Parker, Arizona

Fri - Feb. 12th

Me with my Mom and my Aunt Ruby. Bet you can't guess which one is my Mom. We were just leaving my aunt's place in Phoenix after five days
visiting friends and family in the Phoenix/Mesa area.

We spent a few days in Quartzsite checking out all the flea markets and camping in the desert north of town.

Then we moved on to Parker where we camped a couple days at the BlueWater Casino. These are a few views of the Colorado River from the casino.

This is Parker Dam, until 2003 the deepest dam in the world at 320 feet high and 235 feet below the

river bed, only to be eclipsed by the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River in China which is now number two. The deepest now is the Teceze Arch Dam in Ethiopia.


Then we moved a few miles down the road to an RV park.

Views along the way.

Sunset views of the Colorado River at La Paz County Park on Saturday, February 20th.

We spent one night here and moved on to Lake Havasu.

Tarra

Sedona, Arizona

Tue - Feb. 9th

Driving from Phoenix to Sedona. What a beautiful area! The pictures just speak for themselves.

Hiking with our friends near their home in Sedona.

Overlooking their home.

You can see our little red car in front of their home.

Chimney Rock.

Coffee Pot Rock.

Courthouse Butte & Bell Rock.

Chapel of the Holly Cross.

There are lots of religious meditative type things in the area and mind and body health spa places.

Just a little home, waterfall, pond and guest house just below the chapel.

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San Xavier del Bac Mission

Thur - Feb. 4th

Casino del Sol of the Pascua Yaqui Tribe of the Tohono O'odham Nation. We stayed here Thursday and Friday night before heading to Phoenix to pick up my mother at the airport and visit my aunt and several friends in the area.

San Xavier Mission was founded in 1692 and has been an active mission ever since. It was completely isolated out in the desert when the current church was built in 1783. It is the oldest intact European structure in Arizona with marvelous original statuary and mural paintings.

There is no admission charge and they have over 200,000 visitors each year. It is considered to be the finest example of Spanish Colonial architecture in this country. It is made of low-fire clay brick, stone and lime mortar made by a large workforce of O'odham Indians. The entire structure is roofed with masonry vaults, a unique

Spanish feature.

An earthquake in 1887 knocked down the mortuary wall and damaged part of the church. In 1939 a lightening strike hit the west tower lantern. Mortar that was replaced with cement allowed moisture to seep into the walls and murals started to deteriorate. New restoration has removed all of the cement repairs and put back the original lime plaster allowing the walls to breath and stay dry. Lots of restoration has been done on the interior murals and is ongoing. This is a small side chapel with a desert garden.

This is a view of the courtyard. Franciscans became permanent residents of the Arizona Sonoran Desert in 1768, after Royal suspicion and intrigue exiled the Jesuits from all Spanish lands.

This is Grotto Hill next to the church. The little shelters in front are for locals who come and sell their crafts. When Spanish rule ended and it became part of the U.S., funding was discontinued and the east tower was never finished.

Infusion of Islamic and Christian architecture is from Moorish times in Spain. This view and the one below are taken from Grotto Hill.

Believe it or not, the clouds in the background are covering Mt. Lemmon Ski Peak and chains have been required the last two days to get up there.

The whole time we have been in Tucson, the largest Gem and Mineral Show in the world has been going on. Of course John said there was no need for us to go since he already has his "gem", and as you all know, he treats her like a goddess. Hmmm. What would be so wrong with finding a gem for his goddess?

The Spaniards came here in search of oro (gold) and totally overlooked the silver, copper and turquoise. There is still lots of mining going on here.

No blogs for a few days as we will be visiting friends and family and catching up with shopping and laundry.

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Biosphere 2 - Tucson, Ar.

Tue - Feb. 2nd

Did the groundhog see his shadow today? Six more weeks of winter takes on a new meaning in Arizona. Today we visited Biosphere 2. The earth is Bioshpere 1. It is the world's largest experiment in environmental science, an incredible engineering marvel and scientific experiment in life sciences controlled by water and temperature.

The main part to the left has the main living area and five biomes representing the different environ- ments on earth, ocean, desert, salt water marsh, savannah and rain forest. The building next to it has a small library in the upper dome and the agricultural unit below. To the right is a dome- shaped building that is one of the two lungs used for equalizing the changing air pressure inside.

