December 9, 2009

I woke to another beautiful day today. I have been watching the storm track through eastern US and Canada so I won't say too much about the weather here. I couldn't resist taking a picture of the sunrise, though. Usually we see the sunset, so when I saw George, the Activity Director, out with his camera I realized he was shooting the sunrise and I ran to back to get the camera before it was too late.

We had a good turnout for our hike today; 18 people showed up. Our Hike leader, Terry, wasn't able to make it as he was under the weather. (somehow when you say 'under the weather' around here I don't think it has the same impact :) ) Some of us knew the Saguaro Lake trail so off we went. It's about 35 minutes from the park but the travel time is worth it. I noticed on this trip that you don't always see just desert scenes so I tried to take pictures which represented that view.

Saguaro Lake and the boat dock across the lake

Sometimes I get an unexpected bonus and take a great picture :-)

marshy area in the lake - favourite spot for loons
When we arrived at the trailhead to start our hike we had forgotton that each vehicle needs a Recreation Area pass. We had five vehicles and nobody had any passes! In the past we always had enough passes to cover whatever vehicles we had with us. Not today. It was too late to go back to Apache Junction so we took a chance and headed out. Everybody was pretty anxious when we arrived back in the parking lot but, no problems, nobody had a ticket. Hopefully at this time of year they're not as conscientious in their visits to the parking lot. Anyway, we dodged a bullet this time. Next time we'll check on passes before we leave the RV park.