Rock Knob Trail

Shriveled

We had a dry summer so the desert flora is looking pretty parched, some saguaros are pretty gaunt but visually I notice it most in chain fruit cholla. They are also known as jumping cholla due to the ease with which they attack passers by, but I like the chain fruit name since it highlights their most distinctive feature: their fruit grows in chains. Pretty shriveled up here but I like photographing nature in all its states, not just the pretty ones.

📷: Nikon Z 7II | Nikon 105mm macro
🗓️: October 30, 2023

Eight Peaks

I call this location Eight Peaks as in the distance on the right you can see the mountains known as Four Peaks with their closely spaced four peaks. On this rocky hill before us, the Four Peaks repeat in miniature form. Taken on the Rock Knob Trail with my shadow stretching out into the cholla, Bear’s shadow hidden by the desert’s own.

Weather Patterns

A week’s worth of weather in one picture. Rain turned the soft parts of the trail to mud that deformed under bike tires. More rain filled the depressions with water. Yesterday dawned cold and the water turned to ice, which either took on the color of the muddy water below or reflected the blue skies above.

Omnipotence

On Sunday a heavy cloud bank in the east snuffed out the sunrise but as I made my way back up the trail I was delighted when the sun poked through with such soft, diffuse light that it revealed every detail in the feathers of the birds and the spines of the cholla. I turned around and commanded the sun and clouds to hold their position for the next hour, just in case I had been granted the power of omnipotence without my knowing. Sadly I had not, though there’s always tomorrow. I was able to watch as the thrashers chased each other through the cholla, the black-throated sparrows chittered about, three cottontails poked in and out of the desert scrub, and sight unseen Gambel’s quail and Gila woodpeckers sang the Sonoran song. Just another magical morning in the desert.