Two More Days in the Sonoran Desert

Yesterday we drove north about 30 miles to visit Casa Grande Ruins National Monument. This is the remains of a large settlement built about 700 years ago. It dates from around the same time as the cliff dwellings in the Salt River basin.

This protective roof was built over the main house in 1932, replacing one built in 1903. There are workers repairing some of the walls in the large compound surrounding the structure.

These structures were all built from caliche, a mixture of sand, clay and calcium carbonate that was quarried near the site. It dries nearly as hard as concrete.

To support such a tall structure (35 feet) the bottoms of the walls were four feet wide. There is no reinforcement in the walls, they gradually tapered by having the outside surface curve in. The horizontal striping is from each section of caliche that was allowed to dry before the next layer was added. Timbers and smaller material woven together made the floors, which were also covered with caliche.

I was surprised to learn that the society that built this great house also constructed miles of canals to use the water of the Gila River to support agriculture. Among the crops they grew was cotton, which likes hot weather but also takes a lot of water. Cotton is still grown here today.

No one knows why they abandoned this place in about 1450, but evidence suggests that floods alternating with droughts made maintenance of the canal system too difficult. The O’Odam people (and other current groups) claim these people as their ancestors and some think when the bad times came they went back to a simpler and more sustainable lifestyle closer to the river.

Today we went to view the desert by itself, at Saguaro (sa-wah-ro) National Park. I was thrilled to see this ocotillo with leaves at the visitors center.

I was impressed with the density of plants here.

The saguaros were numerous and huge. Bud is in there at the base of one of them.

We visited a picnic area with this lovely stone shelter built by the C.C.C. I am amazed by how many of the parks we visit still have trails and structures built by the C.C.C. And all of their construction used local materials and so fits beautifully into the landscape.

It was nice and cool inside with a great view. How well thought out!

Even this old restroom (no longer in use) is picture worthy.

The desert can be quite stunning. Those are fruits on the top of the barrel cacti. We were curious how the one on its side could still look healthy.

It seems it has a couple of main roots holding on, and on the left side you can see a bunch of fibrous roots that are still attached. Hang in there baby!

We walked up an abandoned road where Matey was allowed to go and came as far as this vista.

Along the way we saw these small saguaros. Saguaro are more fragile when they are young. A study done in this park found that there were too few saguaro younger than fifteen years, so I was happy to spot these babies. Actually, these are probably somewhere around 10 years old, as these giants only grow an inch or so for their first six to eight years. They reach full height (40 to 50 feet) at age 150!

Although it was sad to see, I thought this saguaro dying in a mesquite tree made an interesting tableau.

On the way back from the park we stopped for a few holes of desert disc golf.

Even there we saw how hard organisms work to stay alive in the desert. Bud spotted this extensive root system unearthed in this freshly eroded gully, all attached to the very tiny plants on the surface.

We ended our day and our stay at Picacho Peak State Park with a meal Bud made from his find in Texas, Jamaican Curried Goat. With four kinds of peppers it was plenty hot, but it was good and the meat was tender and mild.

Tomorrow we move on.