Month: June 2016

Bob and I had our first minor “crisis” of our house sit tour last week when the AC decided it had had enough of the super hot conditions and decided to retire prematurely.  It apparently wasn’t alone, as it took a few calls to find someone that could come out the next day to see what the issue was.  It took the better part of the day to get the issue resolved, but all is well and we’re as “cool” as ever — no worries there.

In other news, we have been watching the AZ Wildcats advance in Omaha, and have confirmed house sit commitments through the beginning of November.  Following our time here, we will fly to Portugal in early September for a 3 week house sit in Olhao, Portugal (southern part of country — near Faro), then we will head to France for a 2 week house sit in Souillac (near Toulouse) and then to Belgium for a 10 day sit in Boitsfort (suburb of Brussels).  Woo Hoo!

Also, we have been seeing some more of the southern Arizona area. . .

We did another urban adventure in Tucson, this time we took the short ride on their street car (for $4 you can ride it all day, but it basically goes from the mercado area just west of the city center, through the 4th street district downtown, and the university) as well as walked.  We found some more big head photo ops for Bob, got a personal tour of the postal museum, and then drove up Sentinel Peak (“A” Mountain) to get a great view of the town as well as the UofA “A” that gets painted white each year by the students.

We suffered through one of the worst tours ever to get to the Whipple Observatory atop one of the mountains outside of Green Valley.  The tour started at 9 am with a couple of films and ended a little before 3 after mostly a slow slog up (and then back down) the mountain by bus.  The road was narrow, windy, and sometimes paved and sometimes not.  We stopped at a couple of different types of telescopes which I still don’t know too much about.  We had a picnic lunch (which we each brought) at our 2nd stop before we were hauled in smaller groups by SUV to the top telescope.  The views at the top were great as well as the views on the way up and down (if you could deal with looking out).  Note to tour guides:  formally introduce yourself, the name and importance of the facility being toured, and what will happen during the tour.  Have fun facts to highlight on bus ride and try to talk to the whole tour group when off of the bus.  (Maybe I’ve found my next career?)

Our find of the stay so far though has to be the cute town of Bisbee.  It is about a 2 hour drive southeast of here.  It is located about a mile up in the Mule Mountains, but you drive down into it and their are steps all over town to help you get from one level to the other.  It definitely has an Austiny ” keep it weird” vibe.  We plan to go back.

Well in terms of northern, everything is relative right?  But, when Bob and I aren’t headed south on Hwy 19 towards Nogales, we’re headed north to Tucson.  Tucson is an easy 30 min plus drive from Green Valley.  Tucson is the county seat of Pima County in which Green Valley is also located.  The city has a population of approximately 530,000 with the metro area being a little over 1 million.  However, it feels smaller as there are very few tall buildings and the linear street layout makes it pretty easy to negotiate.

To date, we have explored the U of A campus (we’re rooting for the Wildcats in the College World Series), walked the turquoise trail around town to see many buildings of historical importance, the impressive Pima Air and Space Museum, drove up lovely Mt. Lemmon to escape into cooler climbs, and returned to Westin Las Paloma’s Spa and Resort where we had stayed years ago after Bob completed a conference there for work.

Mount Lemmon is a mountain just north of Tucson.  The drive up is part of the Sky Island Scenic byway.  We drove to the top of the ski lift to enjoy great views and MUCH cooler temps.

Bob and I had a hot 2 hour walk around downtown Tucson following the Turquoise Trail to see many of its historic buildings.  The walk provided us with a much better feel for the city.  We were most impressed with the courthouse, many lovely restaurants along Congress and Broadway, as well as a couple of markets and a fun Hotel Congress.

We are having a record-breaking June here in Arizona.  It’s not just the fires that are hot.  We are to get to 115 or 116 tomorrow (120 or so in Phoenix) which hasn’t happened here in 20+ years.  Bob is taking all of the credit.

Regardless of temps, however, we are continuing to explore this little corner of the world.  Generally, when we travel here we hop onto Highway 19 — either south towards Nogales or north towards Tucson.  This post covers our southern explorations to date.  (Side note and rare fun transportation fact:  Highway 19 was built when the US was considering adopting the metric system so travel distances listed on road signs are listed in kilometers and not miles.  This is what you get for being proactive.)

Anyhoo, I’m not sure the rest of this post will top that fun fact, but here goes. . .  We have not yet ventured south all the way to Nogales, but we have checked out some natural wildlife areas, state parks, and cute wine and art areas south of Green Valley.  Going south always means that we will hit a border check stop on the way back.  A couple of the places that we have visited sound like we have made it as far south as Argentina.

We arrived in Green Valley, AZ, on Memorial Day and were greeted warmly by the home owners and their two dogs — Molly and Maya.  We have been even more warmly welcomed by Mother Nature, as a day or two after our arrival it hit triple digits for the first time this year and is projected to be 111 or 112 for the next few days.  We are some serious hot tamales!

See Molly and Maya below.

Molly peeking over the end table.

Maya relaxing of top of the sofa.

Our hosts have made it very easy for us here for our three-month stay.  In addition to their lovely home and yard, we have use of their bikes (which we are using!) and access to their recreation centers.  They also left us with a wealth of travel information, coupons for local restaurants and cafes, and introduced us to some of the neighbors.  We have subscribed to a local paper and obtained library cards for the public library system.  We are starting to feel like locals — especially as we are waking up early with the sun and to get a run in and walk the dogs before the heat of the day kicks in.

We have also begun to explore the local area — by foot, car, and bike.  It’s an interesting location with a strong Native American, Mexican, military, and mining history as well as some lovely natural areas and wine regions.

Mission San Xavier del Bac. This was built by Franciscan monks when this part of AZ was part of Mexico.

Inside the chapel

Hiking the Old Baldy Loop at Madera Canyon

Scenes from a bike trip to a bike trail around a new community and fishing lake in the nearby town of Sahuarita.  Many of the roads here have a biking lane, so it’s a fairly bike friendly area.  You just need to be okay about biking in an oven!