Saguaro National Park & Desert Museum

Yesterday Jack and I went down to Tucson to the Saguaro National Park and the Desert Museum. It was a beautiful day to be outside.

We got to the Park around 10:30 and went to the Visitor's Center first to see what we needed to see and get a map. Oh by the way, Jack went to pay the fee and told them he would be 62 in a couple of weeks and they let him get the lifetime card for entrance into all national parks!! See it does pay to be old!! DeAnn, Bruce, Bill and Donna had talked about this card but we weren't familiar with it but now we know. We took the scenic Bajada Loop Drive first. We stopped for a picnic lunch and visited with some people who were originally from Iowa (Iowa City). They have lived in Tucson for many years now so they told us about things to do and see around this area. We saw some beautiful sites on this drive. Here are pictures we took on this drive:

Here is a very large Saguaro cactus - it even makes Jack look little:

After driving through the park, we went on over to the Desert Museum. This was quite a surprise to us. I guess I was expecting a regular museum type setting. Well, how wrong this was! This is more like a zoo and botanical garden, all in one setting. You can see more than 300 animals and 1200 kinds of plants - and all this is in their natural settings. I think that is why it is so impressive.

It is a lot of walking so make sure you wear comfortable shoes, hat, and sunscreen. There are three major sections - you can see the large outdoor animals, i.e, mountain lions, bears, wolves, and deers; then water animals - beavers, otters, & big horn sheep. One of the areas we really enjoyed was the hummingbird area. You could walk right into this area with the hummingbirds flying all around you. We even saw a nest with young ones. You wouldn't believe how small the babies were.

Here are a few of the pictures we took:

This is Javelina - desert pig:

These are some flowers from the Pollination Garden area. Don't remember all the names of them but they were beautiful.

This was a very enjoyable day and we would recommend it to everyone.