Tombstone and Mt. Lemmon

Our next stop was Tombstone, where we enjoyed the Tombstone Western Heritage Museum, a private museum owned by Stephen and Marge Elliott. When we told him we were from Pennsylvania, Stephen said that Steve Reed was his best customer ever, spending over $1,000,000 at once. (While Mr. Elliott didn't know it, that purchase was probably one of the reasons Steve Reed was voted out last fall as the mayor of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania's capital.) The museum was loaded with artifacts, including pictures, letters, newspapers, guns, jewelry, and even rocks from Wyatt Earp's last mining camp. Pictures are not allowed to be taken in the museum, but these signs provide a taste of what can be seen there:




Stephen and Marge Elliott also own the Silver Lady Antiques shop:


This street is closed to automotive traffic:






The Tombstone Courthouse is now a state park. It was built in 1882 and was the Cochise County courthouse for a few years until the county seat was moved to Bisbee.




Tombstone welcomes dogs:


Inside the Tombstone Epitaph, a newspaper which has been published continuously since the 1880s. Just an old softy?


Think again!


The Boothill Cemetery grave of a man mistakenly convicted and hanged in Tombstone:


The graves of Billy Clanton, Frank McLaury and Tom McLaury, who were killed at the OK Corral on October 26, 1881:


Mt. Lemmon looms over Tucson. In the time it takes to drive the 22 miles to its peak, the landscape changes from scorching desert to snow-covered pine forest!

Overlooking Tucson from a low point on Mt. Lemmon:


The Seven Cataracts (waterfalls) on Mt. Lemmon:


The top two waterfalls:


Sometime in the past, a van went over the side and into the canyon at the Seven Cataracts:


Hoodoos on Mt. Lemmon:






A Mexican jay on Mt. Lemmon:






A Beaudry neighbor climbing to his roof to photograph the March 29th sunset:




The Beaudry RV Resort is beautifully landscaped with cacti, yellow noisette roses, oleander, bottle brush trees, and citrus trees. Everyone is urged to collect as much fruit as they can use, so we froze lots of lemon juice!

Holbrook to Tucson

After taking in the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest National Park, we stayed the night in the OK RV Park in Holbrook, Arizona. It had been a regular mobile home park sometime in the past and had extra deep, narrow lots.


We left Holbrook on the morning of March 17th and headed to Tucson on US-60 West through gorgeous country full of canyons. The steep climbs and descents showcased a wide variety of formations and vegetation, from badlands with hardly any growth to flatlands with wildflowers to bare peaks, slopes with pines, and peaks with junipers.








Cemeteries seemed to be given much more attention than at home.


These totem-like formations in the Tonto National Forest are called hoodoos.




On the other side of this bridge, which crosses the Salt River and spans the Salt River Canyon, we entered the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation and left behind the Fort Apache Indian Reservation.


The first Giant Saguaros we saw!






We pulled off the road to enjoy a beautiful array of wildflowers.


Possibly Red Maids:


Possibly Mexican Gold Poppy:


Teddybear cholla:


Desert Marigold, with tiny little yellow flowers below:




The purple-pink tube flowers are possibly a type of toadflax:


Lovely variety of cacti behind the wildflowers, including cholla (grayish, short, multi-branched cactus on the left), ocotillo behind a prickly pear, and Giant Saguaro: