February 8

We went for a ride to Lukeville, AZ, this morning, to scout a restaurant with wifi and have some breakfast.  Every highway we’ve been on south of the I-10 has had border patrol check points stopping all traffic, so when I saw the one at Lukeville, I almost stayed in line.  Nancy pointed out that it was the Mexican border.  Oops!  Turns out Lukeville consists of a gas station and a post office, and little else.  We priced insurance at the gas station, for the Accord to go down to Puerto Penasco, SON for a day trip tomorrow and check out the campgrounds.  I was hoping to price insurance online to see what a competitive price looked like, but the nearest data/wifi is Ajo, 30 miles north. Ajo is Spanish for garlic, but it’s also Tohono for copper-coloured.  Turns out Ajo had a dirty great copper smelter for many moons, closed now.

The other weird thing I noticed is that suddenly neither of my GPS’s will find nor calculate routes to destinations in Mexico, even though they come up in the data base.  At home in Manitoba they both calculated Mx destinations with ease.  I am supposing the US border types have a nanny on the satellite signal locally, to prevent baddies from using GPS to circumnavigate the border.

Saguaro roots

Back from adventures in Lukeville, Nancy, Kirk, and I went for a morning drive on the North Puerto Blanco Drive, as far as you could 2-wheel it.  There were stops along the way with interpretive signage, and a picnic area at the turn around.  It was another 70F windless morning with nary a cloud in the sky.  The otherworldly scenery was spectacular.  

Against sage advice, Nancy and Kirkly headed off on a hike at 11:30 am, just as the heat was coming on.  Several hours later, they dragged back into camp, vowing (again) not to head out in the noon day sun.  (Only mad dogs and Englishmen, etc; or in this case, little dogs and Ukranians).  They both drank a lot of water and flopped in the shade.

Nancy picked up a vegetation key, so we could start distinguishing the increasing diversity of desert plants.  Her bird bag for the day was the Rock Wren and Verdin.