The big storm is no big deal in Tucson. We got about half an inch of rain yesterday and expect another inch today. Most locals want more rain, and also more snow fo rMt. Lemon, a local ski resort.
This was an interesting week. We visited the Spanish mission at Tumacacori. Their website said they had docent guided tours daily at 11:00. Unfortunately, the Thursday docent doesn’t do her tour every week. The knowledge of the rangers we met was abysmal. They could point us to the bathroom, the museum, and a (not free) booklet. That pretty much exhausts what they know. Fortunately, the park service did a terrific job of explaining the site history in their signs. I was surprised how honest they were about the poverty of this mission. For example, they had a separate building used as viewing room (for the deceased). They didn’t have the funds to build the planned dome roof. My biggest surprise was to see flowing water in Santa Cruz river. Most of the rivers around here are dry most of the year.
Tumacacori has several interesting elements. It’s about 40 miles south of Tucson, not far from Nogales, Mexico. We knew we weren’t far from the border, but we were still surprised when we encountered a border patrol check point in the north-bound direction. An ICE officer stood in the middle of the two-lane interstate, looking at the faces of the people in the cars, and either waving traffic through or stopping it to check credentials.
I-19 is interesting in its own self. All mileage markers and exit numbers are metric (Kilometers instead of miles). I remember a very long time ago, there was a push to change the US to the metric measurement system. The effort failed. I-19 was built during the height of this speculation. They posted metric distances as an experiment. When the movement failed, all the signs were up. It might be the only significant US highway using metric measure.
Our last surprise was the best. We stopped at a small Mexican cafe close to Tumacacori, called Wisdom’s Cafe. This being a rather rural area, we didn’t expect much. But we got an excellent lunch. The current owners are the third generation to run the place. The have a desert they call a fruit Burro. It’s a fruit-pie filling in a deep-fried dough (a kind of sweet chimichanga). We selected the lemon-cherry flavor. It came with a huge scoop of ice cream. Ole! I am out of room for coffee cups, but this place absolutely must be acknowledged for it’s superior food and delightful surprises. Maybe I’ll start a virtual coffee cup collection.
Friday evening we went to a demonstration at the Sonoran Glass School. The artist made a glass dragon. It was quite amazing. If you are interested, you can find some pics on the website below this post.
Today rain chased us away from the planned living history exhibition at the presidio. Instead we spent some time at the local mall, followed by a very un-Mexican and un-historic frozen pizza for dinner.
I hope this finds everybody doing well.