Arizona or the 48th State as many Arizonians like to refer to themselves as, and I have just switched over our streaming TV service from the Toledo area of Ohio to the Phoenix area of Arizona, and that comes with a flood of the different terms and descriptions all that we just left this spring. The area around Phoenix itself is referred to as the valley, then there the three different areas east & west valley, then of course the high country areas which is basically the rest in Arizona. We have fallen in love with Arizona, one of the reasons are the dramatic changes to the landscape in such a short distance, within a couple of hundred miles you can go from skiing just north of Flagstaff in the morning to swimming in your pool in Phoenix before dinner. but because we are in the desert that 77ºF afternoon temperature will likely plunge to 45ºF moments after the sun sets. Which is another reason we love this area, we can be sitting outside sucking some of the winter sunshine at our campsite all afternoon with the coach windows all open wide to keep the temperature in the coach at a reasonable temperature, to closing all the windows and be wearing a sweatshirt as soon as the sun disappears, which is also excellent for sleeping. And as with any metropolitan area in the United States we try to avoid the greater Phoenix area, as there are at least two or three shootings every night that make it onto the local news channels, I remember coming back from Mexico last fall and all of our American friends saying how dangerous it must have been travelling in Mexico, and me saying that we felt safer there than we would in almost any American city. But that is also why we try to camp and boondock away from the major cities and only make the occasional hour long trip for supplies to restock.

Now I know that the whole gun conversation is a slippery slope here in the States, with everyone referring to their second amendment (the right to bare arms) and of course they usually roll out one my favorite’s “guns don’t kill people, people kill people“, to which I say yes, but they kill people with guns. The whole country has lost touch with the fact that there are on average over two mass shootings per day here in the United States of America, whether it is some nutbar who just got fired and is seeking revenge, or a radical that is out to become a martyr for some cause, or the ever popular ex-military personal that in many cases have a larger arms stashes than a lot of small countries. And now the sudden realization that mental illness is the root of the problem, which is obviously factor number one, but making guns available to the mentally ill seems like a bit of a problem from my view. The biggest concern appears to be the unwillingness to see that this as a major problem, when some ones right to bare arms as more important than some ones right to life. I can offer no solution or even an idea to correct the concern but acknowledging that there is a problem would be a great start.

Ok that little rant is over so back to why we love Arizona, anyone that knows Miss Laurie knows she has three major loves first of which would most likely be “Sea Shells” followed closely by “Rocks & Stones” and while there are not a lot of sea shells here in Arizona there is an abundance of rocks and of course there is that whole green thumb thing with her ability to bring so many plants from the cusp of being compost, back to a thriving plant. And every trek into the desert is filled with rock hunting and the amazement of the ability for plants to take root and thrive in this harsh climate. We left the desert in the spring during the most amazing “spring bloom” in many years following one of the wettest winters in years and we returned to the desert after one of the hottest and driest summers in years with the valley recording over 60 days over 100ºF and a monsoon season that was virtually none existent. And yes there were plants that did not survive because of the summer drought, but the majority did survive and as the forecast is for another wet winter we have only had one storm in November and it provided less than a ¼” of rain. As you watch forecasts around the country and they are speaking of rain in inches per storm, here in Arizona they measure their rain fall in hundreds of an inch.

Of course our American friends just completed the celebration of their Thanksgiving which seems to us to be a bigger celebration than Christmas with the celebration being on a Thursday followed by the crazy day that they refer to as “Black Friday“, a term that has even made its way north of the border, and it is normally the biggest shopping day of the year, and that term originated from when retailers start to turn their ledger entries black (profitable) on this day instead of the usual red (loss) entries until this shopping extravaganza. Again too often we had only seen the bad press on this event north of the border when we would hear of people being trampled to death by the early morning crowds. With many of these same deals now being available online the crowds don’t seem as crazy and of course the retailers have also started these sale events earlier in the week as well. Now “Black Friday” is followed by “Cyber Monday” the online shopping day for bargains and this year we heard about “Travel Tuesday” the day for deals on trips and of course American Express promoted “Shop Small Saturday” which was the day to support small business’ in our communities. So far we have not participated in any of these sales, as we always wait for the “Boxing Day” sales (LOL) which is now making appearances in some of the States along the Canadian border.

