Our first full day in Tucson started off with “free” breakfast in the hotel restaurant.  High school cafeteria pancakes (or scrambled eggs) were served up with little sausages and a drink.  The hotel wasn’t properly staffed for a full house, with only one cook and two waitresses waiting for a whole hungry hotel of guests.  It took 45 minutes to get my “free” (it’s built into the cost of your room, “free” is a marketing gimmick) McDonald’s imitation pancakes and sausage and the most watered down orange juice I’ve ever had. 

The whole problem could have been averted by turning the situation into a buffet line (they had space behind the counter to rig it), but I’m sure some cost cutting executive noted that folks would “take advantage” of that.  Trust me, three tasteless pancakes are right about my limit.

Our plans had to change as the Air Force base is closed on Sundays.  We decided to swap our plans for today with Monday’s.  Our first stop was the Sonora Desert Museum.  Not much was happening as we were “out of season” to see any plants in bloom or most animals running around.  Most of the critters we saw were hibernating.  We didn’t spot a single lizard the entire time (lie! we saw one clinging to the top of the netting above the hummingbird room).

We did see a herd of Javalina’s (what? – a pig with black hair).

Because of the scarcity of anything with color (other than beige) I found this part of the day kind of a let-down.  The desert museum takes about two and a half hours to walk all the way through – but I wouldn’t recommend it in winter.

We decided to stop at Old Town Tucson for lunch, but when we discovered the admission was $17 (more than the museum, by the way), we collectively said “F – that!” and got back on the road.  We changed our original plans of going to El Charro for dinner and upped it to lunch.  Of course the portions were so big we ended up not even eating dinner anyway.

After eating we headed back out Speedway to Gates’ Pass to watch the sunset.  I convinced my parents to hike up the rocks on the smaller hill.

For the sunset we came back down and started up the mountain on the other side of the parking lot.  My parents wandered half the way up and decided to call it a day.  I kept going and watched the sun go down from a high cliff, alone in the quiet of the vast valley below my feet (or, below the rock below my feet).