The Rest of May

Corona de Tucson

May 31, 2025 

The last sunset in May.

While Lucy had a spa morning in Green Valley, Joe and I took advantage of the couple of hours and walked at Madera Canyon.  

Madera Canyon Road

We parked at the Proctor trailhead and walked to Madera picnic area where we turned around.  

The beginning of the walk is on a paved sidewalk.  I love the shadows!

We missed the sound of water, but the dry creek bed is still so beautiful!

Fountain (or Deergrass) grass has a long history in the area.  It was used to make coiled baskets by Native Americans and they are credited with its current distribution. 

The Mesquite tree flowers from March to November with yellow elongated "spikes".  

A Canyon Towhee...a first sighting for us.  I will never go back to Madera without my camera and zoom lens.  

Lots of deer sightings...a dozen plus on our walk.  

The last part of the walk is a dirt trail.

And sweet little Lucy can't get home fast enough!

Not far from home is Tumacacori National Historical Park.  It has been on "the list" for a while and last week we decided to visit the park and have lunch.  The site has so much history, it is hard to know where to begin.  Tumacacori went from being an O'odham village to a frontier mission, to a headquarters mission in a matter of decades.  At its peak, the busy community had nearly 200 mission residents and many different languages could be heard in the plaza.  Priests from Spain, Austria, Switzerland, Italy came to Tumacacori and lived among the O'odham, Yaqui, and Navajo natives. 

The Courtyard Garden has a Spanish design with a walled courtyard and a central fountain.  It was built in 1939 as part of the Visitor's Center's "New Deal" era construction and the original plantings were carried out by the CCC. Three native mesquite trees already there were left in place and continue to grow in the garden. The olive tree, the ornamental pomegranate and the monks's pepper tree planted in 1939 still survive today.

The ornamental pomegranate...

A beauty all it's own.

The fruit from the ornamental pomegranate is edible, but do lack the "sweetness and size" of the standard edible fruit you buy at the store.

The monk's pepper tree...

The base of the monk's pepper tree.  The aromatic leaves have a smell that we thought was sage, but was this tree.

The seed pods from the fruit/berries (which in the photos I saw were purple) were/are used for a pepper substitute and can be roasted and ground for a spice. 

Also among the gorgeous old trees and many other plants...

Feverfew...dried leaves, fresh leaves, and extracts from this plant are/were used to treat headaches.

Globemallow are edible and have medicinal benefits. Used by Native Americans for centuries, the leaves and roots were used to treat coughs, colds, and the flu.  

Chocolate Daisy...a sweet chocolate smell and a bitter chocolate flavor can be used in salads.

Pear trees originated in mountainous regions of western China. Today there are over 3,000 varieties of pears grown worldwide. 

After the gardens, we strolled through the museum.  The museum building was built in 1937 by the CCC and is listed in the National Register of Historic Landmarks. It is divided into two sections. First is the of history about the area...mountains, lowlands, the mesquite forest, and the river.  Season are displayed, which includes Arizona's monsoon as a fifth season and how the plants, animals, and humans survival depended on the ability to adapt to extreme conditions.  Artifacts are nicely displayed and informative.  The second section is more about Padre Kino and the establishment of the mission.  This included statues that stood in the niches of the Tumacacori mission.  

Saint Francis of Assisi :  1182 - 1226
Born in Italy 
He and his order are characterized by loving, joyous, worship of Christ and by a profession of extreme poverty.
The statue is 4' tall and made of wood carved pieces then glued and doweled together.  The statue is missing the porcelain eyes.

All but one of the statues was made in workshops "to the south" They were retired from use in other missions and taken to storage. Later  (no date given) they were repaired and transported to the mission by wagon. 

Saint Anthony of Padua : 1195 - 1231
Born in Portugal
With the guidance of Saint Francis of Assisi he began his career as a preacher and wonder worker. He is known as a great orator and for having as extrordinary gift of miracles.
The statue is 4' tall made of wood carved pieces glued and doweled together  with porcelain eyes and holding the Christ child.

Father Kino established Tumacacori  (translated as "place of the flat rock") as a mission in 1691.  It is the oldest mission site in Arizona.   There were three churches at the mission.  Construction on the church we see today began around 1800 and the O'odham labored over 20 years to build this new "face for their village" which became a landscape feature itself and a symbol for Tumacacori's "complex story". 

The columns were painted red and the pillars were painted yellow with black markings.

An interior wall with a ninch where a statue stood.  In 1948, the roof timbers were removed and taken by local settlers for construction elsewhere.  Weathering has exposed the sun-dried adobe bricks all made by the mission residents. 

Brightly painted interior walls were decorated by the steady hands of artisans both indigenous and Spanish.

And the floor...so old and so beautiful!  

The bell tower is three stories tall and I read that it was never finished. On the ground floor lies the baptistry, on the second floor is the preparation room for the choir, and on the third floor are the arches and the bells.  

The round holes mark where construction scaffolding still supported the work in progress.  Each of the four arches have a bell.  The bells had ropes to the ground for ringing. The niches harken the saints and indicate a baptistry below.  The bricks at the top never received a final coat of plaster and it is unknown if a dome was intended to sit atop the tower. 

There is a round Mortuary Chapel where ceremonies were held for the dead before they were buried.  

Tumacacori NHP is located near the Santa Cruz River valley and covers 360 acres. It became a historical national park in 1990.  There is an entry fee, but a Senior Pass is accepted.  

Visitor Center and entrance to the park built in 1937 by the CCC.  

After our walk at the park and taking in all the history, we were hungry.  Elvira's was our choice.  Finally after all the years and all the raves I have read about this very unique restaurant, we had a chance to sit and enjoy a nice meal there. 

We each enjoyed grilled flounder on a bed of fresh pineapple with a side of rice...  

and dessert.  Joe had a lava cake with ice cream and I had coconut creme brûlée.

Soooo yummy!

Elvira's offers a nice quiet romantic ambiance...the soft and unusual lighting is so unique. 

So back at the oasis, I planted some flowers.  I had watched a video on potted plants and saw the neatest idea for filling the pot with dirt and flowers. It sure made a typically messy job a lot easier and tidy. 

Take the plant out of the plastic pot you buy it in.  Put enough dirt in the bottom of your pot so that the top of the empty container is even to the top of the pot.

Fill in around the outside of the empty container with potting soil and pack it in.  

After packing in the soil around the empty container, carefully pull the container out of the pot.

And voila...just drop the plant in the space left by the container.  

This even worked for a larger pot with a variety of plants. 

 

A smaller cactus on the plant shelf bloomed last week.  

The color is amazing!

We have a pair of Gilded Flickers.

Mister Gilded

Misses Gilded

The Gila Woodpeckers have been on feeding duty.

And the juvenile Cactus Wren trying to figure out the feeder.

 Lucy has a watermelon...one that blows bubbles.

She has chomped and swatted at the bubbles, but has not chased them yet.

We are adjusting to a summer schedule.  Walks with Lucy are a wee bit earlier,

and coffee and early morning playtime on the patio, feeding the birds and watering the flowers when we get home.

On the east coast, Felix and Edith celebrate the first day of summer vacation with ice cream.

That's a wrap on May.  It was a nice May. Summer is moving in fast and our fingers are crossed for a great monsoon season coming soon.  Until next time,

HAPPY TRAILS!