It was originally a ranch in the 1800s and changed hands several times. It became a conference center in the 60's and 70's, first for Motorola and then the University of Arizona. Space Biosphere Ventures bought the property in 1984 and began construction in 1986. It took four years to build at a cost of $189 million, which was donated by a philanthropist named Bass. His family made their money in Texas oil and later invested in Disney. It was sold in 2007 to a development company for suburbs, with 35 acres where the biosphere is, leased and managed by the University of Arizona.

These are the casitas (small homes) where visiting researchers and conference attendees stay. There were many things to consider when planning it, including physiology and psycology of the eight people that were sealed inside for two years at a time from 1991 to 1993 and another group from 1993 to 1995. The only breach in the seal was when
one person was released for six hours for medical treatment and returned with a small bag of tools. It was designed by Buckminster Fuller and even the ground was completely sealed underneath by a stainless steel liner. Everyone inside had to be cross-trained in several fields such as sciences, mechanics, art, agriculture, cooking. etc.

They had backups to the backups for everything in case something malfunctioned. If the generators stopped working, the temperatures inside could quickly reach 150 degrees. It is 3.14 acres, 91 feet at it's highest point and has 7.2 million feet of glass and is completely self-sustaining.

The original plan was to be able to seal humans inside for 100 years, which would be amazing in case of nuclear war or to support life on another planet. They were enclosed with 250,000 gallons of water (not including the ocean water) and oxygen was pumped in before it was sealed. From then on they had to recycle and/or produce everything

they needed. The two dome-shaped lungs had impermeable, flexible roofs built by Dupont that were totally deflated in the morning from the cool night air and expanded during the heat of the day lifting the roof up again, keeping the air pressure equalized so the glass wouldn't explode out.

This shows the roof inside one of the lungs. An alien movie was filmed here with William Shatner. They had water boilers and chillers to change the temperatures that circulated thru air handlers inside the caves in the desert.

This is inside the rain forest biome. It's most important function was the amount of oxygen it produced. They had hundreds of species of plants and insects and a few animals. The only birds included were hummingbirds for pollination and they all died. Most pollination is done by insects, 30% of which is done by bees. Did you know there

30,000 species of bees, 1,500 in the sonoran desert making it the most diverse in North America. Here is John in the desert biome visiting with a young man he met, whose mother we went to college with in Valley City. Small world. In the desert they had to use coastal fog desert plants. Due to the humidity in the sealed atmosphere, the sonoran plants wouldn't be able to survive.

This is the ocean biome (750,000 gallons), for which they hauled in some actual ocean water, but was mostly made with the stuff they put in aquariums. They had tilapia in the rice paddies.

They had monkeys for socialization purposes, but they turned out to be way more work than they were worth. They had pigs which turned out to be a huge nuisance, because they kept getting into their crops and digging them up and eating them. They had goats and chickens. They had meat once a week and made cheese. Otherwise, they lived on 1800 calorie a day all plant based. It was a nutrient rich diet, but they said they felt hungry all the time and they all lost wieght. The heaviest guy went in at 208 pounds and came out at 150 pounds. Since soil could not be brought in from all over the world for contamination reasons, they had to use all Arizona soil and culture it to create similar conditions to emulate the different world wide environs.

It was opened in 1996 to worldwide research and scientists. If you would like to read more about it check these books. "The Human Experience" by Jane Pointer and one by Rebecca Reid, which is supposed to be better, but I don't remember the title.

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Desert Moon & Old Downtown Tucson

Fri - Jan. 29th

View from the hill next to where we were camped in the desert.

View from our camper. It was supposed to be the brightest moon of the year.

St. Augustin Cathedral.

Pancho Villa.

El Charro Restaurant where they claim to have invented the Chimi Chunga in 1939 when they accidentally dropped a burrito in hot grease. The restaurant has been here in their original home since 1969 and is still run by the original owner's great niece. There were tables in every room of the house upstairs, main floor and basement. It was a really cool place. John ordered bec seca (dry beef). This is a picture of how they season and dry the beef in the sun for several days. We don't recommend it unless you have lots of salsa, sour cream, etc. It is indeed very dry!

This is in front of one of the little tourist shops. Note the sign on the door that says "Fighting terrorists since 1492".

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