We have been volunteering at the arboretum and enjoying the beauty of the park, fall colour is something that we grew up with back in Ontario with the brilliant colours, but here in Arizona where there are a limited amount of deciduous trees fall colour is very popular with many visiting the arboretum hunting for colour. The cottonwood trees (which are a close relative to our popular trees) turn a brilliant yellow and while we have trees at the Arboretum from around the world the colours are very limited as compared to the east and west coasts, but there are weekly reports as to what area has the best colours similar to leaf peeper reports back in Ontario. And of course many trees here in the desert never drop their leaves in the fall, and many plants in the desert drop their leaves in the extreme heat times and regrow their leaves in the fall when the sun is less severe. The ability for desert plants to survive has always amazed me from the ability to drop and grow leaves many times per year, or the small size of the leaves that are often waxy feeling, unlike the maple leaves that we grew up with. And because of the elevation and temperature changes Arizona has a huge variety of native trees from the stunted appearing Southern Arizona Mesquite trees to the towering Ponderosa pines of Northern Arizona.

And of course here in the desert most people don’t consider Arizona being a popular kayaking area, but they would be wrong with a surprising number of excellent kayaking areas. There are a number of major rivers that cut through the State, such as the Colorado, Salt, and Gila rivers with Colorado most likely being the most famous having created the Grand Canyon, and being the source water for Lake Powell, Lake Mead, Lake Havasu and Lake Mohave. Within an hour of our location we have Lake Roosevelt, Canyon Lake, Saguaro Lake and the San Carlos Reservoir, and we have kayaked some of the area rivers as well.

The sunrises and sunsets in Arizona are some of the best in the world, whether it is the traditional saguaro cactus silhouette sunset or the mountain backdrop sunset or the reverse sunset painting the mountain faces. Then there are the Arizonan night skies with unlimited stars, made for those stargazers out there, with what is referred to as “dark skies” with no light pollution.

Then there is the yelp of the coyotes on the evenings that we have our windows open, or the chatter of the Gila woodpeckers when they are not tapping on a tree, or the quail that run along the ground in flocks that remind us of the old partridge family show from many years ago. We even occasionally see the elusive roadrunner which surprisingly has so many of the movements and characteristics’ that we had seen from those old cartoons, and it would be an unusual day if we don’t get buzzed by a humming bird or two fighting over their territory. And we have a plethora of bunnies around the arboretum this year, as I’m sitting here typing I can see a bunny out both side windows of the coach and a walk to the visitor center will involve passing at least four every morning. Mister Sam has an endless stream of birds all day long at our birdbath every day, cardinals, finches, thrashers, sparrows, woodpeckers, humming birds about the only bird we don’t see here are the Blue Jays that are so common back home.

We made it to Superior Arizona which will be our home for this winter on the 10th day of November, we have set up camp in the same site as last year. And we are looking forward to volunteering at the arboretum again this year. We are the first visitor center host volunteers to arrive and we landed on Friday and we are working this weekend, which was ok with us, we enjoy our time at the arboretum, and as frustrating as the management seems at times it cannot dampen the beauty of the arboretum. Lynnea our supervisor greeted us and then turned us loose to over the admissions booth, there is new pricing, but other than the price change it’s the same as before.

So lets start with some photos of our first walk through the Arboretum:

After a busy first weekend in the admissions booth we needed some time to unwind and get settled in, we briefly met the other host volunteers, three couples that are working for the education department. We will get a chance to sit and chat with them soon, in the immediate future we are getting a chance to say hello to the staff members that survived the summer, it wasn’t that the summer was so bad, it was just who would survive the now departed director.

Yes there have been many changes in the management structure of the Arboretum, and while most are for the better, while some will leave a large gap to fill, so what has happened? Lets start with the good items, the head of the education has left, a loss that should have been seen as a bonus. The head of maintenance has also left, again a good thing for the Arboretum, hopefully there will more cooperation between departments now. Another major departure was the departure of the director, I think this was the biggest and possibly the best news, in our opinion the director was not an asset to the operation of the Arboretum. On the sad side the huge set of shoes to fill will be the loss of Emily, who wore many hats and wore them all well, she was the volunteer coordinator and the events manager, a wonderful soul that will be missed.

