The Arizona Sonora Desert Museum was our adventure for today. This is a combination zoo, botanical garden, art gallery, natural history museum, and aquarium all in one. The temperature warmed up to around 70 degrees so it was no problem walking the approximate two miles of trail. We spent about three hours there.

Our first stop was at the Reptile House where we saw different kinds of rattlesnakes, scorpions, desert spiders, and other crawly things.

There is also a hummingbird aviary and another bird aviary, and exhibits on bats, birds, and bees. There are large cats and coyotes and wolves and javelinas. The bighorn sheep was the largest animal we saw. Unfortunately the only black bear they had died about two weeks ago.

Bighorn Sheep

Since the Saguaro National Park was just a few miles up the road we went to see that too. First stop is the visitor center.

Saguaro National Park Visitor Center

The Saguaro Cactus has been called the supreme symbol of the American Southwest and they are protected here.

We were losing sunlight as the clouds began rolling in. Looks like it might rain tonight.

On our way back home we noticed the traffic signs on I-19 were metric. km not miles, and the “mile markers” were in km as well. I Goggled it when I got home and learned that this roughly 60 mile stretch of highway, or rather 100 kilometers, is the only continuous highway in the US with metric signs. This is a relic of a failed Carter administration pilot program to try to get Americans to switch to the metric system like the rest of the world.

• Gasoline:  none
• Lodging:   free
• Admission to the Museum:  $35
• Admission to Saguaro NP:  Free with Bernie’s National Park Senior Pass