Fire in Arizona

There is a huge fire happening right now in eastern Arizona. Thousands
of acres of forest are going up in flames. Strong southwesterly winds are
blowing a lot of the smoke toward places many miles away. This evening,
the wind came up and the sunset and sky took on a surreal look. Even
though Santa Fe is several hundred miles away from the fires, the sun
became very dark and the sky filled with smoke, sometimes burning the
eyes and making it hard to breathe. After sunset, the moon became very
red. It was just a really weird weather and climate scenario.

Headed Home

Two days in Vegas is fun, but anything more than that is a
bit much for the senses. Add to the fact that it would get to
be 107 degrees, we were ready to head to the relatively
cooler Grand Junction. Our stay at Excalibur was nice as
we expected but we basically just slept there so we didn't
use much of the facilities.


A place we drove by while we were driving around town was
The Cleveland Clinic's Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health. I'm
not sure if I like the architectural style or not, but it's
certainly different.


Before stopping for lunch at In-N-Out Burger (which is basically a
mandatory stop!) we went to a Trader Joe's grocery. We stop at one
any time we're in an area there is one and sadly, this is the closest
(or Albuquerque) one to our house. There aren't any in Colorado and
I've heard that the reason is because Colorado won't serve beer or
wine in groceries on Sundays and besides all of the other groceries,
beer and wine are big sellers at Trader Joe's. However, I was able
to find my favorite New Mexico Pinion Coffee and stocked up on it.
Lynn also bought some yummy hummus.


Just north of Las Vegas, on the way home, we passed through a tiny
part of Arizona. This section is totally cut off from the rest of the state
by the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon. Interstate 15 cuts
through this section, called the Arizona Strip and also climbs onto
the Colorado Plateau here at the Virgin River Canyon. All very
pretty and interesting to know that the Colorado Plateau stretches
all the way from here to just east of Grand Junction...500 miles
away!

Politics Isn't Fun

I try not to bring topics such as politics or religion into my
blog, but I ran across this video, presented to the Governor
of Arizona that caught my attention. There has been a lot
of talk about Arizona's new law, that will require people to
present identification to Police officers, proving their ability
to be in the United States. A few things about this law:

* Police will not be able to randomly pull people over, asking
for their identification. It must be for an infraction of another
law, such as a traffic stop. Yes, there is a chance that the
law may be abused by certain officers of the law, but that can
happen with any law by certain people who are not on the up
and up anyway. There has also been so much press on this
subject, I think those unscrupulous officers might be wary of
abusing their powers. Call me naive, but I try to have faith.

* If you are in the U.S. legally, you are required to keep you
Green Card information on you at all times. This is stated in
the documentation produced by the INS.

* There IS a legitimate problem, especially in Arizona, of
many crimes committed by illegal people.

And I think that's what it really does come down to...the
word ILLEGAL. Unless you are a Native American, your
ancestors came into this country as immigrants. Mine did
as well. But...they came into the country LEGALLY. This
country thrives on immigration. I think that everyone from
Mexico that wants to come to this country, should be able to.
As long as it is legal. The Mexican people that I have met and
worked with are some of the nicest, hardest working people I
have ever met. I have a great deal of respect for them. I
hope this issue gets resolved soon, but I don't think that
people who live thousands of miles away from Arizona, such
as politicians in New York and San Francisco should
judge them so harshly until they have lived there and have
lived with the situation..

Uno de Mayo

Photo by Gretel Daugherty and Grand Junction Daily Sentinel

We were downtown today and noticed that there was a large
get together in the parking lot between Main Street and
Colorado Avenue. We discovered that it was a Cinco de
Mayo party! Everyone looked like they were having a good
time. We didn't stay, but it struck me that people of all
nationalities and ethnic makeup were just enjoying the
atmosphere and each other and not worrying or focusing
on the controversial Arizona law that has just been passed.
This didn't seem to be so in other communities on Saturday.
There were no signs, protesters or anyone seemingly
upset about anything. At least not while we walked through
the area. This is one of the things I like so much about
Grand Junction. People are just very friendly and for the
most part easy going...and it really doesn't matter what
country your heritage is from. Nice people are nice people
and we really should all just get along.

The East Valley

We've been driving around a bit since we've been in Phoenix
and most of it has been spent in the East Valley since that's
where I used to live and we know the area better. We went to
a yarn store and this was outside of it. I doubt it's the world's
largest chair, but it's probably the world's largest "Pink" chair!


