The 2014 monsoon rains

We had a very wet summer in the Sonoran Desert. It was the seventh wettest monsoon season since records have been kept. People that have lived here for 30 years says it the most rain they've ever seen. All those storms mean that there were some great photo opportunities, and on a couple of occasions I was even in the right place at the right time, and even had my camera with me.

A storm moved in while I was in Bulldog Canyon. I thought I had heard a screaming animal out there a couple of days before and had returned to find the body (but the only body I found was a dead saguaro). I have since decided that somebody is hunting mountain lions out there.

Great clouds mean some great sunsets.

I was out in the middle of a relatively flat area south of Florence Junction when I took this. You can see dust being kicked up on the left of the photo and a column of rain on the right.

This looked really ominous. I was worried I might be trapped in mud so I hurried to pavement. Turns out the rain never got to where I had been.

I stopped to get a picture of the rain falling on the Superstition Mountains and accidentally got a lightning bolt.

There was a great sunset going on at the same time in the other direction. I kept going back and forth across the road to get pictures of both.

It looks like it's probably raining pretty hard over there.

I hung around after sunset to get some lightning pictures.

This is a normally dry wash a couple of miles east of Tortilla Flat. There were some small waterfalls there but my pictures of them weren't any good. I decided I need to get an ND filter.

Yes, all the storms were great for pictures, but there were a couple of drawbacks, too. On several occasions I gave up on taking pictures because the bugs were so bad. Mostly they were gnats but once when I was on top of Lone Mountain some termites chased me away. Termites often swarm during the monsoon rains. Thousands of winged termites leave the colony to start new colonies. They have no interest in people but when there are so many in the air at once, the can't help landing on you. After a while it's just too creepy with all those bugs in your shirt (they always seem to fall into my shirt).

Just about every day, everywhere I went, there were nice clouds. This was taken northeast of Roosevelt Lake.

The other drawback to all the rain was, of course, the humidity. I decided to get serious about losing some weight this year and was frequently climbing Lone Mountain to burn some calories. The sweat dripping off my face created my own little salty rainstorm. It was a pretty mild summer temperature wise, though. There was only about one week when it got over 110. The humidity hung around long after the storms left. It was only during the past week that it seemed to return to normal. (I noticed because my knuckles cracked and bled when I made a fist.)

Winged termites leaving the nest. Photo taken on top of Lone Mountain.

I took a lot of pictures of Four Peaks from the top of Lone Mountain during the summer.

There were more flowers than usual during the summer.

One day I thought I was going to hike out to Apache Leap, east of Superior. There were storm clouds building over the valley but I didn't think they would affect me. Fortunately, I had forgotten where the trail was and wimped out because of the humidity. A very heavy storm moved through shortly after I got back on the pavement.

Even when it din't rain, there were nice clouds around. In order to keep burning calories, I was out hiking and getting pictures several times a week.

One day I tried to drive out to White Canyon Wilderness, south of Superior. The road seemed to be badly eroded by water, but the ocotillos didn't have leaves, and the ground was dry. Seemed very strange. Couldn't get to the wilderness so I went over to the Ray mine for a look and got a picture of this storm building. It evaporated shortly after I took this.

There are horses running loose around the Salt River. I suspect they were set free there by people that couldn't afford them any more when the economy took a dive. Anyway, I see their tracks all over the place but usually only see them at the river. I was wandering around Bulldog Canyon one day, a mile from the river, and came across 3 horses. Wouldn't wild horses run away from a human? These kept an eye on me but went about their usual business.

I climbed a tall butte near canyon lake. There were nice fluffy clouds all around. From on top you can see the Superstition Mountains, Four Peaks, Saguaro Lake, Canyon Lake, and lots of other landmarks. I got a nice 360 panorama. It's on my Panoramio page.

The only waterfall I've seen since I got the ND filter is by our pool.

I've come across several things I wanted to write a blog about over the past few weeks but didn't have time with all the hiking and picture processing. Maybe I'll catch up now that the sun sets so early.

A favorite spot in Bulldog Canyon

There's an area in Bulldog Canyon where I've always enjoyed hiking. The past few times I've been there, though, was during gnat season. The gnats were so bad they drove me out. The other day when I was trying to decide where to hike, I figured I should go out there before the gnats got bad this year.

There was rain to the north, but I had a feeling it wouldn't get close to me.

I'm going up there.

Unfortunately, the clouds would be behind mountains for most of this hike.

It had been so long since I had been out there, I didn't remember the best route. There's only one way to get where I was going, though. The landscape guided me where I needed to go. I just went the hard way.

I've tried to get up there several times. Haven't found a route, yet.

A cliff edge, and the edge of the rain clouds.

The clouds look ominous. I still wasn't worried.

I've taken a lot of pictures of this view over the years.

The rocks have lots of holes up here.

It seemed to be much easier to get up there than it had years ago. I think there are a couple of reasons for that. First, I stop more often to take pictures. Rest helps. Second, I've only been up there before in very hot weather. Hiking in 100+ degree weather in a place where you can't get out of the sun is difficult.

This is a very nice view. I usually relish the breeze that blows through this spot but on this day it felt a little chilly.

I finally know how to get a halfway decent picture of the holes in that rock.

There are fluffy clouds to the south.

That rock looks almost like a mail box.

It was a pleasant, bug-free hike. I think I've climbed higher years ago than I did on this hike. It didn't seem safe to keep going. Maybe I missed a turn I had made before. Click below for all of the pictures.

