent we saw the other day.  Due to the lack of sun, I could not get a decent picture of it.  Here is one I have liberated from the internet.

It’s the Zoppe Family Circus.  They’ve been doing this since 1842.  We walked around to the front of the tent and I got a couple of photos by holding the camera over my head.  The kid in the front has just launched a blue spinning thing into the air.  It comes back down and is caught on the string.  The child in the background has a yellow one that she was practicing with.

The was music and clapping.  Notice the makeup and hat of the person behind the woman with the headscarf.

I would really like to see them put that tent up.  This is one of the many stakes pulling the structure taut.

After wandering around a little, we admitted to each other that we were dressing for the climate we wanted, rather than the one we had.  So we went home and put on long pants and got our fleece vests out.  After lunch we went to Costco to pick up contact lenses.  By the time we left, it was really cold.  The rest of the day was spent indoors.  Jim is currently watching a youtube tour of the USS Iowa’s gun turrets.  It’s fairly interesting, and it’s not politics.

When we got the two new laptops, I did an incomplete job of moving photos, so today I moved several old folders that were not backed up.  It was good to get them on the new laptop, it’s sort of like reconnecting with old friends.

This was the first hummingbird feeder we had.  It was on the forward driver’s side slide and got the setting sun. 

And here we have the disgruntled resident of the current feeder.  Soon he will have to find somewhere to sleep and go into torpor.

This was posted on Twitter today.  Could some one please explain to me what happened to the notion of politicians being public servants?  I thought this was such an extraordinary communication to come from the office of a senator.

Other than this, I have nothing interesting to report.

More Hiking and Demographics

Greetings Earthlings – and happy 364th day of the regime of chaos.  It’s looking likely that the government will shut down tomorrow at midnight.  It’s just unbelievable to me that we are here.  Interior Secretary Zinke is proposing to leave the national parks open with no rangers on the job.  I can’t imagine how that will work out.

Unlike the eastern side of the country, we are having decent weather.  Saturday we went to Tubac for something to do.  It’s an artsy fartsy community south of Tucson.  Some of their products are very nice, some not so much.  This is the Elephant Head rock formation we see from the freeway.  It was a beautiful day.

Yesterday we hiked the Ammunition Box trail.  The view from the top is just stunning.

If you look at the hill top center photo, that’s where Jim is standing in the above picture.

Today we headed out to the Tortolitas and hiked the Lower Javelinas.  It was a glorious day.

Rocks.

The gnarly cactus.

In the GPNW, they experienced 35 foot waves at the coast.  This was taken at Cape Disappointment.  It’s pretty impressive water.

The administration continues in its desire to cut off immigration, unless the immigrants are from Norway.  This is so bad.  It’s just amazing to me that the politicians can not read and understand the population projections that are being published.  White people are not reproducing in sufficient numbers to support the coming bulge of retiring boomers.  We need immigrants to enter the workforce.

A growing workforce would ease the fiscal pressure that the expanding senior population will impose on Social Security and Medicare. But Trump's efforts to reduce legal immigration would consign the U.S. to virtually no growth in the workforce, Pew projects. Trump has endorsed legislation from Republican Sens. Tom Cotton of Arkansas and David Perdue of Georgia, two attendees at last Thursday's explosive White House meeting, that would cut the total level of legal immigration in half. Pew projects that under that level of future legal immigration, the size of the workforce will remain virtually stagnant over the next half century.

If the workforce remains essentially unchanged while the senior population grows by 40 million, each worker will be required to fund 80% more seniors than they do now. That demographic imbalance represents a political tourniquet that will inexorably increase pressure for cuts in Social Security and Medicare -- a prospect that polls show is anathema to the older and working-class whites Trump relies on.

So there you go.