During our most recent stop in Tucson, we took Millie, our housesitting hound, out on a hike through the Saguaro National Park. Spread out across two massive plots of land totaling 91,442 acres, Saguaro National Park is essentially split down the middle by the city of Tucson with an East and West side.
As we left the city limits that morning west, we watched with awe as each mile brought more and more Saguaros, until we were eventually completely surrounded by them! There are more than 1 million Saguaros throughout the park, and hiking through the desert with these giant 6 – 20 foot tall beasts looming over us was an incredible feeling.
While exploring one of the many trails, we came across these horses on one of the smaller trails, all tied up while their owners enjoyed a chat in the shade, escaping from the already burning morning sun. We’ve never really ridden horses, but were inspired by how amazing it must be to ride across the desert, surrounded by Saguaros, especially when they are in bloom.
Love Arizona. You two should try out horseback riding!
Yes, we definitely should! For some reason, we are both a little bit scared of horses 😀
Aahh.. we visited Saguaro National Park back in May and chilled in one of the stone huts until sunset. It was beautiful!
Pauline – aaw, I am so jealous! We wish we would have seen the sunset there.. we kept seeing it on postcards everywhere and it looked so beautiful! Well… next time! 🙂
Great shot!
Thanks, Andi!
Nice picture. I’ll be honest, I needed to Google saguaro.
Lawrence- to be honest, I had no idea what a Saguaro was, either – until we went to Arizona 🙂
Oh I got confused first and thought that the saguaros were horses. I was terrified by the thought of twenty foot horses wandering the Arizona desert.
You made me laugh so hard, Tom! 20ft horses, hahaha, I would have been terrified 🙂
I SO want to go to Arizona, the more I see the more I know I have to get there in the next year.
Oh, you will love it, Ayngelina! It is so diverse – the desert, cactei and old-fashioned Wild West towns in the South, and the incredible canyons (Grand Canyon, Canyon de Chelley, Antelope Canyon) in the North, and Route 66 plus some fantastic cities in between (Sedona!) Even though Arizona doesn’t have the most immigrant-friendly politics, we’ll always return, because we just love the scenery so much.