March in the desert

March found us traveling from the Little San Domingo Wash by Wickenburg to Quartzsite, and then back to Stanton, north of Wickenburg. Our new friends, Bob and Blanche, are from Oregon and were camped by us at Stanton then Wickenburg. Bob is very lucky as he suffered lung blood clots when they arrived at Wickenburg, but because they were close to the hospital in Sun City he was able to get immediate treatment and is doing well now. The metal detector club in Quartzsite had a coin shoot while we were there. We all stood around a football field and started looking for 8,100 coins at the sound of the horn. Ron and I won a gold nugget and found about 100 coins between the two of us. What a hoot! Bob and Blanche had fun, too, as Bob found more coins than all of us and also won a big nugget! The next day we went to Yuma to shop and stopped over to Algodones, Mexico – thought you might enjoy seeing the prices of meds there. Of course, flowers were blooming in Quartzsite, too – here are a few pictures of them. Back here at Rich Hill by Stanton there are different flowers blooming than in either San Domingo Wash or Quartzsite. Ron found a horned toad while metal detecting. And of course, I had to take a picture of cat claw – this stuff is almost as wicked as jumping cholla, the thorns are razor sharp and curved; Ron says it feels like putting your hand into a basket of newborn kittens who are all stirred up and yowling. He certainly has the scars to show for it!

Little San Domingo Wash

Southeast of Wickenburg is a gold district named San Domingo. We have been camped in the desert by the wash, watching spring arrive. Everywhere you look, there are Mexican poppies – Ron took my picture as I sat in them! The Gila Monster slowly waddled his way through the wash, allowing me to follow him with the camera. His little scales look like smooth beads. Although he is poisonous, he is SLOW and only if I stuck my hand in his mouth would he be able to get me. The other night a wild burro stood outside the camper and brayed, ruining my beauty sleep (and scaring me to death!) They must have really impressed the desert dwellers, because someone made a silhouette of a burro out of sheet metal and stuck it on a high hill. I decided to hike up to it to investigate – it had lots of graffiti dated back to 1975 and plenty of shotgun holes. Actually, it rather looks like a moose to me. Our camper is in the background. Here are a few more flower pictures. I looked up their names – the white one is desert chicory, blue one is a desert lupine, the yellow is called fiddleneck, the red is owl clover, and the pink is fairy duster. Yesterday I climbed up to a mine area which was just covered with poppies and purple flowers – here is a picture from the top. I could see to Wickenburg, a dust devil on the plains far to the west, and even 50 miles to Phoenix skyscrapers. An amazing place!