The wash wasn’t running. Neither was the car.
Tag Archives: Phoenix
Rock Climbing
An ornate tree lizard climbs up a jumble of rocks at the Piestewa Peak Summit Trail in Phoenix Mountains Preserve.
Free Descent
While Yosemite’s El Capitan has been free climbed multiple times, this dragon is attempting the first free descent. Good luck, giant one!
Black Tips
A black-tailed jackrabbit is mostly obscured in the desert scrub but the black tips that dance at the top of its ears caught my eye.
In the Wash
Most of the desert washes I cross when I hike are fairly small but not so Apache Wash, there are signs as you approach warning you not to enter when flooded and the large debris scattered around tells you why. It was damp on the morning I crossed on my first visit to Phoenix Sonoran Preserve but the rains and thus the danger had long since passed the day before, so I and a pair of desert cottontails enjoyed the quiet before the sun came up.
Flight
On the trails my glimpses of jackrabbits are normally rather brief but this one I got to watch for a while as it casually moved through the desert, feeding as it went. It was aware of me and the others on the trail, mostly mountain bikers and hikers (none of whom stopped to watch). Our time together came to an end when the jackrabbit took flight as a loud plane passed overhead.
Good Morning
Sleepytime Down Southwest
A common side-blotched lizard closes its eyes as it hides deep in the crevice of a rock along the Apache Wash Loop Trail in Phoenix Sonoran Preserve. It was tiny even for a side-blotched lizard so I’m guessing it was fairly young.
The Green Web
The lightest of rain falls on a mourning dove perched in the middle of the green web that is the foothill palo verde.
Life in Miniature
An ornate tree lizard (I think) perches on the vertical face of a granite slab, the jagged top a miniature of the mountains that surround. We met on my first visit to Phoenix Mountains Preserve on the Piestewa Peak Summit Trail as it flitted about the rocks, each unique in appearance. I was especially delighted when it returned to this one and arched its tail to match the curve of the granite. I was not as deft on the rocky trail and didn’t make it to the summit, there was a place where the trail got a little too narrow and triggered my fear of heights.
Oh little one, that I could climb as you climb.
