Holiday Greetings

Merry Christmas to everyone. We have stocked up and have a small pre-stuffed Costco turkey roast and veggies in the freezer for dinner and sausage, panettone, and fresh raspberries for breakfast and are ready to mark the day. While we miss everyone and the holiday festivities we are happy to be trying something new. Now that Roger is on the mend we have left our holding spot near the Tucson airport and have moved southwest to Organ Pipe National Monument just 3 miles from the Mexican border between Yuma and Tucson. We have gone as far south as we can to try to get some warmth. Days are not too bad but the last few weeks have been down to freezing or below at night. We looked at the jet stream and you Washington folks with your 'driest December on record' are hogging the high pressure and sending cold air over the top of you where it picks up more arctic cold and and then blasts down through Montana and Utah to us, or it is sending Pacific storms under you and directly at us for some heavy rains and windy days. This has got to stop! We hear that our turn will come this next week so you guys will be back to normal and we may have our warm winter fantasy returned to a possibility.

In the meantime this place is really a green desert, if that is possible. Actual grass coming up in tiny little shoots under the cactus. We thought the Organ Pipe Cactus was named for their spires coming out of the ground kinda clumped up looking like pipes out of an organ but we were wrong. It is actually because their spines and shape cause the wind to whistle over them and make noise. Sounds a little like someone blowing over the top of a pop bottle, or over the tops of many pop bottles in a little chorus. Since it has been windy the last 36 hours it has been really interesting to be out walking around.

On the bad side we are just miles from the Mexican border and can see "The Wall" and have been advised to stick to trails and be aware of our surroundings and not go into 'closed' areas. It is a little like a police state  here with huge presence of Border Patrol SUV's racing around and pulling people over and armed guards at random highway check points. Last week they spotted a guy on one of the hilltops just above the Visitor Center who was acting as a lookout for smugglers/illeagals. They brought in a helicopter and personnel and all means of nasty ways to capture him. We have seen the high tech balloons with radar hanging overhead, helicopters, and massive installations of cameras and infra red devices pointed at the open desert crossings. It is hard to believe that this is such a problem in this scenic place, but we are being cautious and even though it is beautiful and and not a lot of folks in the campground we will probably not stay long. We have a few more trails we want to hike and then we will move back north just to get away from all this aggressive war zone mentality.

We hope that all of you are having a good holiday season. We plan on meeting some folks we ran into earlier on our journey at Tucson Mountain Park for New Years Eve and then must make some decisions about our next move(s).  Best Wishes to All of You ......