Tucson: Outdoor Edition

After leaving our newly beloved first boondocking site at Las Cienegas NCA, we circled the city of Tucson for a few weeks. I say circled because we never really went to the city. When you are in the world’s Covid-19 hotspot while it is the hotspot, you don’t take any chances. Urban streets and museums went unexplored. Breweries and restaurants remained not visited.

However, we did not waste any opportunity to enjoy the area’s parks and trails. Or to spend time with all our new cactus friends. Frenemies?

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We started out in the Tucson Mountains west of the city at Gilbert Ray Campground, inside Pima County’s Tucson Mountain Park. It’s an electric-only campground, so we were still getting practice conserving water. There were a lot of still working full-time RVers, like us, staying in this park. We felt a bit normalized for choosing this lifestyle. The only negative thing was the 7-day limit.

The 5 mile Brown Mountain Loop trail was across the street from the campground so we hiked it multiple afternoons after work. It is also a popular mountain biking trail for people braver than us. The Chainfruit Cholla, also known as Jumping Cholla, reproduces by grabbing onto animals or ungraceful mountain bikers like us and hitching a ride.

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We visited both Saguaro National Park East and West districts. The only place in the world that the Saguaro Cactus, pronounced sa-WAH-row, grows is here in the Sonoran Desert. It can take them 50-100 years to grow their first arms, depending on rainfall. Adults can reach 50ft tall and live for 200 years.

After Gilbert Ray, we moved to Desert Trails RV Park for a couple of days, to utilize their laundry facilities and full hookups. After nearly a month of “navy” showers, we were ready to run the hot water tank out. Our first impression was horror, being squished like sardines between other RVs. But by the time we left, we realized it was a gem of a park. A magical place where food trucks, propane trucks, and bike repair shops appeared every day, just in case you needed them.

We did visit the San Xavier del Bac Mission, founded by an Italian Jesuit in 1692. 75 years later, the Jesuits had been replaced by Franciscans and this church was constructed. It’s the oldest European structure in Arizona. They were also being very Covid cautious so we only walked around the outside.

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We went to the Sabino Canyon National Recreation Area where we hiked the highly rated Seven Falls Trail through the rocky gorge of Bear Canyon. We agreed that it was one of the best trails we’ve ever done.

We moved again, this time to the Santa Catalina Mountains northeast of Tucson. We scored a last-minute spot in the Ringtail overflow lot at Catalina State Park! This is a highly coveted state park, to stay in an actual campsite during January you have to stalk the reservation website a year in advance. We’ve stopped making advanced plans since they seem to get canceled due to pandemics, insurance claims, or weather events resulting in lost reservation fees. Overflow lots will work for us!

Sadly, we were not able to do the state park’s best hike, to the Romero Pools. The trail was still closed due to the Bighorn Fire that burned 120,000 acres of the Catalinas this past summer.

We hiked the Canyon Loop Trail instead which still made us happy because we found our first crested saguaro. This unique shape is caused by a mutation where the cells divide outward instead of in the normal circular pattern.

We also did the obligatory drive up to the top of Mt Lemmon, the highest peak in the Catalinas. From a climate perspective (temperature and precipitation), this was like driving from Mexico to Canada in an hour. It was an hour of stunning views but what really made this drive was listening to the Mt Lemmon Science Tour made by the University of Arizona. We learned that the Tucson Mountains, where we had been previously staying, used to be on top of the Catalinas and slid off, landing in their current location!

We learned so much from the podcast that we worked up an appetite to try the famous Sonoran Dog from El Guero Canelo. A lovely Tucson specialty of a bacon-wrapped hotdog topped with pintos, tomato, and onion.

On our last day here we finally mustered up enough courage to try an MTB trail in cactus land. We took the 50-Mile Trail to the Chutes. The Chutes were really fun, but clearly above our skill level as I walked part of them and one crazy jump took Michael out. Thankfully, he just lost some skin. And did not land in a cactus.

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