I just flew in from Arizona this morning, and man are my arms tired...
While the rest of Minnesota was stuck in the deep freeze last week I was enjoying the sun and 70+ degree weather in Southern Arizona. My parents invited me out to visit and do some sightseeing. I managed to take 12 rolls of color and 5 rolls of black and white photos in 7 days. Just to make all of you jealous, I've posted my favorites form the 10 rolls I've already got developed. I've got photos of the Casa Grande Ruins, Saguaro National Park, the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, the Apache Trail, Tortilla Flat, Besh-Ba-Gowah ruins, the Pima Air and Space Museum, and Mission San Xavier Del Bac. I'm still kicking myself for not taking my camera into Organ Stop Pizza. The pizza's nothing to write home about, but that's not why people go there. They go to see and hear the world's largest theatre organ. Words and pictures can't do this thing justice. It is massive, and the largest pipes are so deep they are felt more than heard.
I've also got a few pictures I need help with. I got a few pictures of planes at the air museum I can't identify. My dad's an Air Force vet so I've ID 'd all the Army Air Corp and Air Force planes, but there's a few Navy planes I can't ID. If you know what they are please let me know.


This is the Casa Grande. It's about 700 years old and four stories tall. In reference, the guy in the tan hat and green jacket is my dad. He's 6'2" and standing about 200-300 feet away from the building and he's not at ground level. Archaeologists backfilled all the ruins at the monument to protect what's left of them. The current ground level is roughly four feet above what would have been ground level when the site was occupied.

Another view of Casa Grande. Again, those are the tops of walls you're seeing in the foreground.

Look carefully at the hill in the middle of the picture. The C on the side of the hill stands for Coolidge and is a navigational marker that was used in the early days of aviation to identify towns. You'll find them outside a lot of towns in Arizona.

This is the Palo Verde tree. Yes, it really is a tree and the bark really is green.

This is probably the most messed up looking cactus I saw the entire trip. My mom's best friend and I made my dad stop so we could take pictures of it.

And this is the friendliest plant in the Southwest. It's called the Jumping Cholla and it wants to come home with you. And if you get too close part of it will.

See the pretty birdies? Those are Harris Hawks and they live at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum outside of Tucson. They're part of a family group of three males and one alpha female that live at the museum and are let out for free flights twice a day during the winter. These hawks literally get within arms reach of the crowd. It really is an amazing experience.

This is one of the males. The snag he's perched on is about ten feet from where I was standing.

And this is a cactus wren perched in an ocatella cactus.

The desert museums Ocelot. He's having a nap at the moment.

Can you see the kitty in this picture?

And this fellow was mugging for the cameras.

The very endangered Mexican Wolf.

Prairie Dog butt ;>

This is a river otter. They actually are native to the Sonoran desert. Needless to say, they are nearly extinct in Arizona.

For some reason they call this an Organ Pipe Cactus. I can't figure out why...

A Joshua Tree. Which isn't actually a tree at all. All the pictures between this one and the hawks were taken at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. I highly recommend visiting it.

And this is lovely Tortilla Flats, AZ (pop. 6). It's the remains of an old stagecoach stop along the Apache Trail in the Superstition Mountains. It's very much a tourist trap, but it's fun, free, and they do a good hamburger out on the patio next to the saloon. I'm not entirely certain, but the town might still be for sale.

A previous owner started the tradition of tacking dollar bills up to the walls. It, and the bills, stuck.

More of the Superstition Mountains, showing the colors of the rocks. The Superstitions are the alleged site of the legendary Lost Dutchman mine. The Apache trail follows an old stagecoach route through the superstitions from Mesa to Globe. The scenery is incredible, but half the route is a very narrow, steep, and curvy dirt road, and all the bridges are one lane, so drive with caution.

Rock formations and the amazingly blue sky. The only thing I did to this photo was re-size it. The rocks and sky really were that vivid.

This was a rare sight: a streambed with water in it. This is Fish Creek under the scary one lane bridge.

The canyon Fish Creek made in the Superstitions. And this was all right along the road.

The light here turned my mind to goo.

This is Besh-Ba-Gowah, a partially reconstructed pueblo in the town of Globe. It was abandoned about the same time the Casa Grande Ruins were; roughly a century before the Spanish reached the area.

The ruins are located in a city park and are fairly cheap to visit. They also have a small museum and botanical garden included in the admission. It's worth an hour or two.

Read the sign. This is officially the coolest cactus ever.

Tequila fans take note: Tequila is made from this plant, the Blue Agave.

And on to the Pima Air and Space Museum. It's south of Tucson next to the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. This is a must see for anyone who likes planes or military history. The plane above is a VC 118. It served as Air Force One to presidents Kennedy and Johnson.

And this is a C-121 Constellation. This particular one is named Columbine and was General Eisenhower's personal transport.

B-17 Bomber "I'll Be Around" The old folk in front of it are my parents.

B-24 Bomber "Bungay Buckaroo" Three guesses as to who the person next to it is.

B-29 Bomber "Sentimental Journey" The guy in stripes is my dad, who can actually remember when these things were in service.

Here fishy fishy... This is the B-377SB Super Guppy. Cute little thing, isn't it?

The F-11 Tiger. This one was flown by the Blue Angels stunt team until it was retired.

Want a few Migs? Here's six of them. The yellow plane in front is a Navy seaplane named the Petulant Porpoise.

And here's my personal favorite: The SR-71 Blackbird. Unfortunately the new hangar it's located in is still under construction so I wasn't able to get a good look at it or touch it :..(

The Air Museum offers a bus tour of the bone yard at the Air Force base. This is where the Air Force, Navy, Guard, and Reserve send their excess or outdated planes to be stored or scrapped. They strongly recommend calling ahead to make reservations for the tour, which is very much worth the effort.

This is where I need some help. This is one of two F4 Phantoms they have that were flown by a Vietnam War Ace. I can't remember who he was. If you have any idea, or know anyone who might, let me know.

This is another one I need help with. It's a Navy early warning plane, but I don't know which one.

I also need help identifying the prop driven planes in the back of this pic. They're Navy planes, and since there are quite a few stored here they may still be in use. I think the name start with an S.

This odd looking thing is called the YC-14. It's one of only two in existence (the other is in the museum). This and the plane next to it were built in an attempt to find a jet to replace the four engine prop planes the armed forces currently use as cargo planes. They failed.

Want a tweety bird? These are T37 tweets -retired training jets. These are all for sale, and they're apparently fun little toys for rich fly-boys to play with.

And here we have a herd of Warthogs. These A-10's are all in to have their wings re-done. The white stuff you see on all the planes here is a spray coating used to cover the glass and all openings to keep internal temperature down in the stored planes and to keep dust and water out.

And these C-141's are in the other part of the yard - The final disposition yard where they go to be scrapped or stripped for parts.

This is Mission San Xavier Del Bac. It's an active parish church located on reservation land south of Tucson. It's a beautiful church, and the painting and sculpture inside is amazing, especially considering that this is an original Jesuit mission church built in the 1600's. The church is free to visit, but donations or souvenir purchases are much needed to fund the ongoing restoration and to repair damage done by vandals a few years ago.

A shot of the dome and part of the altarpiece. This is one of the few shots that turned out. The church is not well lit, and although they don't forbid it, it's not a good idea to use flash around old paintings.

The altar and part of one of the transepts. The color in here has to be seen to be believed.

I've got 7 more rolls left to process, so I'll post those when I get them back. If you want to see more of something or have a desktop made of anything let me know. I took three and a half rolls at the air museum alone, so there's lots more of these.