Great day for a picnic!
Yesterday we went to Saguaro Lake for a day of exploring and to have a picnic lunch.  It was the first warm day in a week so was especially awesome.  It takes about half an hour or less to drive into the mountains and see this lake which is in the Tonto National Park.  We had purchased our national park pass and were good to go.  This is such a beautiful area and you could hike to your hearts content.

I could come here almost every day and never get tired of  it. It is a huge lake and there is a boat tour you can take all the way around the lake.  It takes about 90 minutes and they tell you history and interesting things about the area and the lake.  We decided to hold off on the boat tour so we can take Kylie with us when she comes.

 You really need to watch your step on some of the hikes here.  Two of the hikes were right along the lake on the side of the mountain.  Its very narrow and a long way down in spots.  We need to get some hiking sticks.  A couple of places along this trail required hanging onto branches which isn't Don's favorite.

 Look at the Saguaro cactus right up high on the mountain.

And the globe cactus on this steep side of the mountain.

 With the cooler weather and the rain we had a couple of weeks ago there was a hint of green especially under the trees.  This is the first time I have noticed grass in the desert.

 Hang on and walk carefully!

 This is a cactus root. It grew right on the edge of the mountain where the sand and rock sort of washed away so you could see the root.

There were a lot of coots on this lake.  There were a couple of other ducks also but I could not figure out what kind.  We also saw 2 golden eagles. Amazing!

 Look how the baby cactus grow under a shady bush.

Look how the silly lady loves walking around the desert.  When will I learn to take my sunglasses with me?

 Here's the gourmet picnic lunch. Notice the imported Cheezies.  All the way from Prince Albert, Saskatchewan.

And we had some company while we were eating it.

 We stopped at this spot on the Salt River and it had a beautiful sandy beach.  It runs out of Saguaro Lake. There were a number of fly fishermen out enjoying the day as well as this fellow. I could not resist asking him what the heck he was doing.  This gizmo is a magnet.

 He runs it back and forth in the sand.

 All the magnetic particles stick to the magnet

He puts the magnetic sand (iron) in a bucket.  There was not much in the bucket and it was very heavy.  He takes this home and heats it in a very hot oven.  He harvests the iron and discards the slag.  He uses the iron to make jewellery for his wife.  How cool is that?

Today we did our laundry, helped out our neighbours and then I went to my bird watching class. I was the only student today as the other 3 or 4 could not make it.  I got the teacher's undivided attention and it was fantastic.  He is a super nice "birder" and I learned a lot already.  We even took a 2 hour field trip.  This little park is about 2 - 3 miles long.  It is an area they put in some power lines and such in a residential area.  The park is about as wide as 2 yards and has homes on either side.  It is kept well watered and they feed the birds there.  What a great place to walk and enjoy and it is not far from our park!

There were so many bunnies.  Also ground squirrels and little chipmunk type critters.  We saw 3 kinds of doves, a hawk, hummingbirds, flicker, sparrows, and the peach faced love birds as well as others.

Look - it's a cactus wren nest.  They sure are big on sticks for such little birds.
WARNING - this next part is kind of sad but sometimes nature is kinda cruel I guess.

Can you believe this poor little love bird got caught in the cholla cactus.  It looks like he just flew right into it.  Don  (the birding teacher) said he never saw anything like it.  Those are mean cactus's and you do not want to get too close to them at all.

Also the peoples back yards back onto this park. Lots of them were giving away their excess citrus.  A lady gave us these tangelos. YUM

Don also went shopping while I was gone - got us some steaks too BBQ for supper and this peach schnapps for 5.49 .  I think its yukky but wow what a deal!