We are heading for a desert spring break. It seems like ages since we’ve done a spring trip to the desert. And I don’t know how long it has been since we were in Tucson – maybe 8 years! Our first trip was in 1994. I will never forget the trip. We had to change planes in Salt Lake City and we heard the news that Kurt Cobain, legendary Seattle musician had committed suicide. I remember rushing into our hotel to turn on the TV to hear the news. Grunge was such a part of city life in Seattle at the time.

We made a trek almost yearly to the desert to enjoy the spring wildflowers. We learned how to track the weather starting in October to know how much rain was falling and what the chances were for a Spring wildflower bloom in the desert. Some years we went in mid-March and some years even earlier. One time we were so obsessed we flew to Las Vegas and drove to Death Valley to see a one-in-a-lifetime bloom and then came back and needed to go again to catch the blooms in Tucson almost a week or two later. Crazy.

But for some reason we haven’t made the trek in several years. We decided early on to go. It ended up that timing wise we decided to go in early April. This is a little late for wildflowers and a bit early for cactus. Plus the desert has not received a lot of rain this year. But I have been following the posting on the blooms – we may still be in luck. Desert USA is still talking about blooms up near Phoenix and some cactus has started to bloom.

We have a nice rental in the Armory Park area near downtown Tucson. It sounds like an interesting area. The owners have been great to work with and it looks like it is well equipped and located. We’re planning on trying to make the most of our five days. We may drive up to Phoenix to see the Phillip Haas art exhibit in the Desert Botanical Garden. Bizarre but very intriguing. We hope to do a couple of walks in the desert in Catalina State Park and Saguaro National Park and a little nursery hoping and maybe a drive up into the mountains.

It should be a good break and spring will be busting out when we return and hopefully not endless gray rain.