Saguaro National Park

 Early Saturday morning, our home got a washing and its anual wax. A great job by Xtreme Power Washing owned and operated by Jason Riker. He, along with his wife, daughter, son and friend completed the job in about 3 hours...well worth the reasonable dollars he charged...Thank you!










It was the nicest day we have had here in Tucson. A great day for a scooter ride. We headed for the Saguaro National Park via "no major highways". My first up close and personal experience with the desert and saguaro cacti....a real treat!


Saguaros are found exclusively in the Sonoran Desert. It is estimated that they live as much as 150-200 years old.









That's Joe (the above picture). He stands 6'2" tall so we figured this saguaro is about 35' tall. They are very slow growing cactus. A 10 year old plant might only be 1.5 INCHES tall ! They can grow to be 60 feet tall and weigh between 3200 - 4800 pounds.



This is me (on the left)...the saguaro is the largest cactus in the world!



I did read that a saguaro can be 75 - 100 years old before it grows its first arm.  

Saguaro National Park has two districts located on the east and west side of Tucson about 20 miles apart. The western section (Tucson Mountain) is 15 miles from the city and is smaller than the east section. We only rode through this section on Saturday since we got a late start.

The cactus is supported by 12 to 30 internal woody ribs which can be used to build roofs, fences, and parts of furniture.

The Taylors had a great week-end....hope you did as well. Thank you for your comments and for visiting our blog. Enjoy yourselves and as we say back in GA ..."y'all come back soon !"

The side step!

We love the doggie park here. It's plenty big enough for ball throwing and has fresh water with a bowl and scrubbing brush if the bowl gets dirty.  There were 11 pups at the park yesterday and we had a great time!

This is what our living space looks like! Way cozy......

Well...here we are in Tucson...all snuggly, but not so warm! We arrived in Tucson last Thursday for what we thought would be a week. We had an appointment to have the motorhome serviced on the following Monday. We checked in, pulled to site 1385 and just like always started the routine of setting up.  I turned the key to unlock the slides and out went the small bedroom slide. But when I pressed the button for the main slide...it was dead!  So all week-end we had a great opportunity to perfect the side step! Today was the day...our appointment was at 9:00am. The oil is changed and the bus is running good, but we are still perfecting the side step. It turns out we need a new motor for the slide which has to be built and then shipped here...about 5 to 6 days. So, our week long stay here has turned into a 2 week stay. Joe and I have just about mastered the side step and feel like we will certainly have it down pat by the time we leave here. Wrecks, on the other hand, is having some difficulty getting around, Sally is scared of the electric heater that has to be in the middle of the floor and will not  walk past it,  and Dover and Jack have adjusted nicely taking care of themselves! One good note...The weather is about to change. The forcast calls for one more chilly day and then it should be warming up. YEAH!!!!