February 4, 2020 – Roadwarners

It was a nice night and nice to wake up to some company as well. And ☕️ CoffEE 🙂

So Petrified National Park next, right? Well somehow last night Edwin brought up hoe we are going to miss Saguaro National Park, which is all the way south in Tuscon. It also occurred to me that in a Tuscon I had wanted/intended on seeing an old friend from high school, the only one I really kept/liked after leaving high school, but even her I haven’t spoken to in over 15 years other than giving and receiving Christmas cards. I knew it was a bit of a long shot but I reached out to her last night. It is her birthday today, Happy Birthday Allison 🎈 (I’m still blaming Vegas for my bad planning on not quite thinking about what would happen after the Grand Canyon on this southern route…we had from Truckee to the Grand Canyon planned, but…darn Vegas. Just kidding, just really haven’t planned the southwest route out very well.

Even though us meeting up with my friend was uncertain and it didn’t make time or direction sense, we had decided to head down there anyway because our push to see the country through national parks was winning.

So I was a definitely bummed I hadn’t reached out to Allison earlier to coordinate something, and we did connect. Sorry Allison, that would’ve been fun.

It also meant for a lot of driving today, but at least I’m able to catch up in this lovely blog.

And the girls had fun dressing up as each other.

We liked Arizona up near Flagstaff but not so fond of the cactus environment down here in Tucson. And the dumb Californian me is surprised to see so many mountain passes in Arizona. I thought it was all just hot flat desert.

Saguaro National Park. 23rd National Park. (i think, have to look it up) Pronounced suh waa roh

It was absolutely freezing today. The wind was blowing and it was bitter cold. We didn’t explore Saguaro National Park very much. Saguaro National Park is part of the Sonoran Desert, same as Joshua Tree National Park.

The Saguaro Cactus is the largest cactus and can grow over 40’ tall and live to 200 years old. It is the cactus 🌵 you draw when you think cactus. They are very good at storing water during rains to sustain long droughts. They only begin to grow their first arm at after age 60. They grow very slowly which makes them dependent on “nurse trees” (a tree that provides shade, shelter, and protection) for the growing cactus.