HONEYMOON IN ARIZONA |
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For our Honeymoon, my husband and I took a road trip through Southern Arizona to visit National Parks and Monuments. We managed to fit in seven in as many days and had an amazing time doing it. We spent a day driving from our home in San Diego to Arizona and stopped to visit some crazy sights along the way. Along Interstate 8 before you even get to Arizona, you find yourself in the Center of the World in Felicity, California. This was a very nutty place. You can read more about it here. We also made a stop at the Desert Tower in Jacumba, California. This is part museum, part hiking area, and very unusual. I think kids would love hiking around in the painted and carved rocks - we sure did! We made it to Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument and Biosphere Reserve after dark and we set up our tent for our first night of camping - ever.
~our first night of camping, in Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument |
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After visiting the Visitor Center and Museum the next morning, we spent the early part of the day hiking and sightseeing through the park. The Organ Pipe Cactus is only found native to the Sonoran Desert area, specifically in this park and south of it into Mexico. We enjoyed a day of hiking and exploring the amazing cacti. From there we headed to Tucson for the night. We had dinner at a local famous restaurant, El Charro Cafe, where I tried one of the house specialties, the Carne Seca and then was introduced to desert tamasles! WOW! I like tamales, but this pumpkin confection was fantastic. We spent that night in a jacuzzi suite in local inn - I guess you could call it our Honeymoon Suite! They upgraded us to it because after we called to see if they had a jacuzzi, it ended up being broken, so they put us in the jacuzzi suite. It was fun being able to drink a beer in the jacuzzi while watching movies!
Surrounding Tucson is Saguaro National Park. It is actually split into two sections and we visited only the Tucson Mountain District. I will tell you that the audio-visual program there is one of the most breathtaking of any I have seen, but I'm not going to spoil it for you by telling you why! Just don't miss it when you have the chance to stop at the visitor center there. It was really amazing wandering through the forests of Saguaro cacti. They really are fascinating plants and they're so tall! I loved being around them just because it's so alien to me. Alas, we had to be on our way and headed south towards our next destination, Tumacacori National Historic Park.
We did make a stop at the Titan Missile Museum on the way, which was unplanned. But as we were headed south on Interstate 19, we kept seeing signs for it and my husband is an air and space nut so we had to stop. Wow, what a cool experience! If you are in the Tucson area, definitely make time to go deep into the last remaining Titan Missile, left from the cold war alert. It's a piece of history and really interesting to learn about.
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~Photos from the Titan Missile Museum
We made it to Tumacacori in time to tour the whole historic grounds before they closed. Tumacacori is a mission built by the Jesuits and expanded by the Franciscans. It was established in 1691 and is considered to be the oldest mission in Arizona. This Park has an excellent brochure with a self guided tour of the grounds, including detailed information on everything you see. It was very peaceful there and I discovered that we were actually visiting two parks in one as the San Juan Bautista de Anza Trail goes right through there on it's way to San Francisco! I played tour guide and used the brochure to read out loud about all of the extremely old buildings, paintings, writing, etc that we were seeing. National Historic Sites are a fantastic way to learn about the history of our country.
~Photos from Tumacacori | | |
After our visit to Tumacacori, we were off to another night of camping, this time at nearby Patagonia Lake State Park. We spent the evening munching sandwiches and having beers in front of a raging campfire with our tent neighbor. We would have liked to spend some time at the lake as it looks like a great recreation area, but we were only there for the tent space. |
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The following day was a deviation from our National Park crusade and we spent a couple of hours in Tombstone. Yes, Tombstone is a fun stop, but keep in mind, this is a pure tourist trap. If you visit, plan to be nickled and dimed until you realize you've spent a small fortune! But, be sure not to miss the World's Largest Rose Bush! There is one free thing to do in Tombstone, and that is to visit boothill - the graveyard. You can also get nickel beers at Big Nosed Kate's Saloon, probably my favorite place in Tombstone.
~Entering the Queen Mine |
~The Shady Dell & Dot's Diner |
~Inside our trailer
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Fresh from a night in an Airstream (or its equivalent... what do I know about trailers!?!), we backtracked a bit to
It was a lovely place to visit and hike, but we had to be on our way and started off on a long drive to Chiricahua National Monument, where we would be camping again. Chiricahua is beautiful. When you drive the 8-mile scenic drive around the park and hike into the rocks, you find yourself surrounded by amazing rock formations and spires. There are many hikes of varying difficulties that take you to see the beautiful formations. We really loved this park and hiked through the rocks until sunset. We visited the park's Faraway Ranch, an old homestead that became a guest ranch for many years, in the morning before moving on to Fort Bowie National Historic Site.
Fort Bowie is not a National Park for the faint of heart or short of breath. You must hike in a mile and half to even get to the fort. I definitely recommend it, though, as it is a really nice site and there is a lot of history to be learned about the fight between the military trying to forge west and the Apaches trying to preserve their lands and way of life. Most of what is left is in ruins now, but the ruins are being preserved and the layout of the fort and what the ruins likely were is all provided to you in the park brochure. Plan to spend most of a day there and bring a LOT of water! You'll enjoy several sites, or I should say remains of sites, along the trail to the fort, as well. |
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The last park we visited on our road trip was the mysterious Casa Grande Ruins (The Big House) which is really something to see. The main site is a three story building that was built in pre-historic times and it is unknown what happened to the people known as the Hohokam who are believed to inhabit the area 500-600 years ago. In more modern times, a roof of a sort has been erected over the ruins to help protect them from the elements, so you can actually see what is left of this amazing structure.
We've visited most of the parks in Arizona now. We've added some others since this trip and I had visited some previously. I think the next thing we need to do is plan a trip to the Grand Canyon. I'm hoping that will include a trip to the bottom of the canyon and maybe even some rafting!
Some of you might notice that this article looks a little familiar and in fact, I did previously publish another version of it, but that was before my Road Trippin' The USA Column got underway and I really thought this should be a part of that column. I hope you enjoyed reading the updated version.
Jennifer St.Antoine, Gather Travel Correspondent
Jennifer's column, Road Trippin' The USA is published every Friday on Gather Essentials: Travel.Opposite Fridays of her Road Trippin' The USA: Eight Weeks Across America column, Jennifer will chronicle her other experiences on America's roads, including recommendations and warning for places to see, stay and eat.
You can find all of Jennifer's Road Trippin' the USA articles at www.gather.com/roadtrippintheusa or in Jennifer's Gather Group Road Trippin' the USA. You can keep up with all of Jennifer's articles and her other Gather activity by joining her Gather network. Just click here: ladyjadegd.gather.com and select the orange CONNECT button on the left side of the page.
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Comments: 10
It was a really amazing trip: fun and educational and well, it WAS my honeymoon!!! =)