Sun, glorious Sun!!

The sun here is really bright! Reporting in from sunny Phoenix (Queens Creek to be exact), visiting an old friend I hadn't seen in at least 10 years. So here's the short version of the first two days...

Met up with my girlfriend's husband in the airport as he landed 15 minutes after I did.

I am impressed that we recognized each other as we hadn't seen each other since their wedding,

14 years ago.

We all went to this great cowboy bar for dinner, sat outside with our own personal bonfire, live music, good food, fun atmosphere.

Yesterday it was just me and my friend and we packed in a full day.

This is the view from my friend's front yard.

We went hiking and these saguaro cactus were all over. They apparently grow an inch a year. This guy was probably 15 feet tall.

These are the Superstition Mountains.

See those "little" spires of rock poking up kinda in the middle? We hiked up around those. The park was called the Lost Dutchman State Park, named after a lost gold mine. Apparently people still hike up there thinking they will find the gold mine and become rich.

We spent the day in the Sonoran Desert.

Later we went horseback riding.

That's Stewart Lake behind us. We had a couple of trail nags, but the ride was really nice.

I'll  tell you more later, we're heading out now for another full day. Checking out the Heard Museum and the Desert Botanical Gardens. Hope I don't get sunburned!