A couple of weeks ago Jay, Jodi, @jarvie and I spent the weekend together in Tucson. We went to Kartchner Caverns, San Xavier, Saguaro National Park and the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum.
Here is a look at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum.
According to Wikipedia
The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum is a 98-acre zoo, aquarium, botanical garden, natural history museum, publisher, and art gallery founded in 1952. Located just west of Tucson, Arizona, it features two miles of walking paths traversing 21 acres of desert landscape. 1
It really was as great as people said. The ratings for a designation were the highest I had ever noticed with a 4.8 and 5 rating and 4-8,000 reviews!
Rating: 5 · 8,532 reviews
Rating: 4.8 · 4,458 votes
Botanical Garden
If you know me you will know that I went for the plants. The other things were very cool. I especially liked the garden eels and rocks. The plants are my favorite!
The gardens have 21 acres with two miles of walking paths through different habitats, such as the cactus garden, mountain woodland, agave garden and the desert grasslands. 2
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Zoo
There were many different animals through out museum. I loved seeing the cougar. It is so beautiful and that is the mascot for my alma mater- BYU.
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Stingrays
The stingrays have their own special area in the park, and when it is not restricted due to COVID you can pet and feed them. You may wonder, like most people, why there are stingrays in a desert museum. I learned that the Gulf of California (Sea of Cortez) flows through the Sonoran Desert making it the "lushest desert on earth" and there are stingrays in the Gulf of California. 3
I really liked this mural on the wall by the stingrays.
Aquarium
In addition to the Sea of Cortez there are also many rivers that flow through the desert. There are freshwater and salt water exhibits.
The best part of the aquarium were the garden eels! Fascinating little creatures.
Here is @jarvie watching them go up and down in the sand.
Walk-in Aviary
This walk in aviary looks pretty unassuming at first glance. Then you stop, stand still or sit down and you can hear and see some of the 20 species of birds including my favorite QUAIL! They are the cutest how they waddle-run.
My awesome traveling partners in the aviary.
I got a couple of pictures of birds, not in the aviary but thought this was a good place to share.
This is also a very cool bronze of a heron.
Natural History Museum
Like I said I was very interested in going to this place to see the plants. I didn't realize I would like the rocks and minerals so much. They were very cool.
Wulfenite
Malacite
It was fascinating to me how these could all be malacite and have such unique shapes.
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Ironwood Art Gallery
We went through the art gallery. There was a pastel exhibit happening. I didn't take any pictures.
Ocotillo Cafe and Bar
This cafe was amazing! I had a hard time deciding between the burger and steak. The server highly recommended the steak and I am so glad. I would drive to Tucson again for it. And then we had mango sorbet. A wonderful meal with great service!
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What a great day with some of my favorite people!
The beautiful Sonoran desert.
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I am always amazed at how colorful the desert can be when you look in the right places. Thanks for sharing this experience.
Thanks for your comment Wes. It really is beautiful.
Thats a whole different kind of botanical garden. Awesome. Those garden eels are super cool. Kind of bizarre creatures, how they all face the same direction
Yes, after watching for so long we figured they were facing toward the current and watching for things to float past them.
Hiya, @choogirl here, just swinging by to let you know that this post made it into our Honorable Mentions in Daily Travel Digest #1147.
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Thanks @choogirl.
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Wao !! @sjarvie5, How fascinating, how I would like to be able to visit that place. I loved your post.
I'm just starting to share my first post on this community and I'm fascinated by the posts I see