The next day all eight of us left early for the Boyce Thompson Arboretum.  I learned about this place from reading other people’s blogs, and although it wasn’t as good as the Arizona Sonoran Desert Museum,  we liked it a lot and felt at $12.50 it was very reasonably priced.  The trails are a bit convoluted, so we made Kat our navigator, and Lee was totally in the zone taking pictures.  Most of these flower pictures are his and he was using our macro lens (which I am always too lazy to pull out) to great effect.  The Arboretum started as a rich man’s private garden and grew into a large complex, which was eventually donated to the state.  We see this phenomena quite frequently in our travels and I always enjoy these types of gardens because they are a combination of plants and sculpture. 

What sets the Boyd Thompson apart are it’s location (it is surrounded by beautiful hills and rocky walls which become part of the scenery) and the collection of plants from arid regions around the world.  In particular I liked the Australian outback setting, and it was cool to see plants from there.  Kat, who is originally from England, has traveled extensively and it was neat talking to her about Australia, New Zealand, etc as we walked along.  I also really liked the cactus garden.  I was prepared to be unimpressed, we are surrounded by cactus everywhere here, after all, but the types and arrangements of the cactus were beyond anything I have ever seen and it was clear that particular care was taken with this garden layout.   I’ll just let the pictures speak for themselves.  This is a small sampling of what we saw, and I highly recommend trying it out if you are in this area.  Just go early, because it did get very hot around noon. We both took lots of pictures, because the place was incredibly photogenic, and we’re trying to make up for two months worth of gate-guarding posts. Plus, Lee’s mom loves flowers and all things green and growing!

 

 

 

 

I really liked it and they open early in the morning for folks (like us) who want to beat the heat.  Plus I was glad our schedules gave us time to do something with Bert and Kat.  They are seeing family in the area, Cori and Steve are working, and we all have overlapping travel schedules, so finding a day and time to hang out with all 8 of us was a little challenging. Steve actually took a vacation day to make it work, which was very nice of him!  After the arboretum, Bert and Kat went to see Bert’s niece, and the rest of us came back to the campground.  Cori and I planned a surprise party for Deb for her (REDACTED)th birthday, which is next week, so we decorated, baked and iced a cake, and surprised her when she came over for happy hour.  It’s nice when people are together for their birthdays and we decided this was definitely close enough!

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