No Cub fan would feel that a trip to Arizona was complete
without driving past HoHoKam Park in Mesa. HoHoKam is
the Spring Training site for the Cubs. I drove around the
entire park and couldn't find anyone that might be able to
open up the gates so that I could look around, but at least
it was interesting to see even if the team is playing badly
back home in Chicago.


There was a pretty good view of the field from past the
outfield fence.


At the entrance to the field there were round batting circles
for each of the players that have had their numbers retired
by the team...including my favorite, Ryne Sandberg.


We drove to Chandler and took a look at the condo I used to
rent. Surprisingly, very little had changed in almost 14 years!


One of my favorite flowers is the Bougainvilla. The state Department
of Transportation has chosen to use it on the sides of many of its
freeways. It brings a lot of color to an otherwise tan landscape.

Saguaros

We drove up the Beeline Highway today to look at the
Saguaro cacti. We've been to Saguaro National Park in
Tucson before, but this is much closer to where we're
staying, only about a half hour away. Literally thousands
of Saguaros lined both sides of the highway. The only
thing that could have made it nicer was if they were in
bloom, but we're many months too late for that

Time on Our Hands

Combine the fact that it was a cloudy morning with the fact that
my back was almost as red as my Oklahoma t-shirt (too much
pool), it was a perfect day to drive around the Valley and see
some things that needed to be seen. In our case that means
things that are cheap (free?) and what we might stumble upon.
Finding the Desert Botanical Gardens ($15 admission each) and
the Frank Lloyd Wright House ($30 admission each) a bit beyond
our price range, we opted for old standbys. Lynn wanted to visit
a yarn store in Mesa called the Fiber Factory. No, not the place
where Metamucil is made, although that might be an interesting
trip for another time...but one of the "best" yarn stores in the
Southwest. I have to admit that it was pretty nice if you're into
that sort of place, which Lynn is and the people working there
seemed very knowledgeable about Antarctica and Colorado.
However, they thought Colorado was cold all the time...shhhh...
don't tell them it's not!


While I was waiting for Lynn to peruse the yarn store from top to
bottom, I sat on the "man couch" and read a small newspaper
distributed by the Downtown Mesa Association. In it, they talked
about a "favorite" local Mexican restaurant just down the street
named Mangos Mexican Cafe & Bakery. In a word, it was
AWESOME! Lynn had the Chimichanga and I had Enchiladas and
even the chips and salsa beforehand were great. I found out later
that it had received 5 stars on several internet sites. I especially
liked having to walk through the kitchen to use the restroom.
All very authentic and real comfort food. As much as I love Mexican
food, we hadn't had any real Mexican food in a restaurant since
we came back from Ecuador. I love Taco Bell, but that doesn't
really count...neither does our new discovery, El Pollo Loco.


One of the main goals as we headed out the door was to
visit some used bookstores. We've visited both Bookman's
in Phoenix already, so we wanted something less commercial.
We found it walking back to the car from Mangos. The Book
Gallery. A really nice used bookstore, all of the books are
in good condition and don't smell of mildew. Something we've
run across quite a bit in used book stores. Lynn found a few
knitting books and I found a good book on Colorado
geography and then I stumbled across the "Flag section". Yes,
they actually had a small section of flag books. In it, I found
"Flags Through the Ages and Across the World" by Whitney
Smith. He is the man who coined the term "Vexillology".
I used to check this book out of the Naperville and Denver
Libraries and have seen battered versions of it for sale over
the years but never found a really good copy of it. Here it
was. Only problem...$35...Ouch! However, since the book is
already 34 years old and has been out of print forever...plus
the fact that this copy was in pristine condition...I had to bite
the bullet and buy it. Maybe I can sell some plasma or
something down the road to afford it. Later on, I looked it
up on Amazon and the cheapest copy is available for $106.
Definitely not a price I would pay for a book. I definitely
made a good purchase.


I drove by my old condo in Chandler and took a few pictures
since I didn't have any digital copies (yes, that sounds weird to
me as well) and even past the place where I wrecked Lynn's
Camry leaving the Dairy Queen in 1995 (no photos here
however). Afterwards, we were driving up I-10 toward
downtown Phoenix when there appeared an IKEA in Tempe
on the right hand side of the highway. We'd never been to
an IKEA before and we felt like browsing. For those who
don't know, IKEA is a huge (store size) Swedish-owned
household goods store that has locations around the world.
Everything in the store is VERY reasonable and affordable.
We're looking at making some updates to our house in the
next five years so we were really encouraged that we could
shop at IKEA and make some of the changes we want down
the road without bankrupting ourselves. Only trouble is, the
closest location to us is in Salt Lake City. Not very convenient,
but maybe someday.


