Arizona Spring Trip

California and Arizona

We are on the road again, this time by a more conventional method of transport: truck and trailer. We left home on March 14 and traveled south on I5. We had rain, snow on the passes and wind. We spent the first two nights in route at Harvest Host members. The first night was at Edenvale Winery near Medford, Oregon and the second night was spent at Chico Rice Farm near Willows, California.

Our first camping destination was Pinnacles National Park south of the Bay Area and kind of in the middle of nowhere. This was our first time here. It is a beautiful park and was quite green because of recent rain.  We took lots of nice hikes and even went through a cave on one. We saw lots of birds including tons of acorn woodpeckers and California quails and were very happy to see 2 California condors. They have been introduced to the area and are doing very well.

On March 19, we had a long drive south and east across California to Joshua Tree National Park where we camped at Black Rock Campground. We spent 2 very nice days taking hikes at various areas of the park The rock formations at Joshua Tree are so neat and the Joshua trees are so unusual. Many of them were starting to bloom. Our best bird find here was a Scott’s oriole.

After leaving Joshua Tree, we went south and east into Arizona and spent 1 night at White Tank Mountain Regional Park on the west side of Phoenix. The next morning we took a hike before packing up and heading down to Tucson and Catalina State Park where we stayed for a week.

We were very fortunate to be camped next to the campground hosts who had lots of bird feeders out so we had a great time watching all the birds feeding and hanging out. We saw many cardinals, vermillion flycatchers, sparrows, gila woodpeckers, ladder back woodpeckers, hummingbirds and the occasional coopers hawk dashing in to see if he could get dinner. Almost every night we saw one or two great horned owls on trees around the campground.

We did a lot of our favorite things while in Tucson. We took a lovely hike at Sabino Canyon Recreation Area on the east side of Tucson and followed that with lunch at one of our favorite restaurants : El Charro Cafe Ventura. Tuesday, March 25, was our warmest day so far and we visited beautiful Tohono Chul Gardens. Wednesday, we took a guided bird walk at the state park. Our guides were very good and we saw 19  different species, but they were disappointed at how few birds we saw. It is very dry here and they think that may be part of the reason.

On Thursday, we took an excursion south to Madera Canyon Receation Area. The area is up at 5,000 ft, so the vegetation is much different than Tucson and the temperature is about 10 degrees cooler. We took two hikes here.  It is a well known birding and we saw 15 different species. Some of our favorites were painted red starts, hepatic tanagers, wild turkeys, Mexican jays, Arizona woodpeckers and red naped sapsuckers as well as many hummingbirds.

Hepatic Tananger

Broad-billed Hummingbird

Painted Redstart

Friday, we rode our bikes 20.1 miles on the Tucson Loop, Oro Valley section near our campground. It is a very nice multi-use path and people of all ages were biking on it. We were pretty tired when we got back to our truck but it was a very nice ride.

Saturday, our last full day in Tucson, we took a walk on trails in the state park. Then we decided to check out some birding spots that we had never been to before. The first place we went to was El Rio Preserve. It was a little manmade lake and we saw quite a few birds and water fowl. My favorite place was Sweetwater Wetlands part of a water treatment facility. It was so green and had lots of birds including stilts, a sora, American wigeons, red head ducks, a snowy egret and lots more.

Sweetwater Wetlands

Vermillion Flycatcher

Gambles Quail

Coopers Hawk

Black-necked Stilt

Sora

We had a wonderful stay in Tucson, but Sunday, March 30 was time to go, and we headed 1 hour and 45 minutes south to Patagonia Lake State Park where we are staying for 10 days, but more about that next time.