I Am A Slacker

Actually, I am besmirching myself unfairly.  It's just that I didn't start on any of the things on my To Do List until 4 o'clock this afternoon.... and the things on the list were important things.  Things which needed to be done.  Today.  Things which could not be put off until tomorrow for a variety of important reasons.  Things like writing The Burrow so that you could sip your morning coffee and read it.  

Instead of working on the newsletter or reading El Cid or wrapping holiday presents for the caregivers in the pod-castle (which, in all honesty, can wait to be done tomorrow) or making sure that there were milk and eggs and Diet Coke for Big Cuter's arrival tonight, today I hiked.

The Happy Ladies' Club has spawned a plenitude of groups which cover ground on foot.  Some walk on on city sidewalks, some take flat, short trips on easy terrain, and some of us hike.  Today there were four of us and our intrepid guide, Mme. Hiker's long-suffering husband, Monsieur H.  We met at 8am in the parking lot to carpool to the

and the Coronado National Forest.

What, you say?  A forest?  I thought this was the desert.  And yet there are many forests here in Arizona, and one of them happens to be about 30 minutes from my home.  In the 1930's the CCC built a road 3.8 miles up into the canyon, a road on which the tram wends its way

from the visitor's center to Stop Number 9.  From there, we 5 departed and began our climb up switchbacks and across boulders and between giant slabs of stone and along the edge of a drop-off none of us wished to explore any more closely than from the path.  Miss Marjorie tried to careen down it head first, but luck and her poles and her palms precluded that particular adventure.  I wish I had a photo of her knee; the pants didn't rip but I have to believe that her bruise is all the colors of the rainbow right now.  

The tram ride was breezy and cold, but we folded our fleece the moment we alighted.  We have the weather the rest of you desire - 80's and sunny with a slight breeze to keep you cool enough.  It was 2.5 miles to the place we stopped the first time we did this hike, and another mile to the raging-river-which-is-now-a-gently-flowing-brook which thwarted Miss Marjorie and me last spring, and then another half mile or so to our destination, Hutch's Pool

The deep blue in the foreground is the reflection of the sky.  The water itself is that which is reflecting the branches and the rock faces back up at us.  There are waterfalls at the very end of the cove, but my Nikon was, again, thwarted.  Monsieur H had his super deluxe Sony with him and, perhaps, he'll share some that I can post anon.  For now, imagine 5 hungry and footsore travelers, one with a finger swelling more and more by the second, sitting in the shade of the sycamore tree and its gigantic falling leaves.  The water was cool and shallow and feet and fingers were soaked and frozen and refreshed and then it was time to walk back.

There really are seasons here.  I took some photos to prove it to you.  Scroll down for a snippet of autumn in the desert.

And then, there was the moon

Can't you see why I couldn't look at that list?  This was just so much more fun.