Lastly, we stopped at the Barnes and Noble (sorry Ben) at
the Chandler Fashion Mall. Mainly because they have free
internet! They've made a deal with AT&T (boo) for free
internet access in all of their store cafes around the country
and if we get a small coffee, I don't feel so bad about
abusing their bandwidth. I'm finding that more and more
places are offering free Wi-Fi although here's the part of
this post where I complain. Our hotel only offers it in the
lobby for free, not in the rooms. If you want access in your
room you have to pay $9.95 per day. How is it that
seemingly every Motel 6 or Super 8 across every interstate
highway in America can offer "free" Wi-Fi access in their
motels, but a "resort" charging much more charges a
ridiculous price to do so. There...that's been bothering me
for the last 4 days and it's off my chest! And yes, I'm
smiling as I type this!

Swim Time

One of the reasons we came to the Doubletree Resort in
the first place was because of the pool. It's not the biggest
or best in the area, but we like it anyway. There are actually
two pools here but we tend to use the rear pool the most
and since it's mid-summer, we practically have it all to
ourselves. When I lived in Chandler, the condo complex
had to spray the pool down continuously in the summer
to keep it cool. Not so here. I'm not sure if it's because
it's larger or they have some way to cool down the water.
Kind of like an anti-pool-heater. Regardless, it's very
refreshing.

Wide World of Maps

After spending the morning at the pool, we went to one of
my favorite get my geek on places. Wide World of Maps!
I've been going here since the early 90's when I first started
visiting Arizona but I had never been to the Scottsdale store.
This place has everything for a cartography or geography nut!
I could have spend thousands of dollars here, but alas, left
with a new Phoenix highway map.

Staying in Arizona

In Arizona, we're staying at the Doubletree Resort in Paradise
Valley. It's not the most oppulent resort in the Valley, but it's
not a Motel 6 either. We like it though. We've stayed here off
and on since 1995 when Greg won a weekend here but he and
Nancy couldn't use it because they were busy moving from
Phoenix to Oklahoma. They gave it to us and we've been
enjoying it here ever since.


It's been a few years since we've been back and they've changed
the decor a bit, but it's still very nice and comfortable. Especially
since it's about 110 degrees outside. The great thing about
staying in Phoenix during the summer months is that the resorts
are very reasonable. You can stay at the nicest places for a
fraction of the cost during peak season during the winter.
I'll post more photos of the resort in the next few days.


Of course, Bruno moved right in and became very comfortable!

Driving to Arizona

We drove back home to Grand Junction before heading to our
planned stop in Arizona because we had so much stuff in the car,
we wanted to get rid of it and not haul it around for 10 days. It
made for a bit more driving, but was definitely worth it.

I love driving through this part of the country. Miles and miles of
empty lands, with beautiful rock formations, interesting people
and tons of scenery! About 3 hours south of our house is a formation
called Mexican Hat. Yes...an upside down sombrero. Not exactly
politically correct, but apparently the name has stuck


The northern border of the Navajo Nation is the San Juan River. it
eventually flows into Lake Powell, a few miles to the west, but at this
point, it acts as an oasis in a very dry land.


An iconic view and one I never seem to tire of is on the highway just
north of Monument Valley. It was pretty hazy today so it's not tour
guide photo ready, but pretty nonetheless. We skipped visiting
Monument Valley today (the actual park) because we've been there
many times and had lots of other things to see in a short amount of
time.


Just north of the Utah/Arizona border, we came across these folks from
California that were driving the southwest in their homemade choppers.
Very cool.


The other chopper.


On the southwestern edge of the Navajo Nation is the Cameron
trading post. It's very commercial, but always fun to visit.



Traffic through Flagstaff is always miserable. It seems like it
takes forever to drive through, no matter what time of year it is.
I wish they'd come up with a solution to the problem. We took
advantage of being in Flagstaff to visit one of our favorite
bookstore chains...Bookman's. A great used bookstore, we always
seem to leave there, purchasing something. After 90 minutes or
so there, we needed to continue south to the Phoenix area.
The lights had started to come on in Flagstaff and as the first
International Dark Sky city, it's refreshing to see how little light
pollution there is in the city. We continued the two hour drive
to Phoenix and it definitely is NOT a Dark Sky City! It's glow
can be seen from just south of Flagstaff!