AZ, NM (12-2001)

	Saguaro cactus skeleton. The inside structure of these cacti is made up of a skeleton of very strong wood. Much like an animal, when the cactus dies the soft parts decompose first leaving the skeleton behind.
	West unit of the Saguaro National Park. Both the east and west units of the park are just outside Tucson. Encroachment by urban areas is a constant threat to the park units.
	Heavy frost and some ice on our rental car in Tucson. The kind of weather we had there is quite rare. The icy roads that morning made headlines in the newspapers.
	Karen and a large barrel cactus in the east unit of the Saguaro National Park. The yellow things on the top are fruit. Barrel cacti alway lean towards the south.
	Here's something you don't (yet) have to worry about in Michigan. This is a killer bee trap on the grounds of the Beaudry RV park in Tucson where we were staying. We assume the trap is used to count killer bee populations.
	Karen in front of a gypsum dune at the White Sands National Monument in New Mexico. This was one of our favorite places that we visited! The sand dunes are made of gypsum, the same stuff they make wall board out of. It looks just like snow!
	Ross at the top of one of the many dunes. We hiked out along the Alkali Flats trail. It runs out about 2 miles through the dunes to the Alkali Flats. Here's how you hike through the dunes: up and down, up and down, up and down...
	See the little bit of orange sticking out of the sand? That's the tip of a buried trail marker. The dunes are constantly moving causing the trail markers to be buried as the dune moves over them.
	And when the dune moves on, the trail markers pop out of the sand!
	Sign at the end of the dune field and the start of the Alkali Flats.
	The Alkali Flats.
	Karen hiking along the dunes. The 2 sets of foot prints on her left, the only other foot prints we saw once we got deep into the dune field, show just how wonderfully isolated it was out there.
	The park road. It looks just like a freshly ploughed road after a snow storm!

CA, AZ (11-2001, 12-2001)

	Koala at the San Diego zoo. This animal suprised us with how fast it can move! In all those nature shows it moves as if in slow motion. But when this one climbed down from the tree it just zoomed across the ground.
	San Diego from the Cabrillo National Monument. The monument is located at Point Loma and is home to the oldest lighthouse on the west coast.
	Seal tour car/boat. We went on a tour of San Diego in this contraption. It drives down the highway like a car and goes through the water like a boat!
	Splash down! The Seal tour car/boat entering the water.
	200" telescope dome on Palomar Mountain. It took us 2 tries to make it up there, but seeing this remarkable telescope was worth the effort. Well, it was for Ross anyway. Karen doesn't agree.
	Field of cholla cacti in Joshua Tree National Park. A nearby sign says "Warning - This Cactus is Hazardous. Do Not Touch For Your Safety..." Ross was later to learn what they were talking about.
	Karen bushwacking in Joshua Tree National Park. One of the joys of being in a wilderness area is being able to bushwack, or go hiking in the back country where there aren't any trails. You're on your own. And you'd better make sure you know how to navigate!
	Coyote in Joshua Tree National Park. They stand in the middle of the road and come begging when you stop. We saw many of them doing this. We strongly support the rule about NOT feeding the wildlife. We wondered how many of these beautiful animals died on the road trying to get a free handout after learning that behavior from people who have fed them.
	Ross' aunt and uncle, Shari and Chuck. We spent several very enjoyable days with them. They showed us a lot of the sights such as here in the Tonto National Forest.
	Goldfield ghost town. In the late 1800's the town of Goldfield was larger than Phoenix. More than 3000 miners worked the many gold mines in the area. There are still a few small gold mines in operation in the area.
	Chuck and Shari in front of their house in Mesa. On their lot they have a tangerine tree, an orange tree, a lemon tree, and a grapefruit tree. All except the grapefruit tree had fruit on them. By the way, Shari is hugging one of their plastic pink flamingos. They are even decorated for Christmas with a red and a green bow.
	If you eat out in the southwest you will eventually be asked the question "red or green?" They are refering to the kind of chili you want. Green is much hotter than the red. When in doubt, ask for red on the side.
	In the downtown area of Mesa they have sculptures scattered about. They are very realistic looking! This is an example.
	Karen and a saguaro (pronounced sah-WAH-ro) cactus. These amazing cacti can live up 200 years, reach a height of 50 feet, and weigh up to 15 tons. They don't get their first arms until they are about 75 years old. In the US they grow primarily in Arizona.
	A piece of cholla cactus stuck to Ross' leg. It got him when he stepped off the Crosscut trail in the Tonto National Forest to take a picture and brushed up against the base of the bush where it had ended up after breaking off the parent cholla. About a dozen barbs had penetrated the skin. It took about a minute of painful pulling, barb by barb, to get it off. The microscopic hooks on the end of the barb make them very difficult to remove.
	When we got to Phoenix Ross joked with Chuck that there probably weren't any West Marine stores around. But several large artifical lakes northeast of Phoenix make boating a real sport in the area. We took a boat tour of Canyon Lake and were treated to views like this.
	Karen standing at the west entrance to Casa Grande. It was built by the Hohokam people who lived in the area for over 1000 years. But by about 1450 they, like their Anasazi contemporaries to the north, had abandoned all of their dwellings. No one knows why for sure. The roof structure was built in the 1930's to protect the ruins.

