Organ Pipe NM

We couldn’t have asked for a better day today. Organ Pipe National Monument has been on JoAnn’s must do list for years and today was the day we got a chance to view part of it.

A large part of the western section of the park is closed due to the killing of a park ranger there several years ago. He was trying to intercept some illegal drugs coming into the country and ran afoul of the mob doing the delivering. There have been reports of gun fire in that sector and it is rumored to be Mexican rivals fighting over drug routes into the states.

We drove by the campground at the NM and drove through it. It has no hook ups but the pads are concrete and the views are great.

Then we took a trail from the group camping area and had a very enjoyable 1.5 mile walk up and down the mountains behind the camping area. After this we drove to another section of the park and had a picnic lunch.

This is one of the few places where the organ pipe cactus will grow. There are jillions of saguaro growing around here though. It feels good to wander out among them.

Then came the fun part. A 21 mile very rough road scenic tour called Ajo Mountain Drive. It was a loop through some very beautiful country and it was fun, but the beating the road gave us took away some of the pleasure.

After that we stopped by the area where there is boondocking near Why. Thanks to Al and Kelly for the info, but we were already camped when we got their email about the boondocking area.

We have no wi-fi here at this park. Al and Kelly set up their web site last year for them, but they need a better antenna for wi-fi and apparently ownership is stalling on that. We think their wi-fi is masking ours. We can barely get our Verizon Card to work and we have to be very patient with it for that to happen.

We will move into Tucson tomorrow and plan to stay at Justin's Diamond J park. We will be in the area for a couple of weeks while Doug does his medical stuff. Then JoAnn will go to Florida for a week or so. Then we will be free to head to the northwest for the summer.

Today's photos are from this morning. The afternoon ones will be published tomorrow.

Mar 30, 2009

Show all 18 photos