Arizona Adventures! (Part I)

In January, our friends invited us to join them in Gold Canyon, Arizona for a brief respite from winter in Western Pennsylvania during the President's Day weekend. Since Pittsburgh only averages about sixty clear days per annum, and that we had been in the cloudy and grey, formerly-Steel City for quite some time, we were pretty stoked about the opportunity to join our friends for a long-weekend respite from Pittsburgh.

The trip out west was very new to me. I have never been able to explore continental United States west of the Mississippi river, and I had never been in the desert, so I really didn't know what to expect.

My mind was filled with random thoughts such as... will I sunburn in the desert sun?

Would I get to ride a horse with no name?

What do people eat in the desert?

Will we encounter any criminals buying pseudoephedrine at CVS and large matches at Home Depot trying to get enough red phosphorous to cook meth in a camper van!?!

So here is a preliminary photo-essay of my findings from Arizona! 

In the desert, the sky is very clear. The moon is very beautiful.
And the evenings are cool and there is very little ambient light pollution.

This is a "cloudy" day in the Sonoran desert. Daytime temperatures while we were there did not exceed 80 °F. However, due to the low humidity, the temperature difference between standing in the sun vs. in the shade felt like at 10 degrees °F. This cactus was probably 25 feet tall and a few hundred years old.

Not a bad view to have in your backyard eh?

Green golf courses in the desert!

Made possible by dams and irrigation canals - open bodies of water is quite a peculiar sight from the air and on the ground. The air surrounding such larger bodies of water also feels cooler due to evaporative cooling.

There are some crazy and amazing geological formations. This little oasis of green and beautiful view is made possible by a small creek/river. I'd imagine after a few centuries, the stranded plant and wildlife will be rather unique.

This is a canyon next to a busy road. Very pretty - but somewhat scary too (I don't think the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has a testing protocol for Arizona canyon plunge).

The road follows the canyon through the mountain range. It was a very scenic drive on another "cloudy" day.

Crazy rock formations eh? I don't think two-dimensional pictures do the landscape justice, as it is difficult to capture the depth and sudden rise of the rock formations.

We have many more pictures from our visit, and Part II will focus on all the vegetation and other sights we captured at the Boyce Thompson Arboretum.