A replacement director has not been selected yet, and there has been some moves within the organization that don’t seem to make sense yet to us but the fallout will show up soon I’m sure. So since the previous director was involved the Arboretum is short a director of horticulture, now we are missing the director of education, a new maintenance manager is in place, and the board of director has turned down most likely the most knowledgeable candidate for the open director position. But other than that everything is well, two of the gardeners are sharing the director of horticulture duties, the education department seem to be in some turmoil yet, and the assistant director seems to be holding the operation together right now. But Lynnea our direct manager is still in charge of the visitor center operations.

So I have to mention the new admission price at the Arboretum, $24.95. My first question was who the hell decided on that price? And of course I was told the previous director and that came as no real surprise. The Arboretum is worth that price or probably more, but $25 would cause far less difficulty at the admission booth. And the web site was deigned for even dollar amounts, so the new pricing on the website looks terrible. I know the reason for this pricing style, which in the olden days was used, and the rational was that $9.99 sounded less expensive than $10. And when a penny actually had value that may have been true, but today its just a one more idea who’s day has passed. It is just one more example of a leader who was not in touch with the world today. So will the previous director be missed? Let me put it this way, not by anyone that really cares about the Arboretum, there may be a few pet supporters but not many.

Our first few weeks of November were a whirlwind of little adventures, like the first Grocery run, the first Costco run (Aw I now have a wee Irish blessing for my coffee each morning), and now we are preparing for the onslaught of Black Friday attendance at the Arboretum usually one of the busiest day of the year. So one of our first real adventures was a trip Casa Grande and visit with Tom, Kathleen and of course their puppy Miss Lucy, we had a a lovely lunch, a couple of beverages and we also got a tour of their co-op. I have never spoke about co-ops in our blog but they are an option for full-timers, Tom & Kathleen are members of Escapees an organization designed for full time RVers that share this lifestyle, and the organization offer many services, like mail forwarding, legal addresses, and also some campgrounds and a number of co-ops around the country where you purchase a “pad” (what we know as a campsite) that you can park your rig on for a season or full time, the pad can be rented to other members of the organization when it is vacant and the income generated is used toward the yearly charges. There are boondocking spots as well in their co-op that members can rent for only $5 per night. Their co-op is located south of Casa Grande near interstate I-8 between Tucson and Gila Bend, what makes the co-op idea interesting is that you get back what you paid plus most site improvements that you have been done if you decide to sell and move on.

Meanwhile back to the Black Friday preparation at the Arboretum, the second visitor center couple has made it to the garden and we are tasked with training them, the problem is that working the Black Friday crowd can be a wee bit intimidating. So the weekend before Black Friday we spent time going over the admission booth procedures, and Tony & Cindy seem to be picking up the process well. I think that management should have had them do some more weekday work before putting all four of us in the booth for one of the busiest admissions days of the whole year. But at the end of the day we had processed over 1800 visitors, an unconfirmed all time record number. You must have heard of the saying “trial by fire“, well by the end of the day we all survived and were still speaking civil to each other. I would call that a success!

So we have made it to the last week of November and I think although there is just two host couples covering the admission booth, I think we have a pretty good team, Laurie and I will be covering a few more hours a week, but we will also cover the busiest weekend days and help out where needed. We have heard that the search for a new director for the Arboretum is down to three candidates. and we also understand that a choice will be made soon. The Arboretum is in excellent shape considering the heat and lack of water over the summer, back in the spring the decision was made to drain the reservoir here at the Arboretum to remove some invasive species and to reseal the concrete dam that forms Ayer Lake. So there was a lack of irrigation water at times during the summer, causing some major damage. The project is nearing conclusion and the reservoir is being refilled now, it is situations like this that prove the disconnect between the horticulture staff and the director on planning and timing on projects that are so essential to the welfare of the Arboretum.

As I close out this blog, we have settled into our winter routine and are enjoying the Arizona sunshine, and yes Miss Laurie is working diligently on increasing her rock collection. There is an abundance of bunnies in the Arboretum and we are hearing of more bobcat sightings in the area. We attempted to get all the volunteers together for a beverage and some conversation but got rained out to early to learn much about our new neighbours. Although there is a potluck dinner has been planned for December.

Arizona Sunshine!

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