Arizona in Bits and Pieces part 3

We had a delightful surprise when I heard from a friend and former volunteer at Mass Audubon's Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary where I was volunteer coordinator before retiring.  Mary Lou follows this blog (thanks Mary Lou!), and she and her husband were vacationing in Tucson for a week and wanted to get together.  So we met at the Sabino Canyon Recreation Area visitor center, part of the Coronado National Forest and Santa Catalina Mountains for a hike.  It was so great seeing Mary Lou and Jim!

In addition we did a hike with Harriet on another day.  This is a beautiful spot and we have only explored a small portion of it.  

This recreation area includes Sabino Canyon and Bear Canyon.  In addition to these deep canyons, the mountains soar high here. Diverse plants and wildlife call this area home, and have adapted to the desert environment and blend in with the landscape.  

There are numerous trails and we chose a flat trail leading to Sabino Dam.  Birds seen: Swainson's hawk, American kestrel, mourning dove, greater roadrunner, gila woodpecker, verdin, bushtit, cactus wren, rock wren, blue-gray gnatcatcher, Northern mockingbird, curve-billed thrasher, phainopepla, yellow-rumpled warbler, house finch, lesser goldfinch, song sparrow and house sparrow.

Our purchase!  A Guatemalan woven wall hanging!

On to part 4!