2014_02_01

Along and around A Cross Road

I went for a drive along A Cross Road and some roads that intersect it yesterday. I was planning to hike some, but my stomach decided that wasn't a good idea. So I just drove around getting pictures of the awesome clouds and some other desert stuff.

I like the way this turned out.

Along FR-88 I saw three saguaros with tires on them. In Texas the kids go cow tipping. I guess in Arizona they go saguaro tiring.

A "tired" saguaro.

Along NF-88.

I think this is my favorite.

Nothing exciting happened. No disasters. Nothing to write about. Click below for all of the pictures.

2013_09_14

Just too hot

One day last week, I was thinking I should go for a hike. It was 108, and I decided it was too hot to go for a hike. The next day I felt bad about being so lazy and decided I should go for a hike even if it's 108. It was 110. I decided it was too hot. The next day I felt bad about being so lazy again, but it was 112. I wrestled with the decision for a couple of hours and then decided to go out and at least get some pictures of the storm clouds. I stopped at the closest place where I thought I could get some pictures of a rainbow. It was flat and I just wandered around slowly getting various saguaros in the cloud or rainbow pictures. The temperature had dropped by the time I got out there, but it still felt oppressively hot. I think I got some nice pictures, though.

A cool storm cloud.

The rainbow.

For some reason, I really like this picture.

I like the way this one turned out, too.

I also got pictures of a cryptic sign and some lightning, but those aren't very impressive. Click below for all of the pictures.

2013_08_16

Ragged Top, and sunburned ankles

I read in the paper about a scenic drive just west of Tucson. It was too hot for a hike. Normally I don't go to places described in the paper on the same day they're in the paper because that's when everybody else goes. I braced myself for crowds and went anyway. It was a very humid day. The truck's air conditioner iced up after about an hour on the road. I ran it on recirculate the rest of the trip, once I got the ice cleared out. It didn't take long to clear it out with an outside temperature of 104.

This is Ragged Top, the main thing I wanted to see on this drive.

It was 109 by the time I got to the dirt road that goes around Ragged Top. I climbed to the top of a very small hill to get the picture above and was glad I wasn't going to be out there for very long.

Yes, it's hot, but there's dark clouds over the Catalina Mountains (which can't be seen here).

By the time I started going around Ragged Top, there were dark clouds approaching from the southeast. Tuscon always seems to get more rain that Phoenix during the monsoon rainy season. Phoenix often gets the dust blown out by Tucson's storms. I started to think I might get stranded by flooded washes. The rain is never as heavy as it looks from a distance, though.

My last picture of Ragged Top with sun shining on it.

It never rained while I was on dirt roads. I drove through some sprinkles on the highway on the way home. It was far from being the downpour I was hoping to see. Also, I only saw 2 other vehicles the whole time I was out there.

Now, about the sunburn. No, I didn't get sunburned again. Google searches for sunburned ankles seem to be one of the most common ways that people get to my blog this time of year. I thought I would provide some more details about my experience for those searchers. I don't think I was ever able to find any description or account that matched what I had experienced and I bet a lot of other people are finding the same nothing.

A few years ago, I had gone tubing on the Salt River and had smeared a highly touted sunscreen thickly on my legs, and they were still greasy at the end of the day. Maybe the chemical that blocks UV had washed out of the greasy stuff, though. My ankles were badly burned. Sunburn is painful, of course. It hurts if you bump it, it hurts to put clothes over it, it hurts if the sun shines on it, it hurts to take a shower, etc. But all those hurts are minor, trivial, inconsequential. Sunburned ankles are another whole level of hurt. I was fine until I stood up in the morning. I guess what happens then is that gravity pulls blood down to your ankles and they swell a little. Normally, that isn't noticeable. You certainly can't see it happening and you sure don't feel it. With burned ankles, though, it's excruciatingly painful. If a sprained ankle is a 10, standing up in the morning with sunburned ankles is an 8.5 or 9. Walking keeps the ankles from swelling as quickly. So I would get up and walk in circles in the bedroom. I would make 1 or 2 circles (less than 10 seconds on my feet) before I had to sit down and lift my legs up to get relief from the intense pain. Then I would do it again and again and slowly increase the time I could stay on my feet. After about 10 minutes of this I was able to stay on my feet long enough to go to the kitchen and eat breakfast. I think that the repeated standing allows the skin to slowly stretch as much as it's going to. Several times while standing at the counter fixing coffee or a bowl of cereal, the pain suddenly became so bad I couldn't even get to a chair, and just fell on the floor so I could lift my legs. I had to eat breakfast with my legs propped up on a chair. It was at least 45 minutes after first standing up before I could sit up long enough for the 20 minute drive to work. All day at work, I had to be sure to walk around at least every hour so it wouldn't become too painful to stand up during the day. All this went on for more than a week.

So how do you relieve the pain? I don't think there's anything you can put on your legs that will help significantly. I used some kind of moisturizing lotion with aloe. Maybe it helped, but going from 9.0 to 8.9 on the pain scale isn't a big deal. I thought about trying support hose, but I also thought about scraping my burned skin off trying to get the hose on and off, and I bet that would hurt. I started taking acetaminophen towards the end of the week and that seemed to help, but maybe I was getting better by then, anyway. I didn't take it sooner because I thought I might be allergic to it. Turns out I'm not.

I hope this lets some sunburned people know that their experience is not unique. Sorry I don't have a quick solution. Click below for all of the pictures.

2013_07_07