CA (11-2001)

	One of the major attractions for us in southern California was Joshua Tree National Park. These are Joshua trees. Not a cactus and not a tree the Joshua tree is most closely related to the lily! They can reach an enormous size.
	The first trail we hiked at Joshua Tree was the Mastodon Peak trail. Here is a section of the trail with a palm tree growing nearby. We had always thought of the palm tree as a tropical tree, but given the right conditions they thrive in the desert.
	The second hike we did was Ryan Mt. The hiking book said the elevation gain was 700' but the GPS said it was actually 1100'. This is a view from the summit.
	Ryan Mt. trail on the way down. The trail here curves to the right so it looks like Karen is standing right on the edge of the mountain. One step in the wrong direction and it's a long way down!
	Rock mountain on the other side of a valley cut into Ryan Mt. They don't show up very well in this picture but we could see people rock climbing near the trees in the middle.
	Further down the Ryan Mt. trail heading down. As this picture shows we're definately in the desert here!
	The third trail we hiked was the Skull Rock nature trail. This is a Juniper pine with berries. Juniper berries are used to make gin.
	Shields dates in Indio. Indio is the "Date Capital of the Nation." We learned that there are many different kinds of dates including Blondes, Brunetts, Deglet Noors, and Medjools.
	South of Indio is the Salton Sea, one of the world's largest inland bodies of saltwater. It's 35 miles by 15 miles and is saltier than the Pacific Ocean. Also interesting is that it was just formed in 1905 by flood waters from the Colorado River. And elevation in the area is about 200' BELOW sea level.
	Passing under the Coronado Bay bridge in San Diego harbor on a boat tour we took. The center span sections are designed to float. This feature would allow the Navy to move the sections out of the way to allow the fleet continued access to the ocean.
	One of the many Navy ships in San Diego harbor, the USS Nimitz.
	The front of this building in downtown San Diego was designed to look like a champaign glass. If you zoom in on it you can even see that several of the windows have been accented to look like champaign bubbles.
	Trolley to Tijuana. San Diego has a very good public transportation system. The main trolley lines are fed by many bus lines. One of the bus lines had a stop right in our RV park.
	You can get pretty much any prescription drug you want very cheaply in Tijuana including Cipro, the antibiotic now being prescribed for Anthrax.
	Line heading back into the USA. We had walked over to Mexico. There were a couple of other people walking over along with us. We walked right in without even being asked any questions by the one Mexican authority at the crossing point. Walking back to the USA we were joined by hundreds of other people and the security was very tight.
	We saw this guy from the bridge where we took the picture of the traffic heading into the USA. All we could figure was that he must have been a pot smuggler. HAHAHA!!!

NV (11-2001)

	Las Vegas! Our Flair at the Circusland RV park located behind the Circus Circus hotel/casino. "The Strip" is just a short shuttle bus ride away from here. For being located in the center of the action the park was pretty cheap. They charge $18 on weekends and $16 during the week.
	1/2 lb. hotdog at Slots A Fun casino. Always on the lookout for cheap things, we found these monsters for only 99 cents!
	3/4 lb. hotdog! The next day we came across the great mutant hotdogs of Las Vegas at the Westward Ho casino. Again, they were only 99 cents!
	The hotdogs aren't the only huge things in Vegas. Most casinos have these large slot machines. This one, at Slots A Fun is at the entrance along the sidewalk. Yes, we tried it. No, we didn't win.
	Fake manhole cover at New York New York. Several of them are located in the restaurant area which looks like a street from New York City. They even have fake steam coming out of them.
	We played some slots while in Vegas, mostly nickel and quarter machines. At New York New York (and probably all the other casinos too) they have an area with larger stakes machines. This one was a $100 one. Besides not being able to believe someone would put $100 into a slot machine we noticed that this one said that the number of "coins" played last time was 2. Someone played a $200 spin on this machine!
	This memorial has sprung up at New York New York. The notes were mostly written about people lost in the 9-11 attacks. A few were from people from other countries saying that they supported the US in what we are going through. It was quite moving.
	Bellagio. One of the newer mega-hotel/casinos.
	Part of the gardens at Bellagio.
	Paris hotel/casino. It's amazing just how many of these huge places there are. Besides the ones we've put up here there are: Mandalay Bay, Luxor, Excalibur, MGM, Aladin, Bally's, Ceasar's Palace, Treasure Island, Mirage, Rio, etc... And then there are the downtown casinos like Golden Nugget, Binion's, etc...
	Hoover dam is about 40 miles southeast of Las Vegas. Like a lot of other places around the country the operations at the dam have been impacted by the 9-11 attacks. Security is pretty tight and you can no longer tour the inside of the dam. Also, only passenger cars are allowed to drive over the top of the dam on highway 93. Trucks and RV's must detour around through Laughlin.
	No matter how many pictures of the dam we took, none came even close to showing how big it is! This view is looking down from the top of the dam to the power plant at the bottom. Notice the trucks on the left side. It's a long way down there!
	Valley of Fire State Park is about an hour northeast of Las Vegas. One of it's most remarkable features are the red sandstone mountains. Part of the movie "Star Trek Generations" was filmed here.
	The sandstone is easily eroded by the wind creating many interesting shapes and holes like this. Depending on how the light hits the sandstone it appears different colors.
	Petrified log at the Valley of Fire State Park. The several that are here are fenced in to keep people from taking pieces. We learned that petrified wood can be found in all 50 states.